While Penn State coach James Franklin and his staff are almost certainly going to end up naming true freshman Drew Allar the Nittany Lions’ starting quarterback for the 2023 season, it doesn’t change the fact Penn State still has a potential issue in its quarterback room. There are only three quarterbacks currently slated to be on the Nittany Lions’ 2023 roster.
Allar is one. Fellow freshman and rising sophomore Beau Pribula is the other and incoming freshman Jaxon Smolik will give Penn State a third quarterback.
In and of itself a team only “needs” one quarterback to win games, but a single injury could see Penn State one more injury away from not having a backup quarterback. While that particular issue hasn’t happened under Franklin, the Nittany Lions have had their backup quarterback take meaningful snaps in meaningful games every season since 2018. In fact seven different quarterbacks have seen the field with the game still undecided for Penn State since 2018. So while Allar might be all Penn State needs, it could certainly use more depth as a security blanket.
But where do you find that quarterback? The transfer portal is a busy place but quarterbacks rarely go from one bench to another, so selling someone on a job just like the one they left is a hard sell. Fittingly, now former Penn State backup Christian Veilleux was among the best options in the portal. Veilleux announced on Sunday night that he had transferred to Pitt.
“You prefer to have more than three,” Franklin said last Friday. “There’s no doubt about it. I think if you look across the country, whenever you’re in a situation where your starter is a sophomore or less, to your point it’s a hard sell, it really is a hard sell.”
“Sometimes you can convince an older player that just wants to be a part of a big-time program and part of a special experience to come as more of a backup, a senior backup, a veteran backup. Sometimes you can find that. More times than not, the guys that you’re going to want want to go somewhere to play and be the guy and compete. That’s always a challenge when you’re starting a true freshman, a redshirt freshman. You may start a true freshman and have five quarterbacks on your roster, but after the season ends your room is going to change dramatically.”
Franklin certainly knows a thing or two about that change, since 2018 effectively every backup quarterback immediately behind the current starter has left the program. Tommy Stevens, Ta’Quan Roberson, Will Levis and Veilleux creating a notable line of departures – inevitable or not – all of whom left just prior or during the long tenure of Sean Clifford.
So if not the portal, then perhaps the recruiting trial. But even that is a tricky sell.
“We’ve had some conversations early on as things started to play out,” Franklin added. “Does that mean we try to sign two quarterbacks in this class, whatever it may be? We try to not ever box ourselves in when we’re talking to recruits and their parents. I’m a big under-promise, over-deliver guy. What you try not to do is say, we’re going to sign three defensive ends in this class. Once you say that, then you sign four, people are upset about it. For me, I always say if we’re expecting to sign three, I’m always going to say four, I’m always going to say one more, just to try to explain there’s going to be some flexibility and things that happen on your roster that you’re not expecting. It’s easier to address that on the front end as much as you can.”
Who exactly Penn State might sign remains to be seen if Franklin and company opt to go that route. Former Penn State commit and Elite 11 attendee Marcus Stokes is still without a landing spot after his eventual commitment to Florida stalled following a video which surfaced of Stokes rapping a racial slur. According to the 247 Network, Austin Texas native Bo Edmundson is the only other uncommitted quarterback prospect in the 2023 class Penn State has offered. Edmundson is reportedly a likely Michigan State commit.
