How Desirable Is the Penn State Head Coaching Job?

As expected, Penn State head coach Joe Paterno has announced that he will retire at the end of the season, following a sex abuse scandal involving one of his former assistants, Jerry Sandusky, that has rocked the entire State College community.

Paterno, who just two weeks ago won his record 409th game, has been a fixture at Penn State for six decades, and he’s one of the most iconic figures in college football history. But due to the fact that he failed to handle the Sandusky situation properly years ago when it was first brought to his attention, his legacy will now be forever tarnished.

Many knew that the day was coming when the 84-year-old Paterno would no longer be strolling the sidelines or up in the press box at Beaver Stadium, but no one could have ever imagined that the coach’s career would come to an end under these type of sad circumstances.

With Paterno out, Penn State will now have to start the difficult search for finding the type of leader that can come in and help restore the program to what it once was, but that duty will in no way be easy, as the school’s reputation is sure to take a hit following all that’s gone on recently.

Names like Urban Meyer, who is expected to be the hottest college football coaching candidate this offseason, and Al Golden, the current Miami coach and former Penn State player, are two names that will get a lot of play in the media as potential replacements for Paterno, but it’s too early to speculate about who will be the main coaching target just yet.

What Penn State will be looking for is an established, proven head coach with a winning background, who has the type of strong character and leadership qualities to step in and stabilize a program that's gone through so much turmoil in such a short amount of time.

Both Meyer and Golden fit that description, but it remains to be seen if either of them would be interested in coming to Happy Valley and taking on all that will come with being the Penn State head coach at this point.

Replacing a legend is hard enough, but doing it at a school that’s just been rocked by one of the worst sports scandals in recent memory makes it that much more difficult.

There is still room for success at Penn State, given the type of facilities, fanbase and surrounding recruiting hot beds that the school already has going for it, but this isn’t a program that’s going to be in rebuilding mode, it’s one that’s going to be in recovery mode, and it takes a special type of head coach to lead that kind of effort.

There are definitely prominent head coaches with strong backgrounds who would love to come coach at a school like Penn State, but only time will tell if any of them will be able to handle the recovery efforts or not.