Penn State's highly-rated special teams unit suffers a blow as a key analyst departs for a Big Ten rival.
The Penn State Nittany Lions had a lot of coaching staff turnover in the offseason after James Franklin was fired midseason.
PSU was able to keep Terry Smith on staff, a key leader who took over the interim head coaching role when Franklin was fired.
New head coach Matt Campbell had a busy offseason, filling out the Nittany Lions staff and trying to salvage the team's recruiting aims via the transfer portal after losing many high school recruits before the early signing period.
One key analyst from the 2025 staff is headed to another Big Ten school.
Per Christopher Sheppard of the Nittany Lions Wire, special teams analyst Allen Tucker is joining Purdue as an assistant special teams coach for the upcoming season.
"Allen Tucker, who originally had joined the Nittany Lions staff in the 2025 season, is now joining Purdue as an assistant special teams coach," Sheppard wrote. "He had previously been the coach at both Troy and Akron for the same position.
"His name now officially appears in the Purdue directory. Interestingly enough, while Penn State's season was disastrous, the special teams unit was a major bright spot."
As Matt Zenitz of CBS Sports pointed out, PSU was No. 1 nationally in special teams efficiency last season.
Still, not everything was dandy on special teams in 2025.
Following PSU's 25-24 loss to Iowa in October, Smith voiced his frustration with the special teams unit.
“Obviously very disappointing loss,” Smith said, via On3. “Very disappointing the way we lost. I don’t feel like we made them earn it at the very end. All three areas (offense, defense, and special teams) need improvement.
Our special teams, we continue to have problems handling punts and kicks, just making good decisions with the football there... We’re going to take the bye week to try to get those three areas cleaned up and better for when we go to Ohio State.”
Penn State was able to improve on special teams through the rest of the season. The Nittany Lions would struggle against College Football Playoff programs Ohio State and Indiana before winning their final four games of the season.