News & Notes: Recapping James Franklin's Tuesday press conference

Penn State head coach James Franklin returned to the podium at Beaver Stadium Tuesday afternoon as the ninth-ranked Nittany Lions prepare to face their biggest challenge of the season when they travel to No. 2 Ohio State this weekend.

Let’s get right into the news and notes items to emerge from Franklin’s weekly press conference, here:

1) Right off the bat, Franklin was faced with yet another big-picture topic that he eloquently handled.

For the third time this season, a Penn State player touched on objectionable behavior posed by a Penn State fan in some capacity when quarterback Sean Clifford noted in his morning teleconference with reporters why he had decided to delete the Twitter app from his cell phone.

"I usually delete it closer to games, but I completely deleted it after the Minnesota game. It's kind of sad to say, but you know how some fans get. They get a little crazy. I was kind of sick and tired of getting death threats and some pretty explicit and pretty tough to read messages,” Clifford said. “But you learn how to deal with certain things and how certain people are just going to react because it's a very passionate game with a lot of passionate people. Our fans are definitely one of, if not the most passionate fans in the country. So I just try to stay away from it. I appreciate, you know, all the positive people that are around, but there are also people that try to tear you down. So I think it's always just been better to keep your head away from that kind of stuff.”

That’s right: Death threats, according to Clifford, were leveled at him following the Nittany Lions’ loss at Minnesota to drop to 8-1 on the season just two weeks ago.

Asked about this latest issue and fan interactions with players, Franklin went on at length about the topic as a whole regarding the fans and social media in today’s day and age.

His response, in full:

“Yeah, I'm not going to get into a whole lot of it. Yeah, I was involved in it. I would hope I'm involved in any of these types of things where our players need support, then we make sure they get the right type of support.

“Yeah, I mean, I was trying, and probably my wife told me I wasn't so subtle after the game, but when I was thanking the positive, loyal fans, that's what I was trying to do a little bit.

“I don't know. I don't know where we are as a society. It's concerning. We're 9-1. We're ranked in the top 10, I think. [We] have had a pretty good year based on most people's standards. Sometimes you go on social media and you wouldn't feel that way. The fact that our players are having to deal with stuff like this…

“Remember before I got here, we had a little bit of an issue with Sam Ficken. It's not just our fan base, it's all over. I think a little bit of going to this playoff model that we're in now, I think has had an impact on it a little bit. I think the fact that everybody kind of has a voice and everybody has the ability to contact others, it's concerning.

“But I don't know if I necessarily have the answers. It's concerning. You see it everywhere. We laugh about it, not this incident, but I think the Eagles won the Super Bowl, the next game, at halftime, they're getting booed. We laugh about those types of things.

“I don't know. I don't know if I have an answer for it. But it's troubling, there's no doubt about it. It's troubling. I think it's concerning for all of us. I think that's sometimes where I maybe get upset sometimes and maybe I shouldn't, and I ask you guys some questions, that's kind of where these things are coming from.

“I know the power that you guys have. I don't want you guys to take that the wrong way. I'm just saying that's kind of where we are right now. Things get extreme. You hate to see it, but the sad thing, it's a part of our reality of our society right now. You see that in a lot of areas.

“The last thing I want to do is get into other things besides football right now. But you see a lot of things that are behaviors in our society now that we accept that I don't know why we're accepting. You see some things from a violence perspective. You see some things that people in positions, how they're conducting themselves. Just a lot of things that we're accepting in our society that we would never have accepted before, the things that parents have to worry about kids going to school, elementary schools. It's just concerning.

“Obviously football is just a very, very small piece, but I do think it's a microcosm of a lot of other issues that show up in our society. I'm not sure why we accept it or why we think it's okay. Whether you've had 14 Budweisers or not, I don't see why it's okay or acceptable.”

Other incidents to come to the surface this season involved Antonio Shelton discussing objectionable words by Penn State fans directed toward players at Beaver Stadium following the Nittany Lions’ week two win against Buffalo, as well as a letter penned to Jonathan Sutherland describing his dreadlocks as “disgusting.”

2) As for football, some immediately important personnel questions were asked regarding K.J. Hamler, who left the field in the first quarter and would not return against Indiana due to an apparent head or neck injury Saturday, running back Noah Cain, who has been absent since the first quarter of Penn State’s win at Michigan State in late-October, and receiver Justin Shorter, who has moved on the depth chart.

Per Hamler, Franklin reiterated his comments in the Indiana postgame, saying simply that they’re “hopeful” for his return but currently do not know. “There's medical policies and procedures that we go through. We have to go through a series of steps and things like that,” Franklin said. “But we were hopeful after the game. I still remain hopeful. Those decisions I don't make. I won't make them now and I never have since I've been at Penn State.

“We'll wait and see, but we were hopeful after the game. I still remain hopeful. Again, the medical professionals will make those decisions.”

When it comes to Cain, Franklin reiterated that the true freshman running back could have played against Indiana but, given the team’s depth at running back, it continued to make sense to hold him out. “If Noah Cain was to returning starter in year three, you may let him go without practicing all week because of the amount of football he's played,” Franklin said. “But at this point, I don't know if you would necessarily do that.”

And for Shorter, Franklin said that the depth chart this week was simply a reflection of the way that last week played out in terms of the team’s “best chance to be successful,” but that those circumstances could change as the week progresses.

3) Without giving away the game plan, Franklin was asked how its anatomy changes when you’re playing an opponent with a roster self-described as “one of the most talented” that the Nittany Lions have or will face this season.

Franklin’s answer was illuminating.

“Basically you look at the things that they do well, and one of two things: how do you limit the impact of what they do well, whether it's personnel or scheme, but also what do they do well that also could put them in jeopardy or at risk, and how can you use that against them, whether it's someone's overly aggressive, whether someone is not aggressive enough. You're looking at those things,” Franklin said. “The combination of those things that you see on film from them, then knowing who you are and what you're capable of taking advantage of, that's where those things factor.”

And this is where Franklin took a turn into talking about the broader philosophy behind the Nittany Lions’ approach to this weekend’s game:

Boiled down, big plays will absolutely be a necessity, as will be a resolute mindset as the Buckeyes are certain to land big plays.

“I think one of the worst things that people do is they play a really talented team or roster, and you play conservatively. You can't do that. I mean, we're going to have to go there, we're going to have to match their confidence, and we're going to have to match their playmaking,” Franklin said. “Matching their playmaking isn't just taking shots down the field, things like that. You're carrying the ball as a runner, as a running back or as a receiver, and they come up to make a tackle, they've made that tackle in the nine or 10 previous games, and you break that tackle and go for 40. That sends a message. You've made that tackle for 10 straight weeks, you didn't make that tackle this week. You got to be able to match those things. They bring a pressure that they've had a lot of success getting home on. We're able to slide and pick it up, now take advantage of when they blitz, they've vacated a zone or left someone one-on-one, you got to capitalize on it. Same thing on defense.

“For us to sit here and expect that Ohio State isn't going to make plays on Saturday, they're going to. Don't be shocked by that. I'm not just talking to you guys, I'm talking to my team. That's going to be my message to the team. they're going to make plays, we got to match them. It needs to be one of those types of games, like a heavyweight fight. That guy delivers a blow, you counter. That's what it's going to need to be.”