Locked On ACC - Daily College Football & Basketball Podcast - BREAKUP WINNER: Virginia Tech Surges Past Penn State as James Franklin DOMINATES Recruiting Buzz

Episode Date: June 15, 2026

James Franklin transforms Virginia Tech recruiting, surpassing Penn State in a stunning shift on the trail. Can Matt Campbell keep the Nittany Lions’ top-10 status, or will Hokies fans see a new powerhouse emerge in the ACC? Alex Donno, Kenton Gibbs, and Zach Seyko break down the intense competition between Franklin’s program-building prowess and Campbell’s quarterback development, spotlighting top recruits like Jordan Karhoff and Peter Bourque. Key questions include whether Franklin’s top-10 struggles will resurface at Virginia Tech, the impact of major donations on Hokies football, and how Penn State’s expectations shift in the super-conference era. The hosts also tackle the growing chaos surrounding NCAA enforcement after the Texas Tech–Brendan Sorsby betting scandal, and what it means for Big Ten and SEC Super League ambitions. Is college football on the verge of a seismic realignment? Don’t miss the analysis of these game-changing trends. Everydayer ClubIf you never miss an episode, it’s time to make it official. Join the Locked On Everydayer Club and get ad-free audio, access to our members-only Discord, and more — all built for our most loyal fans. Click here to learn more and join your team’s community: https://lockedonpodcasts.com/everydayerclub   Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!   Odoo Great organizations win because operations matter. And that’s why you should get Odoo. Try for free today at https://Odoo.com/lockedon.  RugietGet 15% off your treatment → https://rugiet.com/lockedonnhlRugiet. Performance medicine for men. Indeed Listeners of this show get a $75 Sponsored Job Credit to help give your job the premium placement it deserves at http://Indeed.com/podcast   FanDuel Today's episode is brought to you by FanDuel. From the opening whistle to the final kick, Let There Be Goals on FanDuel.Visithttps://FANDUEL.COMto get started now.   FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

James Franklin is doing so well recruiting for Virginia Tech that they've passed Penn State on the trail. Well, it seems like everybody except SACO is shocked. You are Locked-on College Crossover, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network. Your team every day. I am Alex Dono from Locked-on-A-C-C. Kenton-C-Gybs from Locked-on-A-C-C. Zach Saco from Locked-on-Nitney Lions and welcome into this ACCC crossover event. We'll talk about James Franklin's ceiling at Virginia Tech.

I also want to talk a little bit about that Texas Tech fiasco and how that may influence the Super League, possibly, Big Ten and SEC. But Seco, I'd love to know your perspective because, you know, you follow Penn State. Kenton and I are following Virginia Tech. Virginia Tech, as I mentioned, is ahead of Penn State right now in the recruiting rankings. So on the Penn State side, how is Matt Campbell doing on the trail? I mean, give or take, we're splitting hairs, right? And I never said that James wasn't going to be successful at Virginia Tech or that he wasn't going to be able to recruit well. The idea was that Penn State did not need James Franklin to have success on the recruiting trail. So both Penn State and Virginia Tech are succeeding. Both those things can be true. They can be independently true. But the idea that, well, Penn State was going to tumble and barely be inside the top 25 and James Franklin was going to get top 10 class after top 10 class. Those are extremes, but there was some belief out there that you would notice a major difference.

And right now, depending on where you look, one day Penn State's one spot or two spots ahead of Virginia Tech. Another ranking, a composite ranking says that actually Virginia Tech is a decimal point ahead of Penn State. So they're even right now. James Franklin is a good recruiter, but it was the idea that James Franklin was the only reason Penn State was successful on the recruiting trail. I didn't subscribe to that theory.

and clearly that's because Penn State is in the top 10 according to 24-7. If Matt Campbell was this bad recruiter or had no idea what he was doing, you wouldn't have a top 10 class right now if you were Penn State. I mean, I completely and totally get that. And I do agree that there are people, fan is sure for fanatics. So, of course, you're going to have the people that go off the beep being like, oh, we'll never see another top 10 class. And it was all frank and all that good stuff.

