When they were high school seniors in January 2014, Trace McSorley and Grant Haley were all set to play college football for James Franklin.
At Vanderbilt.
But very soon after Franklin took the Penn State head coach’s job on Jan. 11, 2014, both McSorley and Haley decomitted to Vandy. And committed to Penn State.
Most of all, though, they stayed committed to Franklin.
That loyalty paid off for all of them on Saturday, when the two Penn State juniors played huge and pivotal roles in the Nittany Lions’ 24-21 upset of No. 2 Ohio State in Beaver Stadium.
MORE THAN A TRACE
McSorley, Penn State’s first-year starting quarterback and a junior with sophomore eligibility, threw and ran for a touchdown in his third straight game to lead Penn State to 17 consecutive fourth-quarter points. He ran 19 times for 63 yards and a 2-yard touchdown, where he outraced the Buckeyes to the east side goal line pylon. He completed just 8 of 23 passes, but they went for 154 yards, with completions of 35, 34, 26 and 20 yards – the last a 20-yard TD reception by Chris Godwin in the second quarter.
When McSorley, who was 55-5 and gained over 12,000 yards of total offense as a starter at Briar Woods High School in Virginia, switched his allegiance to Penn State he knew that the incumbent quarterback was Christian Hackenberg, coming off a stellar Penn State freshman season where Hack threw for almost 3,000 yards, with 20 touchdown passes. McSorley came anyway.
On Saturday, especially, he was glad he did. Same goes for Franklin. Obviously.
Given their recruiting history, McSorley knows Franklin better and longer than almost any of his 100-plus teammates, so his POV of the win – and Franklin – is unique.
“I think it was huge for him in that he cares so much about this program,” McSorley said after the game. “He knows how hard every single one of us comes in to work. He loves all of us. For him to see all of our hard work come to a culmination was huge. He sets the tone for the work ethic. He works harder than anyone else. For him, it was such a relief to see the hard work pay off.”
McSorley said Franklin has the same “It Factor” now that the coach did when they met several years ago.
“When you talk to him – throughout recruiting and even now – he’s one of ‘those guys,’” McSorley said. “He has something different about him, is the best way to say it. I’m not sure what it is, but he makes you believe in the process. He makes you believe in what you’re doing. That’s the big reason I was able to follow him. Just like that” – McSorley snapped his fingers – “on the drop of a dime.”
NOTHING FOR GRANTED
It was Haley who made the play of the day on Saturday. He scooped up Marcus Allen’s block of an Ohio State field goal attempt and raced 60 yards for a touchdown that gave Penn State the lead – and ultimately the win – with just 4:27 left in the game.
A junior cornerback who played at The Lovett School in Atlanta, Ga., he switched his commitment to Penn State from Vanderbilt the same time that McSorley did, just a week after Franklin was signed by Penn State and within a day of the high school seniors’ official visit to PSU. Haley already possessed some Penn State ties; his mother, Carla Neal-Harley was a Penn State undergrad who ran track and field. “I’ve seen WhiteOut games before,” he said on Saturday. “My mom was a Penn State fan.”
Haley, for his part, is a big Franklin fan.
“The moment I’ll always remember was seeing Coach Franklin after the game and seeing the tears come out of his eyes,” Haley said, “because you could see how much it means to him and how much he cares about us. I gave him a big hug. That was the moment, with everything that has happened to us these last few years, that made it all worth it. He’s our head coach. We’re going to win for him and fight for him until the end.”
Other Penn State players who originally committed to Vanderbilt when Franklin was there, but then flipped to Penn State included offensive linemen Brendan Brosnan (Park Ridge, Ill.) and Chance Sorrell (Middletown, Ohio), as well as cornerback Amani Oruwariye (Tampa, Fla.).
And then there are the 10 members of the Penn State football staff who worked for Franklin at Vanderbilt, ranging from defensive coordinator Brent Pry, who was a defensive assistant at East Stroudsburg University when Franklin played quarterback there, to Dwight Galt, Penn State’s assistant athletics director of performance enhancement. Galt was with Franklin at Maryland for eight seasons, when Franklin was an assistant with the Terps, as well as through three-year stints at Vandy and Penn State.
For a complete look at The Vandy Ten, who I profiled in April, click here.
PRY FROM VANDY
Credit Pry, who slid into the defensive coordinator’s position when Bob Shoop left for Tennessee in the offseason, as the architect of a Nittany Lion defense on Saturday that held Ohio State to four touchdowns below its season average of 49.3 points.
“Our defense is unbelievable. I’ve been telling you guys for three years that this Brent Pry guy is pretty good, and he stepped up,” Franklin said. “We lost seven linebackers this year, for long periods of time. And our defense just kept grinding and grinding, making no excuses, and just playing.
“I’ve known Brent Pry for my entire coaching career; his dad was my offensive coordinator. I am so happy for that guy.”
Taking nothing for granted, there was more than a trace of pride in Franklin’s voice. Justifiably so.
