Penn State head coach James Franklin has constructed a status for giving followers a peek inside his program. His perspective shifts noticeably when the dialog turns to defensive coordinator Jim Knowles, the place admiration mixes with a transparent humorousness concerning the “mad scientist” on his workers.
Because the 2025 faculty soccer season approaches, Franklin is leaning on Knowles’s championship expertise to raise a program that reached a nationwide semifinal within the 2024-25 season. It’s a course of that includes managing distinct personalities and making a tradition the place everybody, together with the pinnacle coach, is consistently studying.
How Does James Franklin Stability His Teaching Employees’s Personalities?
Showing on Josh Pate’s “School Soccer Present”, Franklin defined how he leverages the completely different approaches of his coordinators to create a extra well-rounded workforce. For him, bringing in coaches with championship pedigrees, like Knowles and operating backs coach Stan Drayton, is about absorbing each little bit of their profitable data.
“Jim Knowles simply had a nationwide championship final 12 months. So I’m making an attempt to encourage Jim to say, ‘Look, I simply was part of it. That is what it appears to be like like,’” Franklin stated. “What we simply did at apply yesterday, that’s what it appears to be like like. This doesn’t align with championship-level soccer.”
For Franklin, the actual worth lies in drawing from these experiences and guaranteeing each gamers and different coaches take in them. He famous that whereas followers see the press conferences, they miss the “granular” particulars of how a coach like Knowles operates behind the scenes.
“We’ll by no means get to take a seat in a gathering room in a number of the first days of Jim Knowles being on this constructing,” Franklin stated, emphasizing the significance of getting below the hood to “get each bit of knowledge we will.”
A part of that course of includes permitting coordinators to handle all the workforce in conferences, creating an surroundings of shared data.
“I let the coordinators stand up and communicate as properly as a result of I would like everyone to listen to what the protection is being taught, what the offense is being taught,” he defined. This setup creates a chance for gamers to be taught ideas from the opposite facet of the ball.
The variations in fashion are stark. Franklin contrasted the high-energy strategy of offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki with Knowles’s quieter, extra deliberate technique.
“Andy will get up… he’s had like 4 cups of espresso. He’s speaking 1,000 miles an hour,” Franklin stated. “Then Jim will get up, and it takes him three minutes to even begin speaking, after which he’s whispering, and everyone’s type of leaning in just like the previous EF Hutton commercials. He’s slightly bit type of a mad scientist.”
Why Does a Head Coach Nonetheless Take Notes on His Personal Coordinator?
As an alternative of seeing these contrasting types as an issue, Franklin views them as a significant profit for the Nittany Lions. He believes that quite a lot of views is important for fulfillment.
“You don’t need a complete bunch of individuals within the constructing that view the sport the identical means,” he remarked. Franklin added that Knowles’s distinctive strategy enhances not solely Kotelnicki but in addition particular groups coordinator Justin Lustig, creating what he known as “actually good stability.”
This dynamic additionally ensures that Franklin himself stays a pupil of the sport, even after years as a head coach.
“I’m in there taking notes similar to the gamers,” he stated. “Jim says one thing I like, I wish to double down on.”
In the end, it’s this tradition of crossover studying, the place coaches are actively listening and studying from their friends outdoors of their particular roles, that Franklin sees as important to constructing a championship-caliber program at Penn State.