But I do think it needs to be stated here because of what we talked about before. The comparison levels before the breakup make it very easy for James Franklin to quote unquote win the breakup here, right? Oh, Penn State top 10 recruiting class. Is that new? Is that something that we're like, oh, Penn State's never been able to do that? Under James Franklin, this just wasn't the case. But now you're seeing Virginia Tech be elevated to a level at which you have never seen. And you're matching that up with Matt Campbell holding the ship steady.

in essence, not taking Penn State's recruiting to another level where you're like, oh, James Franklin wasn't doing this, especially in year one. So I get what you're saying, Seiko. I get what you're saying in terms of nobody, anybody who knows anything about football at a high level would agree to James Franklin. He's a recruiting ace. He really is. That's who he is.

That's one of his calling cards. And he's in the specific area now. That was one of his hotbeds. He's in the heart of the territory. Exactly. He's in the heart of where he was, he's in the belly of the beast, per se, where he was always going to have a little bit of success there. I do think Penn State and what Matt Campbell is doing is impressive.

But again, you got to maintain that over some years to say, hey, you did your thing and they didn't need James Franklin, as opposed to James Franklin. Two years of top 20 classes, they have not seen that since the height of Beamer Bowl, the absolute height. Yeah, I mean, I can't remember the last time Virginia Tech head-to-head beat Miami for a blue-chip recruit that they were both going for, especially not during the Mario Cristobal era of the last four years. And Virginia Tech landed four-star tight end Jordan Carhoff over Miami. Virginia Tech has one of the best quarterbacks in the class of 2027, Peter Bork, committed, who just had a tremendous showing in the Elite 11 finals a couple of weeks ago.

And I think that's now becoming the standard in recruiting for Virginia Tech. You know, they have this new, obviously the money is getting excited about James Franklin being there because they have a new $75 million single donation. They've never had a single donation that big for athletics. Most of that is going to go to football. Now, to something that you were saying, Kenton, about Penn State, this also applies to Virginia Tech. I mean, both of these teams have new coaches, which, you know, it inspires your donor base. Everyone's excited about that new coach smell, as I call it. So I would look at both of these teams, and God forbid, you have a terrible season.

And this goes for Virginia Tech the same way it would go for Penn State. I mean, if Virginia Tech, who schedule, ACC schedule, but as we've talked about before, Kenton, it's not as easy as some people think. If they have a bad year, are you able to hold on to all those verbal commits come December? because we're still five and a half months away from National Signing Day. But right now, the excitement, the charge, the donor base is really pumped about what James Franklin is bringing to the DMV. I have a thought on that because you said Penn State and Virginia Tech, if they have a bad season, would you be able to hold on to those recruiting classes?

If James Franklin goes six and six at Virginia Tech in year one, seven and five, that is a lot more understandable than Penn State doing that, six and six, seven and five. So the consequences are greater on Matt Campbell's side, where it's, okay, James Franklin's getting started. He's pulling back Virginia Tech and trying to get them into a better spot, whereas as we've talked about, hey, Matt Campbell's maintaining. So if Penn State goes six and six, that's severely underwhelming, especially given an easier Big Ten schedule. And comparatively, that ACC schedule, I don't want to say it's a total gauntlet or unforgiving for James Franklin. But yeah, yeah, it's difficult, especially down the stretch. I think they're going to need to do a lot of winning in the first half of the season.

But I think James is not going to have an issue maintaining that class if they were to go have a six win, seven win season versus Matt Campbell where there are going to be a lot more questions. Because Brian Smith talks about this, there's no proof of concept for either side right now at Penn State and Virginia Tech. And if you underwhelm in your first season, it's not going to cost Franklin as much. It could cost Matt Campbell a little bit. And that's exactly what I mean by comparison level. and how this breakup has kind of win. The reality is Penn State is not in an untenable situation, but the reality is, to me,

if in the next three to four years you were not in a national championship, this was a waste. To me, if you are looking at four years from now in your best season, 10 wins with a win over Ohio State, guess what? You got that under James Franklin. Oh, I'm sorry. No, you didn't. Hold on. Hold on. No, you didn't. He lost Ohio State, but he still got you to 10 wins. So the 10 wins with the win over this big time team is not worth more than 10 wins getting waxed by the big time team.

