Blue White Illustrated

T H E B I G P I C T U R E when they choose the Nittany Lions over the likes of Ohio State or Alabama or Clemson, it tells you something about how the program is being perceived by the constituency that matters most. Right now, that perception appears to be overwhelmingly positive. In choosing the Nittany Lions over Ohio State, de- fensive end Jayson Oweh said, "I think we can do something really big there. [The previously committed recruits] have been telling me we'll have a chance to do something special and take Penn State to the next level." Juice Scruggs is an Ohio native and even shares a home- town with Urban Meyer – Ashtabula – yet he still picked the Lions over the Buckeyes. Pat Freiermuth was being pursued by Alabama and many others and even got a text from a Crimson Tide coach while attending the Lasch Bash barbecue. But he, too, will be wearing blue and white for the next four or five years. And then there's Micah Parsons. Ac- cording to Rivals, he's the nation's sixth- leading recruit, regardless of position. His offer sheet bears out that assessment, as it includes 22 schools, including elite schools from all of the Power Five confer- ences: Penn State, Ohio State, Michigan, Alabama, Georgia, Clemson, Oklahoma and Southern Cal, among others. Landing Parsons wasn't easy. Penn State had him, then lost him, then got him back. The story of his recruitment was too convoluted even for the lengthy news conference that Franklin gave on the first day of the early signing period in December. "You're going to have to wait until the book comes out," he said. "I've been coaching 23 years, and the book will probably be five chapters on my career and then 15 chapters on the ups and downs and twists and turns, and the journey of Micah Parsons. The sec- ond-guessing, and all the people that felt like they had an opinion in this and what he should do or shouldn't do. "Fortunately for us, at the end of the day, we built a strong relationship with his mom. We built a very strong rela- tionship with his dad by the end of the process, with the high school coach, and a bunch of people in that community. "So it will be in my memoirs when I'm retired and hopefully sitting on a beach somewhere, writing my book – or recit- ing this to someone else to write the book. He will have a number of pages in it." Since Franklin's arrival in 2014, the Nittany Lions' recruiting success has tracked with the overall state of the pro- gram. There was a burst of excitement when he was announced as Bill O'Brien's able to come in and play as a true freshman, which is unusual at that po- sition. And from what I'm hearing about Culpepper and Hawkins, they are approaching it the same way. So we'll see. On the offensive side of the ball, you know, we're obviously losing some tremendous wide receiver production, but being able to go out and get [Justin] Shorter and [Jahan] Dotson and [Daniel] George, I feel really good about those guys having the opportunity to replace some of the production we lost, or at least help compete at that position. Losing [Mike] Gesicki and going out and getting [Pat] Freiermuth and [Zack] Kuntz, who we are really excited about, I think helped us with some of those losses. And then obviously [it was important] to go out and get another high-level quarterback to continue to develop our depth there for competition for the fu- ture when Trace [McSorley] leaves. Obviously, it's hard to ever say you're going to replace Saquon Barkley, but I think what you do is that you try to do it at every position to make up for the loss of Saquon. But [Ricky] Slade is a highly regarded guy who was very productive in high school. And then obviously on the offensive line, we got Nana [Asiedu], who is at tackle, [Rasheed] Walker, who is a tackle, [Bryce] Effner, who I would char- acterize as one of those swing guys, a guy who could play guard or tackle, and then [Juice] Scruggs, who we think could play center or guard. So I feel like we addressed a lot of our needs. We probably would have liked to have been able to take another safety in this class. We probably would have liked to take another wide receiver in this class. But besides that, I think for the most part we did very well. ON THE EARLY SIGNING PERIOD We approached it like a lot of programs across the country, and that was that the first signing period was going to be the signing period. If you look across the country, I think the number was pretty high, like 85 percent of the prospects signed in the first signing period. I think that's how it's going to be. The way most people were approach- ing it, if you didn't sign in the first signing period then you weren't really committed and they were going to move on. So for us, we really didn't have a whole lot of question marks out there. We re- ally only were hoping and waiting for one signature today. That's what we were expecting, and it worked out that way. So feel really good about that. The area where I think there's a little bit of concern across the country – and I know specifically in Happy Valley – is with the early [official] visits. I get it and I understand why, and I think you can really make an argument being in Big Ten country that being able to bring guys here when the campus is warm and there are flowers and all those wonderful things [is beneficial]. I think you could make that argument. But I also want to make sure that we're able to spend enough time with our current players and develop them and then also spend time with our own families. I get the early visits. I wish the window was a little bit smaller. I just worry about how that's all going to play out. ■ C L A S S O F 2 0 1 8

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