James Franklin and Penn State haven’t played Pitt since 2019.
Franklin is probably well aware of this, and if he isn’t, there’s “always something there to remind him,” to paraphrase the band Naked Eyes.
Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi really wants to play Penn State, and made that clear again earlier this summer.
Franklin doesn’t show the same enthusiasm for playing Pitt, and Wednesday at Big Ten Media Days in loss Vegas wasn’t an exception.
WHAT JAMES SAID
Here’s what Franklin had to say about the possibility of playing Pitt.
“I love out-of-conference scheduling discussions. I’d be all about a discussion about Pitt. We have played Pitt nonconference, we’ve played West Virginia nonconference, we’ve played Auburn nonconference and had success in all of them. The good thing is we all have the ability to build our programs the way we see best. Coach has the ability to build his program how he thinks best, and we have the ability to do that at Penn State as well.”
To Franklin’s point, Penn State is 7-1 against those three schools under Franklin. The one loss came against Pitt in 2016.
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Franklin took the Pitt question and used it to rehash his thoughts on out-of-conference scheduling.
All the man wants is consistency.
“The thing that I struggle with is the same thing I’ve been talking about for a long time, and this doesn’t change: Everybody has to play the same number of conference games,” he said. “Like, this ain’t that hard. Everybody should be playing eight or everybody should be playing nine. I was in that other conference (the SEC) when that whole discussion about going to 9 games was voted on. Everybody should either play a conference championship game or everybody shouldn’t. Everybody should be in a conference.”
Franklin then brought up a controversial press conference moment when— while he was sitting right next to Notre Dame coach Marcus Freeman— he flat out said that Notre Dame should be in a conference.
“Everybody thought I was slighting Notre Dame,” Franklin said Wednesday. “I’ve been saying that for 10 years. If I didn’t say it in that moment when I was asked a question, I’d be a hypocrite. I’m going to say it now because I’ve been saying it the whole time, and that’s not a knock, but you’re asking a group of people to get into a room and decide the best 12 or 16 teams in college football, and you’re not comparing apples to apples.”
Penn State’s out-of-conference slate this season is Nevada, Florida International and Villanova, all at home. The Nevada game is scheduled for 3:30 Aug. 30