But they led you to the exact same place. To me, if you're going to make a move that big to end up in the same place four years from now and say that success, that's hustling backwards, in my opinion. You're firing somebody to pay them out. It's different because of the super conference, though. It's different because of the super conference. The 10 and 2 today is not the same as 10 and 2 yesterday because the big 10 10 was not as deep as it was. Neither was the ACC, neither was the big 12 SEC, all of them. So if Matt Campbell goes 10 and 2 and gets that signature victory over a top 5,

top 10 team on a more consistent basis, it is not an addier bust for me in three to four years. It is you got to get to the playoff. especially if it's going to expand to 24, but also those wins over Ohio State, Oregon, whomever, whoever is at the top of the Big Ten on a year-to-year basis. But if this thing expanded to 24, how many years would James Franklin at best?

The same way you say that winning now is worth more than it was back then. Playoff appearances have to be weighted differently. If you're expanding it out and expand the field to twice what it was, and not to mention, people seem to forget, because of how last season went for James Franklin, just two years ago, he was one quarterback that had a pulse away from a national championship appearance. We all saw what we saw with Drew Aller. And people from Penn State thought I hated Penn State didn't.

And I'm like, no, I don't hate you guys. I'm telling you about your quarterback. I'm telling you what I have seen time and time again. So again, for me, it's not natty or bust from a standpoint of they must win a national championship or they must, you know, if they do anything short of winning a national championship, or even going. I'll even take going out of the picture. You know what?

I'll even give you that. If you don't have a final four finish in the next three to four years with the donor support, with what James Franklin had them at, to me, that's an abject failure. You have objectively decided to fire a guy, pay two guys, to be right where you are. And that, to me, is like, you could have just kept the old guy for me. The ROI, I see your point. The ROI doesn't exactly match up. Exactly.

Well, and something I want to get into on the other side, because Seiko has gone through the James Franklin experience, and now it's on to Matt Campbell. So, yeah, things are very tight on the recruiting trail between Campbell and Franklin, but what can the actual game day and week of coaching difference be between the two? Because if, you know, the recruiting is pretty much equal, you have to go to these other criteria. you want to keep it locked right here.

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Go to Lockdownpodcast.com slash Everydayer and join that Everydayer club today. Thank you so much for making this Lockdown on ACCC, Lockdown Nittney Lions crossover, your first listen. All right, so Kenton, I'll start with you on this one before we get, you know, Seiko after the years of watching James Franklin. he is obviously a capable program builder, right, when it comes to recruiting, putting the right talent and pieces in place. Do you have concerns about that win-loss record against ranked teams in the top 10? Is that going to be a factor eventually at Virginia Tech the way it was at Penn State? Well, the thing about James Franklin's record against top 10 teams is people are discounting.

What's everybody's record against top 10 teams, right? who what coaches have superstar you know kind of records against top 10 teams Jim Harbaugh. Sabin. Exactly. Ryan, Ryan Day. Yeah.

Jim Harbaugh before a certain assistant showed up, if you look at his record against top 10 teams, it was abysmal, despite the fact that he was revered as one of the best coaches and not just the college level, but the professional level as well. You've got a bunch of coaches that people consider it to be great, that you look. look at their record against top 10 opponents. Hell, even if you look at Mario Crystal Ball, right now, his record against top 10 opponents all time. Not great.

Not great. So when you talk about that part of it, that is absolutely an indictment on James Franklin, but I don't even think that strikes at the heart of the biggest indictment and the biggest improvement, in my opinion, that Penn State has in Matt Campbell, because everybody said, I don't say enough nice stuff about Penn State with Seco's here.

