STATE COLLEGE, Pa. -- One week in the world of college football can lead to sweeping changes anywhere.
Just ask Tennessee, or Florida State or heck, even Mississippi State and Florida. The Nittany Lions lost a pair of coaches in the past six days and as a result, promoted Ricky Rahne to offensive coordinator on Friday evening, hired Phil Galiano to coach the special teams and brought back former graduate assistant Tyler Bowen to coach the tight ends. James Franklin, equipped with the running list of people he wants to work with, certainly looked ready to deal with the inevitable Joe Moorhead departure.
While sifting through all the coaching changes, new titles and familiar faces wearing maroon and white after just standing on the sideline in blue and white one week ago, here are some of my takeaways:
• Franklin must've had Rahne's promotion in mind for quite some time. How could he not? Every now and again the Lions' head coach will drop a comment here or there that seems like it has a little more oomph behind it, and when he was asked about his history with Rahne this summer he went all in, adding that Rahne had been "fiercely loyal."
"He’s a guy that I think can coach the running backs and has," Franklin said back in August. "Can coach the tight ends and has done so at a very high level. Mike Gesicki thinks the world of him and what he’s been able to do to help him develop. He can coach the quarterbacks. I think he’s a future coordinator."
Franklin knew Moorhead wouldn't be here forever and given Rahne's loyalty -- after all, he is someone Franklin always refers to as a "team-first guy" -- this move makes a lot of sense on a lot of levels. Not only will the scheme not get overhauled, but Rahne knows the players, and Franklin knows his new coordinator very well.
How loyal has Rahne been? Back when the two were at Vanderbilt, Rahne went to Franklin before buying a house, asking the Commodores' then-head coach if he'd be there long enough for Rahne's big purchase to make sense. When Franklin grew quiet after Rahne asked his friend and boss if he'd ever leave for the Penn State job, he knew his answer. He didn't buy a house in Nashville.
The Rahne family planned to purchase a house in State College this season and Rahne's young sons are seemingly always running around with Franklin's similar-aged daughters. The pair is that close, which is why if some perceive this as a gamble nobody knows more about Rahne than the guy who oversaw him 11 years ago when Rahne was a graduate back at Kansas State when Franklin was the offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach there.
• Just how has Franklin rewarded his loyal assistants? Well, this marks the second time he's promoted from within to fill a coordinator vacancy, first doing so with Brent Pry two seasons ago after Bob Shoop left for Tennessee. They've all added new titles as well, roles that come with more prestige and more money. That's how someone like receivers coach, offensive recruiting coordinator and now passing game coordinator Josh Gattis can continue bolstering his resume, making him a potential future offensive coordinator.
• There's a chance for there to be some longevity here between Franklin and Rahne. Well, as much longevity as one gets in college football these days. Rahne said before he sees all that Franklin does and doesn't have any head coaching aspirations. That -- for a man who fired one coordinator after two seasons at Penn State and then just lost another one after two seasons -- should be pretty appealing, too.
• There was never any formal announcement of Penn State hiring Galiano last March. In fact, a quick scan through the team's website archives makes no mention of the man until his hiring Friday night as the special teams coach and assistant defensive line coach. Well, since Galiano wasn't an assistant coach here last season -- rather a consultant for the defense, a detail his fresh bio page mentions -- he largely flew under the radar, but as soon as the Lions hired someone with as much experience as him it certainly seemed like they had something else in mind. With 17 years of coaching experience, including two in the NFL working with special teams, this seemed like much more than bringing in someone to oversee the defense from afar.
Clearly they wanted to stash him as the 10th assistant coach, getting a head start on that process before the Jan. 9 start date when this goes into effect. It's smart and they're surely not the only team that was proactive with this, either. And, the fact that Franklin mentioned that the Lions could potentially use that 10th spot on a special teams coach now lines up perfectly with Galiano's background and Huff's departure.
• I'll file this next item under things I'll never understand. There's seemingly no uniform thought process when it comes to who Franklin thanks or doesn't thank when a staff member departs. Maybe it doesn't matter because hey, they're all busy and things change all the time. But, there was a public thank you for Moorhead via Twitter from the Lions' head coach yet still as of Friday night there's been no public mention from Penn State regarding Huff.
