The Penn State Nittany Lions were comfortably in Brett McMurphy's post-spring College Football Playoff prediction.
Everyone is seemingly drinking the Penn State Kool-Aid. Just seven months removed from the Nittany Lions completing a 7-6 season that featured a six-game losing streak and the firing of their coach, they are back in the National headlines. And, for good reason.
Since new head coach Matt Campbell took over the program in January, he has flipped the feeling of Penn State on its head.
He and his staff single-handedly saved the future recruiting classes by pounding the pavement and pitching a new Penn State.
Then, he saved the current team by infusing the roster with over 20 Iowa State transfers and immediately melting them into the roster that they maintained over the Nittany Lions.
The next task for Campbell and the Nittany Lions is to turn it all into wins in the Fall. All of the goodwill that they have built in the first five months of Campbell's tenure, they have flipped the program; they can either accelerate it in the fall or lose all of the momentum they built. There is no in between.
We are a few short months away from football being played anywhere in the fall, so until then, we are back into prediction mode. This time, we are looking at a post-spring ball College Football Playoff prediction that features your Penn State Nittany Lions.
Whether it is deserved or it is a stretch, it doesn't matter. What does matter is the idea that the Nittany Lions are back in the Playoff and not just barely, landed in there as the sixth seed.
Getting through the Big Ten in 2026 will not be easy. The Big Ten is easily the best conference in College Football from top to bottom. The teams at the top are all threats to win the National Championship, the teams in the middle are all liable to pull off an upset every week, and the teams at the bottom are not getting a Saturday off.
Penn State drew a very favorable draw with their conference opponents, as they only face one in the top tier, the Michigan Wolverines.
The rest of the conference opponents are manageable. They should be able to win enough to make them relevant in the postseason conversation.
Landing as the sixth seed is probably a little bit rich, but the idea of the Nittany Lions being immediately back in the playoffs after a disaster of a 2025 season would be incredible for their program in 2026.
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