So let me say something nice about Penn State. Let me say something nice about Matt Campbell. I like the guy personally. When he was recruiting me, he was at Toledo. He's a great guy. I genuinely felt like, hey, this is a guy that genuinely wants what's best for you. Yeah, it's overlap there. But another thing that he's shown on the field production,

his quarterback development leaps and bounds ahead of James Franklin. You cannot make the argument. Wasn't he Brock Purdy's head coach as well as Rocco Bex? Or am I missing? Yes, sir. Okay. Yeah. So when you talk about quarterback development, if you combine,

if you could marry James Franklin's everything else ability with Matt Campbell's quarterback development, we would all be investigating Happy Valley to see what the hell they got going on up in those mountains. They got these boys playing like this, right? But the reality is, again, Matt Campbell has the secret sauce when it comes to quarterback development that James Franklin could never seem to put in his stoop.

He could never seem to brine those oxtails just right with the quarterback development to get it to be a tasty meal. Instead, it was always right there. It was always, hmm, this is an eight out of ten. We just need that one ten out of ten season. Get us where we need to go. And quarterback development, again, Matt Campbell, Hazardin and Spades, James Franklin. The proof is kind of into pudding for the opposite.

Let me help you. Zach, let me help you out with something before we get to you. Because, you know, Kenton, you're not wrong that it's really hard to beat top ten teams and to have a winning record. But I do have the records of some prominent head coaches in college football, including James Franklin and how they've done head-to-head against top 10. Kirby Smart is 27 and 11 against the top 10. I might have to fact-check this one. Kaelin DeBore, seven and three. I mean, maybe he just loses to the bad teams. We might have to run a fact-check through that one. I think some of these other ones are right, though. Let's see. Ryan Day,

15 and 10, Dabo Sweeney, 19 and 16, Mario Cristobal 8 and 8, Dan Lanning, 6 and 6, Steve Sarkesian, 8 and 19, Lane Kiffin, 5 and 16, and James Franklin, 4 and 21. So, you know, doesn't stack up that well. Again, he's not stacking up well against Kirby, damn smart. He's not stacking up well to Dan Lennie. I like, when we look at this, I'm not saying that it's excusable. I'm not saying it's excusable at all, because James, Franklin was making top tier money.

He had top tier support. He's at a tier one university. When I talk about tier one, I talk about at most schools you can win eight games a year they'll build you a statute. You win eight games of year of Penn State, you'll be fired by year four. We can all agree to that. We all know Penn State is tier one. The expectations

are up there. But again, to me, the record against top ten teams, even amongst those coaches, doesn't look great, but even with that. So you would take the DeBoer situation where you beat top 10 teams, but you're laying an egg against Florida State. Oh, you beat top 10 teams, but Lord forbid the mighty, mighty fighting Mike Norvelle's come your way. Now you're pissing down

your leg. I don't know if that's a tradeoff I'd be willing to make. Let me add a little bit of context, and it's not even to dunk on James Franklin because the quarterback development somewhere stalled along the way. It's not that every QB that went to Penn State was a failure because the Trace McSorley years were great. But after that, it just stopped completely. It was, and he was the only point of success. So how do you get back to that? Is it a particular type of QB?

Can James just not develop the five-star quarterback? Or is it a quarter, is it an offensive coordinator QB coach issue? Because Joe Moorhead was the best OC that James Franklin ever had. And I don't, James Franklin is a different type of coach. Okay. So he is a program builder. He is a recruiter. he checks a lot of other boxes that means that there are going to be some weaknesses when it

comes to the X's and O side of it. And he's talked about how he wants a head coach of the offense, a head coach of the defense, a head coach of the special teams, head coaches at their position groups. He is very, he wants to be involved in everything, but not so deeply. And that means that there are assistance on. So this is where James kind of lost, I don't want to say lost his way, but wasn't as good down the stretch. Hiring OCs. Hiring. Hiring. QB coaches. I got the defensive coordinator well up until Jim Knowles. So that's where James really is that all or nothing component. He's not particularly developing QBs. He's finding people. He's the liaison. But if you don't find the right people, then you're not going to be as good.

