Battista: Perspective and Perseverance for Penn State Football

This is my appeal to all my fellow Nittany Lion football fans to take a chill pill and put things in perspective before you have a nervous breakdown with regard to this current football season.

It’s time to ignore all the social media “critics without credentials” who are calling for Coach Matt Campbell (CMC) to be fired. Enough already; give the man a chance. I am in this for the long run and I for one anticipate that CMC and his staff will persevere if given time.

Obviously, we would’ve all liked the outcome of the past few games to be different. But if we are going to be true fans, then we need to keep things in proper perspective. Let me start by reminding everyone that Coach Joe Paterno‘s record in his first season as head coach at Penn State was 5-5. 

My wife and I recently started watching the ESPN documentary on Nick Saban. Coach Saban’s record in his first season as head coach at Michigan State was 6-5-1. His first season at Alabama? A pedestrian 7-6.  The legendary Bear Bryant was a mere 5-4 in his first year at Alabama.

When you keep the careers of the top college football coaches of all-time in perspective — such as Bryant, Woody Hayes, Tom Osborne, Bobby Bowden, Paterno and Saban — every one of them had pretty mediocre starts to their careers. It’s not just limited to football coaches, as Mike Krzyzewski at Duke stumbled out of the gate before going on to his spectacular successes with their basketball team. They each had their perceived strengths and their perceived weaknesses. Time does not allow me the ability to dissect this subject further, but suffice it to say, every one of these legends has some scars associated with them somewhere during their illustrious careers. Perspective matters.

My wife and I attended the White Out game at Beaver Stadium against the University of

Southern California (USC-CA) on Oct. 10. I have to distinguish that USC because where I now live in Bluffton, South Carolina, USC is known as the University of South Carolina (USC-SC) Gamecocks. Having just attended a game at USC-SC in Columbia, I was asked by one of my friends who hosted us, “Does it get this loud in Happy Valley?!” Being a gracious guest, I had to acknowledge that the USC-SC crowd was indeed extremely loud and enthusiastic. Maybe as loud as any other college football stadium that I’ve been to outside of the 16801 Zip Code. 

Taking into account my obvious bias and loyalty to Dear Old State, the crowd noise inside Beaver Stadium, especially for a White Out game at night, is undoubtedly the loudest and most raucous I’ve personally experienced. I have been to over 40 college and pro football stadiums between and nothing has compared to what I have experienced at our Penn State White Out games.

My take on the White Out loss to USC-CA? The atmosphere at the game was awesome. They announced a crowd of over 114,000 at the game. To quote SNL’s Kenan Thompson, “I don’t know about that!” As bad as the game on the field seemed, we were in it until the very end. Yes, Coach Campbell may have been out-coached, especially giving up timeouts by getting duped by USC-CA Coach Lincoln Riley. That was really disappointing. However, I firmly believe that they need to change that rule of letting the defense take their time after the offense makes a substitution. They should give the defense the delay of game penalty if, in the judgment of the officials, they are clearly taking their good old time. 

Even so, I’m still giving CMC grace for getting hired late and not getting to recruit the transfer portal. That wasn’t his fault. I’m more than willing to see what he does with his first true recruiting class and shot at the transfer portal. I am prepared to give CMC and his staff time to make the adjustments to get us back on track. For those who believe we shouldn’t have moved on from Coach Franklin, please understand that that ship has sailed. If you’re paying attention, Virginia Tech has lost its last two games to teams it should have beaten. You can’t use the argument that we are losing to Big Ten teams with Big 12 talent and not apply that same mentality to Coach Franklin at Virginia Tech who arguably took Big Ten talent with him that can’t beat ACC talent. 

Interestingly, I just spoke to the May River High School Football team in my capacity as their Fellowship of Christian Athletes representative on this very subject of perspective and perseverance. They have a first-year head coach, too. He’s implemented a whole new system, and as expected, there have been some growing pains. I know I didn’t always have the answers after 19 years as a head coach of the Penn State ACHA hockey team and I sure as heck didn’t in my first season when I coached at Penn State. I think the biggest improvement I experienced as a head coach of both the Pittsburgh Junior Penguins (1982-85) and then the Penn State Icers (1987-2006), was from year one to year two.

None of us knows how Coach Campbell’s career at Penn State will ultimately turn out, but I for one am going to give him grace for this first season regardless of how it finishes. How can he realistically be judged based on such a small sample size especially in the NIL/transfer portal era? Whether you call it trusting the process, setting the standard or building the culture, all of it takes time. Unfortunately, in the social media driven world we live in and the NIL/TP era, everyone wants it all and they want it now. 

So, I am again appealing to my fellow Penn State fans to keep this season in perspective and allow for perseverance to play its role in how we judge whether or not CMC is the right man at the helm. Having met him and having had the opportunity to speak with him personally, I remain bullish on CMC and what he will bring to the Nittany Lion faithful.  Give the man a chance, and keep the faith. We are!