Franklin sees future coordinator in his tight ends coach

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- The road to the top of the coaching ranks is long and winding, so unpredictable that Ricky Rahne still hasn't bought a house here -- and for good reason.

"I'm in the process," Penn State's tight ends coach and passing game coordinator said with a laugh. "My wife gets on me every day. My wife is from Pittsburgh and to me this is the greatest place in the world because my wife is happy here. If my wife is happy, I'm happy. I work a lot so wherever she's happy, I'm happy."

Nothing in the coaching profession is permanent, but for Rahne, whose coaching career has been intertwined with James Franklin, dating back to 2006-2007 at Kansas State when Rahne was a graduate assistant and Franklin the offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach, this place certainly has proven to be more than just another stop along the way for both. That's more than Rahne could say as a GA who scrambled to get the playbook in order and just make it day to day and more than Franklin could say when Rahne asked him at Vanderbilt if he saw himself as the head coach there forever.



"I asked him, 'Hey, are you thinking about being here forever because I'm thinking about buying a house,' " Rahne recalled. "He said, 'Yeah.' I said, 'What if Penn State opens up?' He got real quiet so I kind of took that as maybe I shouldn't buy a house."

Rahne didn't buy a house in Nashville and since arriving with Franklin at Penn State has coached the quarterbacks and even served as the team's play caller in the TaxSlayer Bowl after offensive coordinator John Donovan was fired prior to the game. Rahne coached the running backs and tight ends at Kansas State, the quarterbacks at Vanderbilt -- where he also was the lead recruiter on Trace McSorley -- and then shifted to tight ends coach/passing game coordinator after offensive coordinator Joe Moorhead came on board last season.