Penn State's Matt Campbell Thought Someone Else Would Get Iowa State Job

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Being a head coach in college football comes with a ton of responsibilities, something that I don't think everybody truly understands from top to bottom. Unless you've been in a college setting, it's almost tough to understand what a lot of these guys do on a day-to-day basis. 

That's the harsh reality, especially when coaching at a major program in a power conference.

Iowa State head coach and current Penn State head man Matt Campbell has learned that the hard way. Campbell has done a really good job of building a program in the past, taking Iowa State to new heights it hasn't reached in a very long time. 

However, Campbell also saw how ugly things can get when things don't go as planned. One of those situations was when he decided to take the Penn State coaching job and thought Taylor Mouser would be the next head coach at Iowa State. Instead of that happening, Iowa State didn't go that direction, and Campbell admitted that he didn't really know what to tell his players.

“There were two major emotions. One, my initial assumption was I was going (to Penn State) and they were going to name Mouse (offensive coordinator Taylor Mouser) the head football coach. My initial assumption was how do I help him transition and how do I make sure our kids are taken care of? I felt good that that was going to be the plan,” Campbell said, per Audrey Snyder.

“I was probably stunned when I went over there and that wasn’t the plan. So, I think it was really hard for me to go up and talk to the team to be honest with you. I was like how am I gonna handle this with our guys?”

While that's a tough situation for Campbell to be in, he also benefited from Mouser not getting the job at Iowa State, since he now followed him to Happy Valley. Mouser, only 35 years old, would have been a very young head coach compared to most other Power Four programs.

Perhaps he's in line to get a new job in the future, but for now, Penn State will have the benefit of having a really good offensive mind running its offense.

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