Trending
By Neil Rudel
nrudel@altoonamirror.com
ATLANTA -- Penn State quarterback Drew Allar admits the Nov. 12 firing of offensive coordinator Mike Yurcich shook him.
Yurcich recruited Allar and was one of the big reasons the Ohio product and five-star prospect committed to Penn State.
As the Nittany Lions prepare for Saturday's Peach Bowl with Mississippi (noon, ESPN), Allar addressed the topic during a Wednesday morning availability.
"That's kind of what I struggled with probably the two or three days after it happened," Allar said. "Coach Yurcich is a big part of why I'm here. He recruited me throughout high school, and obviously, I had a ton of fun playing under him."
As a team leader, however, he took a company line and supported James Franklin's decision.
"At the end of the day, Coach Franklin did what he thought was best for the program, and I'm completely aligned with Coach Franklin," Allar said. "He (Franklin) was a big reason why I came here, too."
Allar, who completed 61.1% of his passes for 2,336 yards this season and had a touchdown-interception ratio of 23-1, said he's confident Yurcich will be back in coaching soon.
"I know Coach Yurcich is going to end up on his feet, and he's doing to do good wherever he goes," Allar said.
Tight ends coach Ty Howle and running backs coach Ja'Juan Seider took over the playcalling duties for the last two regular season games, wins over Rutgers and Michigan State, and Andy Kotelnicki has since been hired to be the Nittany Lions' offensive coordinator in 2024.
Franklin has said he's planning to be involved with the quarterbacks next year with Kotelnicki and offensive analyst Danny O'Brien, who worked with the quarterbacks and Yurcich in 2023.
In the ensuing weeks after Yurcich was let go, Franklin said he was pleased with the "collaboration" of the staff and used that word several times.
"I was very pleased with how we operated from the Lasch Building and in the office and how we game planned, how the scripts were done the night before, how the (sideline) cards were done early for the scout team, and we could look them over and work through in detail," he said. "I thought the collaboration, the environment that was created that everybody spoke up and had opinions, was really good. I thought Ja'Juan and Ty were really good complementary pieces of each other."
He also thought Howle and Seider called plays designed to "making them (opponent) defend the whole field, putting people in conflict, and also when we had success with plays, going back to them and forcing the defense to adjust."
Yurcich was the first assistant in Franklin's 10 years at PSU to be fired during the season.
"I think if you look at my history as a head coach, I'm a very, very loyal guy," he said. "You look, we got the Vanderbilt job and came to Penn State, I think we brought 16 people with us and their families. That's not common, if you look at what's going on in college football.
"Let me say this, too," he added. "The loyalty part, sometimes you make a change and people say, well, you made a change, I don't understand how you're talking about loyalty. My loyalty is to Penn State. My loyalty is to the players. My loyalty is to the entire staff. Sometimes you have to make a change for the loyalty of the entire staff and the entire team. So I want to make sure that that doesn't come off as contradictory."