Penn State’s roller coaster of a 2025 season will be over by the end of November.

At that point, and even before it, all focus will be on the next head coach in Happy Valley to replace the fired James Franklin .

It’s still early in that process. Penn State is vetting candidates, some are more or less out of the running and others have emerged as big-time targets.

But it’s important to remember that things can and will change between now and the time of the hire. It’s also important to know Penn State won’t have a head coach in place until the regular season has officially ended, barring something crazy.

After another week of intriguing results around college football, let’s take the temperature of another pool of candidates, as we’ll do every week moving forward.

Mike Elko, Texas A

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