How Penn State OC Andy Kotelnicki, TE Tyler Warren Transformed a Stagnant Offense

The creative play-caller has converted a hybrid receiver, quarterback and one-time center into the Nittany Lions’ CFP advantage.

Penn State tight end Tyler Warren does a little of everything for the Nittany Lions. / Robert Goddin-Imagn Images

The Penn State Nittany Lions were near the goal line in a game earlier this season, and they did what they normally do. They shifted tight end Tyler Warren to quarterback, with the intention of the 6' 6", 260-pounder taking a direct snap, smashing a hole in the opposing defense and scoring a touchdown.

But there was a stoppage before the play, which gave Warren the opportunity to suggest a variation on the play that would allow a teammate to score instead of him. Offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki vetoed the idea, knowing the most reliable route to the end zone in short yardage was with No. 44 carrying the ball. Warren ran it on the play, and sure enough scored.

“He was totally cool letting a teammate get a touchdown,” Kotelnicki says. “His humility comes through; he just exudes it. He’s a no-brainer team guy. It’s awesome.”

Coaches love it when their best players are also the least selfish, and Warren is that guy at Penn State. He’s also the manifestation of everything Kotelnicki was hired to do with the Nittany Lions.

“When Andy Met Tyler” has been the bromance hit of 2024 in college football. The marriage of first-year coordinator Kotelnicki’s creative mind with Warren’s seemingly infinite skill set has been kismet from the start for Penn State, helping them reach the quarterfinal round of the College Football Playoff. And there may well be more to come.

“Our only limitation is the imagination with this kid,” Kotelnicki says.

How many ways has Kotelnicki deployed Warren to destroy opposing defenses? Let’s try to count them.

There are his conventional tight end duties, where the hulking specimen is a highly effective blocker in the running game. 

There are his receiver talents that make him a matchup nightmare—splitting out wide, lining up in the slot, playing H-back out of the backfield, whatever. Warren’s 92 catches rank second in school history for a single season, and he’s within reach of the record of 97. The previous Penn State tight end record was 57.

There are his abilities as a short-yardage sledgehammer, carrying the ball out of the Wildcat formation 24 times for 197 yards and four touchdowns. “He imposes his will in the running game,” says Boise State Broncos coach Spencer Danielson, who is next up to try to stop Warren Tuesday night in the Fiesta Bowl.

There is also the threat of Warren as a passer. The old high school quarterback has completed 3-of-6 passes this season for 35 yards and a touchdown.

And he even punted once this season, against the Minnesota Golden Gophers. It wasn’t great—16 yards—but add it to the list of potential options when Warren lines up in the backfield.

Kotelnicki has made his mark in his first season with the Nittany Lions. / Matthew O'Haren-Imagn Images

“It’s just a lot of different ways that we like to use him, and also which makes him difficult to defend,” head coach James Franklin says. “Because as a defensive coordinator, you don’t know where he will line up. If the threat always lines up in the slot or always lines up in a three-by-one to the single side—if you always know where the receiver or the threat lines up, it makes it easier to defend the guy. But when he can line up really anywhere on the field, it makes it very challenging.

“His physical skills, his athletic skills and his intelligence allows us to use him in a ton of different ways and combine all of those things we have done throughout his career and do it all in one year. And sometimes all in one game.”

Warren is doing much more now than he did his first three years at Penn State. He was an occasional short-yardage runner during the first half of his freshman season (six carries, two touchdowns) but logged no rushing attempts as a sophomore or junior. He hadn’t thrown a college pass until this season. And he was not a focal point in the passing game until 2023, when he shared the tight end position with current New York Giants player Theo Johnson.

Kotelnicki’s arrival unleashed the beast—and the entire offense.