Huff was even with Franklin on Wednesday during the in-home visit in Iowa for kicker Jake Pinegar.
Great home visit with my future coaches!?⚪️#WeAre @coachjfranklin @CoachHuff pic.twitter.com/zwKbyoq3ul
— Jake Pinegar (@jpinegar10) November 28, 2017
Huff recruited and landed Saquon Barkley. If that doesn't deserve a thank you in 210 characters or less then I'm not sure what does. Penn State has not publicly announced anything about Huff's departure, yet his Twitter bio has since changed and the Bulldogs sent out a news release Friday afternoon announcing Huff as Moorhead's first hire. It's more than official.
• You know who gets lost in all of these transactions? The players. It certainly seems that way after what Trace McSorley tweeted Friday in response to Florida State quarterback Deondre Francois who tweeted about being blindsided by Jimbo Fisher's departure.
I feel ya https://t.co/VUTOvXru5l
— Trace McSorley (@McSorley_IX) December 1, 2017
But hey, signing day is coming and we'll hear every coach in the nation beat the drum about being a family and family first. That's always the go-to line, right? College sports are a business and these coaching transactions happen so quickly often with 18-22 year olds left to figure out what's next and what the loss of the person they learned from means for their future.
• The good news for McSorley? Well, not only will this offense not drastically change, but Rahne was the coach who recruited him and they're very close. It was Rahne who showed up at McSorley's high school for a 7 a.m. workout to meet with a kid who other schools thought was a safety. Rahne was sold after the workout and reported back to Franklin and the Vanderbilt staff that they needed to offer this McSorley kid as a quarterback.
• Rahne's preference on game day is operating from up top in the sometimes not so cozy confines of a crammed booth. Taking on OC duties could throw a wrench in this though. Rahne went back and forth when he was the quarterbacks coach for Christian Hackenberg, with No. 14 wanting someone to talk to on the sideline between plays rather than on the headset. We'll see where Rahne calls plays from for the bowl game.
• If offensive line coach Matt Limegrover was headed with Moorhead that move would've been done by now, especially since the Lions' offensive line coach added the title of run game coordinator to his resume in the midst of all of Friday's staff changes. He wouldn't agree to a promotion and then bolt elsewhere. So, Moorhead leaves with one assistant, and we'll see how the rest of his staff shapes up.
• Someone has to coach the running backs for the bowl game. Barkley said he's all in, but for the time being he doesn't have a position coach. Also, how the Lions shuffle around the positions during bowl prep will be interesting. In many ways it's like they're getting a jump on spring ball by having these new coaches like Galiano and Tyler Bowen in place now as opposed to it happening after late December.
• The Bowen connections made him an ideal hire for the next tight ends coach. Heck, Franklin even mentioned him in the opening statement last week when rehashing his previous connections to Maryland.
Bowen worked under Moorhead for one year at Fordham, was a player when Franklin was at Vanderbilt and then was here as an offensive graduate assistant during Franklin's first year at Penn State. I remember reaching out to Bowen when he was at Fordham for a story I was working on when Moorhead was first hired at Penn State and Bowen raved about learning from Moorhead.
Franklin pointed out in his comment in the news release Friday that Bowen's familiarity with the offense is a help and that's spot on. Unlike when most coordinator changes happen and there's an entire overhaul for that side of the ball, that won't be the case this time around. Bowen knows it, Rahne knows it, Franklin knows it and so too do all the other players. Now, they just need a running backs coach.
• Penn State's recruiting won't be impacted by these departures, especially since running back Ricky Slade is still 100 percent committed, as his father told me on Thursday. The sooner they hire a running backs coach, or at least name one so Slade can meet him before the early signing period on Dec. 20, the better.
• Oh hey, lost in all of this is that bowl selection is on Sunday at noon on ESPN. I'm projecting -- just like most people out there -- that the Lions will go to the Cotton Bowl. I suspect there will be much more pageantry surrounding this trip than the Lions' last bowl game in Dallas, the forgettable Houston vs. Penn State matchup in the 2012 TicketCity Bowl.