2020 hindsight: 5 coaches Texas could have hired instead of Tom Herman

James Franklin may still wind up in Austin after all

It is a bit of a stretch to think Pennsylvania native James Franklin would leave the Penn State Nittany Lions after only three years. Then again, he did leave a quality Vanderbilt program he built out of nothing after only three seasons. Franklin’s Penn State tenure has been a good one but has yet to emerge as great. However, 2016 was a nice exit point for him.

After back-to-back 7-6 seasons in 2014 and 2015, the 2016 Nittany Lions went 11-3 and finished as the No. 7 team in the country. They won the Big Ten Championship Game but narrowly missed out on the College Football Playoff. Penn State finished the season with a narrow loss to the USC Trojans in the Rose Bowl.

From 2016-2019, Penn State never won fewer than nine games in a season. They were ranked no worse than No. 17 at the end of any of those seasons, playing in three New Year’s Six Bowls in the College Football Playoff era. While the 2020 season went off the rails early for Penn State with a disastrous 0-5 start, Franklin has built up a ton of coaching credibility in the 2010s.

Yes, it would have been a tad early for Franklin to leave one dream job for another at that point in this Penn State tenure, but he absolutely would have made an immediate impact in Texas. Franklin is one of those names that always comes up when discussing the Texas and USC jobs. If Herman were to be axed, Franklin would still be a head-coaching candidate worth pursuing.