After scoring a combined 27 points in yet another round of losses to Ohio State and Michigan last year, Franklin had seen enough. He fired Mike Yurcich, then hired Kotelnicki away from the Kansas Jayhawks. Kotelnicki came up through the small-school ranks—playing at Wisconsin-River Falls and then coaching at Western Illinois, his alma mater and the University of Mary before hooking on with Lance Leipold at Wisconsin-Whitewater. He followed Leipold from there to Buffalo and on to Kansas. 

After helping transform the Jayhawks, Kotelnicki gained a national reputation. Franklin’s sixth offensive coordinator hire at Penn State has been his best; the improvements have been evident.

Penn State’s yards per play has jumped from 5.6 to 6.7. Yards per rush are up from 4.7 to 5.3; pass efficiency is up from 139.41 to 159.04; explosive plays of 20 yards or more are up from 47 to 67. Quarterback Drew Allar is an improved player in a less constrained offense.

But the biggest single beneficiary of Kotelnicki’s arrival is Warren. He was made for a multifaceted role.

Warren’s 92 receptions are the sixth-most in the nation. / Matthew O'Haren-Imagn Images

A basketball and baseball player growing up in Mechanicsville, Va., his coach at Atlee High School made the smart decision to put his best (and biggest) athlete at quarterback. The highlights from those games are almost comical, with the gigantic Warren shrugging off tacklers like small children.

“I was just a running back who threw it sometimes,” Warren says of his high school QB days.

Now he’s a tight end who runs it and throws it sometimes. Warren finished seventh in the Heisman Trophy voting and was the most versatile player this side of Heisman winner Travis Hunter. He might also end up being the first tight end taken in the NFL draft.

“When we were game-planning against SMU and Penn State, I made a lot of calls,” Danielson says. “Everybody I talked to who played Penn State has brought him up. Then diving into the film, he’s even better. He’s a generational talent.”

For Kotelnicki, figuring out all the things he could do with Warren was an evolution. It wasn’t obvious in spring practice, or even in the early days of preseason camp. Warren didn’t run the ball at all in the first two Penn State games—though his 146 receiving yards against the Bowling Green Falcons in Week 2 were a preview of coming attractions.

“He’s a physically impressive person, obviously,” Kotelnicki says. “Over the course of time you recognize how athletic he is, how easy he is to coach, and it just allows you to do all this kind of stuff. You start to play some games and it’s like, O.K., here it is.”

In Penn State’s third game, Warren threw his TD pass. In its fourth game, he scored his first rushing touchdown. By Game 6, at the USC Trojans, the Nittany Lions needed him to be a superstar.

Warren turned in one of the best games by any player all season. He set an NCAA tight end record with 17 receptions, and his 224 receiving yards are the second-most in Penn State history. He also completed a pass for nine yards and ran once for four yards to convert a third down.

The Nittany Lions needed all of it to pull out a 33–30 overtime victory—a loss there might have meant missing the playoff. Thirteen of Warren’s catches came in the second half and overtime, as Penn State battled back from a 20–6 deficit. The best of them came on a play that showed exactly how creative Kotelnicki can be.

It started with Warren at center, snapping the ball as a legal receiver on the end of the line of scrimmage—the rest of the linemen were to his right. He snapped it to backup quarterback Beau Pribula in the shotgun, who then fired a lateral to Allar lined up as wide receiver. Allar then went deep to Warren, who leaped over a USC defensive back to make a spectacular catch. 

“If you’re going to do all that, it better work,” Warren says. “I had to make the catch.”

This was the stuff of flag football. Running it with a Big Ten game on the line, down two touchdowns, was bold.

“We just worked through it as an offensive staff to come up with that,” Kotelnicki says. “It was something we had repped for about two weeks. It was something that had been stewing for a little bit and we finally said, ‘O.K., let’s call it.’ ”

Warren later told Kotelnicki, “That’s got to be the first time that’s ever been done.” Kotelnicki thinks it might be.

When a creative coordinator gets together with an elite all-around talent, unprecedented things can happen. We’ll see what Andy Kotelnicki can dream up next for Tyler Warren.