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Penn State's James Franklin Wants a Word With College Football

"I'm concerned for college football right now," the Nittany Lions coach says about the "no-win" decision QB Beau Pribula faced in transferring.

Mark Wogenrich

Penn State football coach James Franklin looks on from the sideline during the fourth quarter against the Washington Huskies at Beaver Stadium.
Penn State football coach James Franklin looks on from the sideline during the fourth quarter against the Washington Huskies at Beaver Stadium. / Matthew O'Haren-Imagn Images
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Beau Pribula, the now-former Penn State quarterback, attended the team's practice Sunday in State College, though he wasn't truly there. Nittany Lions coach James Franklin sensed it. They had talked for weeks about navigating the minefield planted by the NCAA and college football, the schedule it imposed and the "impossible decsion" that Pribula said it created.

A few hours later, Pribula announced that he would enter the NCAA Transfer Portal and leave the team before it begins the College Football Playoff. Penn State removed his name from the online roster. Everyone had to be clinical, though the emotional toll was palpable. Not at each other but with a system that required a college football player to make a career-changing decision that also affected his team at the season's biggest inflection point.

"That's why I've got so much respect for Beau Pribula," Franklin said Monday, "not just how he handled himself for the last four years during the recruiting process and since he's been on campus. But he came into my office, and we had multiple man-to-man conversations trying to find a solution that was in Penn State's best interests and Beau's best interests. And I think outside of both of our control, things outside of our control from a calendar standpoint, from an NCAA perspective, made that almost impossible to do."

That Pribula will transfer from Penn State isn't surprising, particularly after starting quarterback Drew Allar announced that he will return in 2025 for a fourth season. Pribula has two years of eligibility remaining and wants to play more than a boutique offensive role. Franklin and Pribula had this conversation over the past several weeks. That isn't what drives Franklin's concern.

It's the transfer portal window that is open from Dec. 9-28, concurrent with the first round of the College Football Playoff. Yes, players whose teams are competing in the playoffs have a bonus five-day window when their season ends. Theoretically, Pribula could have waited. Practically, though, he would have lost ground against fellow quarterbacks in the portal jockeying for the few spots at premium programs across the nation. If Pribula wants to contact coaches, conduct visits, choose a program and be on campus for the January semester, he could not be part of Penn State's roster for the playoff run.

Thus the "no-win situation" to which Franklin alluded. But, the head coach added, it doesn't have to be that way. Franklin then spent 6 minutes explaining how college football's timeline doesn't work for college football.

"We've got problems in college football," Franklin said. "And I can give you my word, Beau Pribula did not want to leave our program and he did not want to leave our program until the end of the season. But the way the portal is and the timing of it and the way our team is playing — and when you play the position of quarterback and there's only one spot and those spots are filling up — he felt like he was put in a no-win situation, and I agree with him.

"Number one, I hate it, most importantly, for Beau Pribula. I don't think it's in the best interests of the student-athlete. I don't think it's in the best interests of college football. But I think that's our challenge right now, right? Who is really running college football and making the best decisions for the student-athletes and for our sport as a whole? Beau should not be put in this position. Whether we don't play as many games during the season, whether we don't play conference championship games — which could equal things out for teams not playing them anyway — [we could] finish this season so it aligns more with the academic calendar for most institutions because that's part of this pressure as well. To have a transfer portal/free agency going on right in the middle of the playoffs, there's just a lot of things that don't really make sense."

Pribula, who spent three years in Penn State's program after a lifetime as a fan, now becomes a symbol of college football's lurch toward the future. Players have more freedom, money and influence in the game. They also have to deal with the game's error messages as it gets to a place with athletic department payments and contracts. And largely, they're guideless on this path.

Franklin wandered down the road of hiring a college football commissioner before pausing at some of the complications that might cause. The sport is regional and temperamental, and hiring a commissioner will prove to be a fight.

"I know there's been a lot of discussions about maybe a commissioner of college football, but I think it's pretty obvious we need that," Franklin said. "We need somebody running college football. We need somebody that is not biased based on a conference and that is out of the financial impacts of it as well, because if you're just making the decisions which are in the best interests of the student-athletes and college football, then I think you can do it. But if you're biased by a specific conference or if you're impacted by making all your decisions based on revenue and earnings, then we're never going to get to a good place."

Remember that Penn State will play its first game Saturday against SMU in the College Football Playoff. The program has pined for this moment since 2016. Franklin is pleading to discuss SMU, but college football wouldn't allow him that Monday.

"Beau grew up wanting to come to Penn State his whole life," Franklin said. "This is his dream school, and [he] had a phenomenal career here. And I just want everybody to understand that, most importantly. And why have we created a system where this guy couldn't finish this season with his team?"

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Mark Wogenrich
MARK WOGENRICH

Mark Wogenrich is Editor and Publisher of AllPennState, the site for Penn State news on SI's FanNation Network. He has covered Penn State sports for more than two decades across three coaching staffs and three Rose Bowls.

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