Penn State head coach Matt Campbell has a tall task ahead as he officially starts his chapter with the Nittany Lions.
Campbell is coming over from Iowa State in the Big 12, which had limited recruiting resources, and he managed to keep the team competitive and produce winning seasons regularly.
While he did a good job of optimizing his limited tools, Campbell is entering the lion’s den in the Big Ten. Penn State has high expectations for its coaches, including National Championships, and demands more than a better-than-expected season.
Penn State is coming off a 6-6 season that saw the team drop three straight games early on, leading to head coach James Franklin’s firing and interim coach Terry Smith being put in his place.
Smith did a good job of steadying the ship, but Franklin quickly landed at Virginia Tech and flipped 11 Penn State commits to the ACC school.
During the early signing period, Penn State only signed two recruits, a devastating blow for the program, which will be limited and behind in terms of high school recruiting.
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During an interview with college football expert Josh Pate, Campbell focused on the kinds of players the program brings in, rather than the number or raw quality.
However, he acknowledged the tough choices he will need to make between tackling the remaining recruits and looking at the transfer portal.
“But I think the reality still comes down to whether we continue in this current cycle for the 2026 season and find the best high school guys that would fit us, or we build through the transfer portal,” Campbell said on Josh Pate’s College Football Show.
“It has to be about the character; it has to be about what we want this program to look like moving forward.
“And we can’t waver, we can’t collect talent, we’ve got to collect a football team and build a football team through talent acquisition, no matter how that looks and feels.
“And I think knowing that this is year one for us, we better make darn sure that every young man that comes in here is a young man that’s going to reflect where we want this program to go, the character, the standards of excellence, how we’re going to work.
“And we’re going to have to do a great job of that and not flinching from our morals in that aspect of it.”
In modern college football, the transfer portal can make up for poor high school recruiting, though it is only a short-term fix. Campbell can likely get away with two years of heavy portal usage, but he will need to establish firm roots in Pennsylvania soon.
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