And again, it was just never. You bring up, well, Penn State was in was a couple plays away from a national championship. Yes, they were. But they, it was time and time again, they would never win that game. Oregon. Oregon again. Notre Dame, Ohio State, Ohio State, Ohio State, Ohio State, Ohio State, Michigan, when they were peaking for the right or wrong reasons, wasn't beating them. So whoever was that top team in the Big Ten, never one time in 2016 on a miracle-blocked field goal. If there were a couple, I say James Franklin's still at Penn State, if he wins one more game, he gets to the national title. Doesn't win, but he gets to the national title. He beats Notre Dame. He beats Oregon in the whiteout or in that big 10 championship game.

It's just one other game in the past five years, one other big game. He's still at Penn State and we're not even having these conversations. I mean, yeah, I couldn't agree more. I could not agree more. And when you talk about what he has done at Penn State, that is why I say it's completely fair to hold his top 10 record against him because he's had the support. He's had all the things that makes sense for him to do that. the only part of that top 10 and the top 10 teams that he's not beating,

you named multiple national championship teams. That's true. Like who's beating national championship teams before this year, or not even before this year, before the last, what, decade or so, if you were a national championship team, that means you went what? Undefeated nine times out of 10, maybe one loss. So it's like, I don't know how much I can say. say, oh, you couldn't beat Michigan who got better out of nowhere for the right

of wrong reasons, right? But who beat them? How long do you? TCU did. So how long do you put up with that, though? How long do you put up with James Franklin losing every, it's not it was here and there or not a majority of the time. It was every time.

Every time since 2016, Penn State came up on the short end in a big game. How long do you put up with that? If we take away Penn State as a top 10 team, how many top 10 wins would Oregon have? How many times has Dan Lending showed up in the big time game? The only team that they've showed up in a big time game against that you would argue. In there for three seasons though, not 12. Yeah. Okay.

That's fair. But regardless of how you cut it or slice it, if you look at most of the big time coaches, even if you give them a decade or whatever the case may be, there are a handful that you know, hey, this guy's going to get it done even at that big time level. Now, you can make the argument. Penn State gave you the resources to make that handful of six. I would not disagree with that.

I would fully own if I'm trying to defend James Franklin, which I'm not, but if I was trying to defend James Franklin, I would fully own, hey, brother, you got to do better. This is unacceptable. I'm just saying from the standpoint of, well, all the knocks against them, there are plenty of knocks against James Franklin that we talk about. You got into the quarterback development of how it started. You got into the, how does he pick offensive coordinators and all that?

I would say the same way that schools get hit with lack of institutional control, I like to hit coaches with a thing I call lack of institutional success. I don't care who the hell you're hiring to be the head coach of the offense. If you're hiring them, if you're the man pulling the trigger saying, hey, this is it. When I was on a recruiting visit, I had a head coach pull out his wallet and show me a picture of his family. He said, Ken, when I offered you a scholarship, I trust. trusted you to feed these people. So that's what James Franklin did.

Every time he hired one of these assistants, he trusted them with his reputation. So you might have hired the wrong guys, but guess what? Now that stench is on you. You've got the stench now. It's like you, it's as if you live in that house with a smoker. You know, if you've ever had a roommate

or if somebody in your family smokes, you know their kids school, they'll call home and say, hey, their paper smell like cigarettes. What's going on? their book bags smell like Newport's what's happening right now right the stench is on you even if that kid ain't smoking a pack a day it's daddy it's Auntie it's whoever if they're in the house you're responsible for that so again James Franklin is wholly responsible for that abysmal record against top 10 team not denying that not taking it away from him the reality is you've got five coaches in America that you would say they are dominant against top 10 or they're good because nobody's truly dominant except maybe Kirby, but they're serviceable against top 10 teams. James Franklin was abysmal against top 10 teams. You're right.

If he goes to the national championship, it changes things. It just wasn't in the cars to work out that way. And that's what Penn State was looking for, just not abysmal, not Ryan Day, not Kirby smart. Just slightly above, not abysmal. That's what they were looking for. A little more of Lannning or Cristobal at 500 against top 10 teams, a little less of Four and 21. Or you can get Kaelin DeBoard.

