Penn State football head coach Matt Campbell calls himself out after embarrassing loss to Northwestern
The Penn State Nittany Lions are now 3-2 on the year after losing to Northwestern in what was an embarrassing showing by Matt Campbell and his crew.
The Penn State Nittany Lions got embarrassed on Friday night against the Northwestern Wildcats. For a program with standards this high, that kind of performance will have fans asking what Matt Campbell is bringing to Happy Valley.
Penn State never won a National Championship in the James Franklin era. However, the expectation was always there to compete in every game and be a College Football Playoff contender. This team is far from that right now.
To be fair, it’s year one for Campbell, and the season is only a few games old. Still, it’s already obvious that Campbell’s team looks a lot different than Franklin’s teams over the last few years, outside of last season. That isn’t a good thing for the Nittany Lions.
Matt Campbell puts the loss on himself
Penn State coach Matt Campbell didn’t try to dodge anything after the game. He made it clear where he thought the responsibility belongs.
“I think the frustrating thing for me is the standard of what this program plays football with, the attitude, the effort, the toughness. We lacked it in every way, shape, and form tonight, and I put that, and I put a lot of that on me,” Campbell said.
That’s the right thing for a head coach to say. But, Campbell isn’t hitting the panic button either. He still believes he has the pieces in place to get Penn State where he wants it to go.
“We have the right human beings in that locker room, and we certainly have the right coaches in that locker room. The challenge will be getting ourselves aligned back to who we want to be, where we need to be, and fundamentally the team we need to be to be able to win,” Campbell said.
He may feel that way. It’s just not showing up on the field.
The No. 13 ranking looks like a mistake now
Here’s the thing about this Penn State team. Even during non-conference play, there were signs of trouble. The Nittany Lions won all those games, but there were stretches where it looked like this team would struggle once the schedule got tougher.
Some would say this was the No. 13 team in the country, so the concern was overblown. Looking back now, Penn State shouldn’t have been ranked there. This isn’t a very good team, and it has shown that against Big Ten opponents.
Penn State was up 17-0 against Wisconsin at home and still lost. Blowing a lead like that in your own stadium is bad enough. Then the Nittany Lions traveled to Northwestern, a program that frankly hasn’t been very good at football but is trending up, and they got embarrassed on national TV. It felt like Northwestern could have put up 40 points in that game. When you look at how the night went, it’s hard to argue that the Wildcats weren’t the better team in every phase.
Now, Penn State has to circle back and figure out what it wants to be. The offense is not very good. The defense is not very good. Put simply, the Nittany Lions are not a very good football team right now. So, how does Campbell attack the rest of this season? That’s the big question. Then there’s the bigger one: are major changes coming for the future?
That could mean just about anything. It could be the coaching staff, the quarterback position, or any other spot on the roster. It’s impossible to predict exactly what Campbell will do, and he may not know yet himself.
Either way, the standard Campbell talked about after the game is the same one fans are going to hold him to. Penn State has a lot of season left to show it can get back to that standard, and we will have to see if Campbell has the answers.
