Iowa State football coach Matt Campbell departing for Penn State job

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Matt Campbell is moving on to the next chapter of his coaching career.

After establishing himself as the winningest football coach in Iowa State football history, Campbell is now headed for Penn State in the Big Ten.

Campbell intends to inform his team during a Friday night meeting that he plans to take the Penn State job, a source with direct knowledge of the situation told the Register.

ESPN’s Pete Thamel reported Friday night that Washington State’s Jimmy Rogers will become the Cyclones’ next coach. Rogers also coached at South Dakota State, where he won a national title in 2023.

Campbell went 72-55 over his 10 seasons as the Cyclones coach. He is 107-70 overall, dating back to his debut season as a head coach in 2011, when he led Toledo to a win in the Military Bowl. He coached four full seasons at Toledo from 2011-15 before coming to Iowa State in 2016.

Before Campbell’s arrival, there had been a total of 12 bowl-game appearances in Cyclones history, with the first coming in the 1971 Sun Bowl. Iowa State will play in its eighth bowl game under Campbell in 10 years.

He tied Clay Stapleton (1958-67) as the second-longest tenured coach in Iowa State history, finishing just shy of Dan McCarney’s 12-year run as the Cyclones’ head coach.

Last season, he surpassed McCarney as Iowa State’s all-time coaching wins leader when the Cyclones defeated Houston, 20-0, on Sept. 28, 2024. The Cyclones went on to tie the 1938 team for the best start in school history and they finished with a program-record 11 wins, topping it off with a win over Miami in the Pop-Tarts Bowl.

During the COVID-impacted 2020 season, the Cyclones finished 9-3 and defeated Oregon in the Fiesta Bowl. They finished No. 9 in the final AP and Coaches Polls, marking the highest finish for a ranked Iowa State football team.

He guided the Cyclones to their first two Big 12 Conference Championship Game appearances, leading them in 2020 and 2024.

Campbell leaves with the highest overall winning percentage in the history of Cyclone coaches, finishing at .567. His 50 conference victories and .556 Big 12 winning percentage as Iowa State head coach are also program records.

This season, the Cyclones finished the regular season with an 8-4 record. Their season-opening victory over rival Kansas State marked the 100th career win for Campbell.

He takes over for James Franklin, who spent 12 years with the Nittany Lions and was fired on Oct. 12. This year, Penn State went 6-6 and 3-6 in league play.

Eugene Rapay covers Iowa State athletics for the Des Moines Register. Contact Eugene at erapay@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter at @erapay5.

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Iowa State football coach Matt Campbell leaving for Penn State

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