New Penn State HC Matt Campbell could have left Iowa State a bunch of times.
In one coaching cycle alone, Campbell reportedly received interest from six NFL teams, and that leaves out the college programs that wanted him.
That’s what happens when a coach turns Iowa State from a laughing stock into a formidable operation.
In the 39 seasons before Campbell arrived at Iowa State, the program had eight winning seasons.
In the 10 seasons Campbell was there, he matched that.
When those things happen, the guy who leads the turnaround gets recognized.
By March 2020, Campbell had made Iowa State a winner, with three consecutive winning seasons.
Then, the COVID-19 pandemic took over the world, and Campbell, like everyone else, started to see things differently.
“I became a head football coach at 31 years old,” Campbell said Monday during his introductory press conference. “I was drinking out of a firehose to be honest with you. Until COVID hit and then you had this grace period. You usually don’t get that until they fire you.”
Campbell had the advantage of gaining perspective without losing his job.
“You’re sitting at home that spring and I remember looking at my wife, we had four children at the time and I said, this is what’s going on at home? It was humbling, to be honest with you. I think we came out of COVID, and for us, one of the things that really gave me perspective, because I think I was the guy that, man, do I want to bounce around, do the next big thing? I said no, you better have some priorities in your life.”
Campbell then outlined those priorities.
“Number one, if you are ever going to leave or move, it better be about your family,” he said. “We’re two-and-a-half hours away from home (in State College). To be able to have my father and my mother and my brother and my wife’s family be able to come be a part of this journey with me means a lot.”
“Number two, I always said you want to be around great people. You want to; if we’re going to lead, we want to lead with the best. It was one conversation with Pat (Kraft) and one conversation with Neeli (Bendapudi). I knew what their demand is and they want to be the best for the right reasons.”
Then I think the last piece is, what do you want to stand for? The hard thing for me ever wanting to leave Iowa State, at times and getting close but saying, you know what, it’s just not the right time, is I never wanted to be that coach that was ‘oh, man, I’m going to jump from job to job.’
Campbell is only 46, so if he wanted to coach for 20+ more years, he could.
Campbell made it clear that he plans to retire at Penn State.
Add Nittany Sports Now as a preferred source in Google! Click here to add us.“If we were to leave Iowa State I wanted to go somewhere and I wanted to finish my career and I wanted to stand for something that’s bigger than Matt Campbell,” Campbell said. “It’s not about me, but about the players and represents something bigger than myself and I found that.
I couldn’t be more humbled and grateful for that opportunity.”
On Penn State’s end, Campbell’s hiring ended a wild 54-day search.
Penn State thought it had landed BYU’s Kalani Sitake in early December, but Sitake ended up deciding to stay in Provo.
Penn State Coaching Search: Kalani Sitake Makes His Decision
The night after Sitake made his decision, Kraft talked to Campbell for the first time.
The next night, Bendapudi talked to him.
By Friday night, Campbell had agreed to come to Penn State.
Reportedly, Penn State would have gotten in contact with Campbell sooner, but Campbell not having an agent ended up complicating the process.
For Kraft, all that mattered was Penn State getting its guy.
“We didn’t really have a timeline, and I mean that,” Kraft said. “We were focused on finding the right person, and at all costs. It will probably be a Netflix documentary at some point. The way that Matt and I got to each other was through some twists and turns in the road. I needed a partner that I had trust and belief in, to take that role because it was so important. This department needs a leader for this role and for this institution. I would echo it was a late-night phone call for the two of us and I’ll give you this. I was banging my head against the wall, like, why did it take so long for us to find each other? He was perfect. We connected on so many levels.
So excited was Kraft about Campbell, that he woke up his wife to tell him “he’s the guy.”
“Look, there were a lot of turns and I appreciate the media speculating and putting things out there every step of the way that was true or not true, but we got the guy. We really got the guy and the guy who is going to lead us to a national championship and bring us back to the best program in the country.”
