Giving a press conference is part of every college coach’s job. Matt Rhule certainly knows that and the Nebraska football head coach seems to almost relish getting to share his thoughts with the assembled media. Other coaches don’t seem to share that opinion.
James Franklin has always been a bit of a mixed bag when it comes to dealing with the media. There are some out there who have talked about an attitude that isn’t helpful. But what he did this week might stick with him for a while. Especially because he did it at Penn State.
The Nebraska football rival is dealing with an issue where two former Nittany Lions were recently charged with sexual assault crimes. Ahead of this week’s press conference, a university SID read a statement saying Penn State would not comment on the situation. Because the media has a job to do, they asked questions about Jameial Lyons and Kaveion Keys.
https://x.com/audsnyder4/status/1849216697909006446
Nebraska football rival holds seminar in how not to handle media
When the questions came, Franklin walked away, sometimes behind a curtain and had the SID step up and reiterate they weren’t answering questions. And then came back and said “hey guys” as though he was just coming to the press conference.
The whole thing looked bad. It was so bad that Nebraska offensive coordinator Marcus Satterfield likely pointed and laughed.
At issue is not that Franklin didn’t answer questions. That’s expected. What stood out as the worst possible way to handle things was that he walked away and both he and the SID seemed angry and put out that the questions were coming at all.
There’s also something to be said for this kind of behavior to be happening at Penn State. The school has had this kind of thing happen before and it didn’t handle it well either. It doesn’t appear as though the Nebraska football rival has learned much about putting these kinds of things behind them.
Penn State and James Franklin deserve scorn for the way they’ve handled this. Its too bad they’ve managed to put a damper on a season where they’re competing (and look like one of the frontrunners) for a national title.