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Penn State Coaches Caravan ready to roll in May The Penn State Coaches Caravan will visit three East Coast cities this spring, with football head coach James Franklin and athletic director Sandy Barbour ap- pearing at each of the three evening events. Franklin, Bar- bour, and other featured Penn State coaches will travel to three metros where sig- nificant numbers of Penn State alumni live and work, starting in New York on May 8. Two additional stops – Philadelphia on May 9 and Wash- ington, D.C., on May 10 – will com- plete the trip. Registration and pricing informa- tion will be available later this month. As a benefit of membership, regis- tration is open only to members of ei- ther the Penn State Alumni Associa- tion or Nittany Lion Club, and each member who registers can bring a guest at the member price. Each of the events will feature a meet-and-greet with Franklin, Bar- bour and other Nittany Lion head coaches during the evening recep- tions prior to the programs. Franklin will meet with alumni and fans and talk about Penn State's 2017 season that ended with 11 wins, a top- 10 national ranking and Fiesta Bowl victory, as well as preparations for the 2018 campaign. Also at each event, alumni, friends and fans will hear an update from Barbour on the Nittany Lions' na- tionally recognized 31-sport athletic program and learn more about the ac- ademic and athletic achievements of 800 student-athletes. Jointly sponsored by the Penn State Alumni Association and the Nittany Lion Club, this will be the sixth edi- tion of the Penn State Coaches Cara- van. ■ P E N N S T A T E F O O T B A L L >> that enjoyed comparable success. The symbols of that success – trophies, T-shirts, memorabilia – are everywhere, and the incoming class will see every bit of it. It's what they won't see, however, that has linebacker Jason Cabinda's attention. "It's obviously different for them. They didn't go through that rise, and that climb, and those adverse games where we were losing games that we felt like we really should have won," Cabinda said. "But they know. They know the history. They know what we've been through." The older Nittany Lions are counting on it. They're determined to see their struggles and intense effort translate into sustained excellence, not just a fleeting burst of success. The question of how to do so demands an examination of what it took to create the conditions in which sustained excellence is even a possibility. As each successive recruiting class passes through the program, the story of Penn State football changes, shifting from lived experience to memories and even- tually into stories passed down from one group to the next. Six seasons have now passed since Bill O'Brien first took over as head coach following Joe Paterno's ouster. The NCAA levied its sanctions, which were meant to hinder the program in every meaningful way, from recruiting to on- field performance. O'Brien weathered the storm for two years, then left for the NFL, creating a vacancy that was soon filled by James Franklin. The O'Brien era, particularly its sudden end, was in many ways a wrenching experience for a program that had grown accustomed to stability over the decades. But when Penn State takes the field this fall, it will be almost entirely without the players, coaches and support staff who lived through it. None of the players on the current ros- ter played a game under O'Brien, al- though five gave him their verbal commitments. All the players who suit up for Penn State this fall will have spent their entire college careers under Franklin's leadership. Here's how turbu- lent Penn State's past decade has been: Not since the Class of 2005 signed its let- ters of intent has an entire class ex- hausted its eligibility under the direction of the same head coach. DATE LOCATION VENUE RECEPTION PROGRAM May 8 New York Wyndham New Yorker 5:30 p.m. 6:30 p.m. May 9 Philadelphia Crystal Tea Room 6:00 p.m. 7:00 p.m. May 10 Washington, D.C. Marriott Renaissance Downtown 6:00 p.m. 7:00 p.m. S C H E D U L E O F E V E N T S BARBOUR

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