James Franklin details spring portal approach for Penn State football

The NCAA transfer portal window officially opens on Wednesday. With a week and a half until the Blue-White Game, Penn State football will have to manage the dual tasks of wrapping up spring practice and working through its roster management.

In light of the unusual timing of the spring portal and spring practice, James Franklin says he and the Nittany Lions staff made an effort ahead of time to ensure there would be “no surprises” over the next 10 days.

“That [the winter portal window] was different because we were in negotiations with guys and things like that,” he said on Tuesday. “This is more just, ‘Hey, no surprises. Let’s communicate with each other.’ It’s more that.”

The portal opening won’t change anything operationally inside Lasch. The Nittany Lions will still wait until after next week’s intra-squad scrimmage to hold its typical post-spring meetings.

“Once again, it’s really kind of a ‘no surprises’ discussion. What I mean by that [is], if a player has any issues or concerns, we want them to come in and talk to us,” Franklin said. “We’ve talked already to the team about how we’re handling the 105 [NCAA’s new scholarship cap]. That was addressed before the first window. That was addressed before this window. So everybody’s on the same page.

“The other thing is, as you guys know, I meet with the players a lot, and there needs to be a communication, two-way street. So, right now, we’re not having meetings obviously during spring ball, but there needs to be communication.”

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Penn State football has already seen one roster departure this spring. Offensive guard JB Nelson made his plans to enter the portal known Monday after leaving the Nittany Lions last week.

“Really not a whole lot of changes for us,” Franklin said in light of the departure. “Not a whole lot of changes for us.”

“There’s a lot of competition there. There’s a lot of competition at those positions,” he added. “Traut [offensive line coach Phil Trautwein] has done a really good job of recruiting and developing guys, so we have depth, which creates some of that [turnover] as well. Right? It’s all of that. But it will be really good competition with Cooper [Cousins] being one of those guys that’s heavily involved there.”

The transfer portal will remain open until next Friday, April 25.

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