You beat the top 10 teams. And then all of a sudden. How do you lose to Michigan State? What is going on around here? Florida State. You know, it's a thing. Yeah. Well, will the Super League be even more of a thing now?

What a train wreck the last week and a half has been with Texas Tech and Brennan Sorsby. Rules apparently can no longer be in four. When you want to keep it locked right here, does this give more incentive to the Big Ten and the SEC to break away? We're not done yet on this crossover, locked on Nittney Lions and locked on ACC. Guys, throughout the NHL finals, every shift matters. Every moment is intense and everything comes down to execution when the pressure is at its highest. And just like athletes must be ready to perform when that puck drops, a lot of guys want that same sense of readiness and confidence in their own lives, too. That's where Ruggiette comes in.

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quickly makes it feel way more straightforward. Head to Rujiet.com slash. Locked-on NHL, get 15% off your ED treatment. That's RUG-IET.com slash locked-on NHL for 15% off. Ruggiette, performance medicine for men. Thank you so much for making this crossover your first listen. For your next listen, make sure you check out our other shows. If you're a locked-on ACC every day or make sure you check out what SACC is up to every single day on Locked on Nittney Lions.

If you're a locked-locked-on-Nitney-Lions every day or check out Kenton and I on Locked on A-C-C-C-C. and Kenton also hosts Locked on Wolfpack, and I host Locked on Cains, talking all things NC State and Miami as well. So, Zach, we'll get your thoughts on this, being that you're the Big Ten guy. You know, Kenton and I don't want to be left behind the old ACC. So, you know, the NCAA, with whatever power they have left,

which is virtually zero, are desperately trying to keep Brendan Sorsby for obvious reasons. from playing the upcoming 2026 season, the Texas Tech starting quarterback who bet no less than 9,000 times for over $90,000, including several bets on Indiana when he was playing for them, some bets on negative outcomes like unders in passing yards and unders in Indiana points. And yet the NCAA seemingly is virtually powerless to enforce their own rules. If you can find a friendly judge and get an injunction,

Sorsby, you sit out a two. two-game non-conference suspension then seems to be full speed ahead from that point forward. So Seco, does this put us maybe anywhere closer to a Super League with heavy Big Ten and SEC involvement where they can find a way to collectively bargain? Absolutely it does. I still think we were on the same track as it was anyway, but does this, does this accelerate it from something that's just an idea to it's going to happen tomorrow? What it does is it gives it more legitimacy.

Okay. So I think we were already on the track to the Super League and we didn't need a moment like this, an event like this to spark it. But now what it does is it makes it look better. It makes the NCAA. It makes this structure look a lot worse. And it makes the idea of the Super League more acceptable to everybody because you talk about the problem, not even necessarily the problems, but just the what if because you don't know there's so much unknown with this instance. But then you have an event like this and you're just going to get more powerful people that are, we don't want the Super League to, maybe it's not such a bad idea. Then more fans, the public saying, this would have been prevented with a CBA? Well, how do you get a CBA, collective bargaining agreement? How do you get that with the Super League? So, yes, the Super League benefits so much from this. But one way or another, it means that there's more power and leverage from the Big Ten

as opposed to whether or not it was going to happen. It's going to happen. It's just now the Big Ten and the SEC hold more cards in their hands. I wholeheartedly disagree. This is when your old lady wants to break up with you and every reason becomes a reason, right? Oh, yeah. You snored the entire relationship. Now all of a sudden, you're snoring is the worst thing in the world, right?

Like, oh, your car has been the same car the entire time. You take it to get maintenance and all that, but everybody knew it was a beater when you got it. Everybody knew it was a limit. And now she's talking about, I don't feel safe in this thing. Well, of course. Well, of course, you know, like Seiko said, and Senko even alluded to this, we were already on the track to this. And you could make the argument of,

well, let's sped up the process. The process was going to catch momentum and speed as it goes. Somewhere. So we know about the indiscretions of teams in the Big Ten. We know about the indiscretions of teams in the SEC. We know. None of these things are secret. It is a different world now, right?

famous Miami alum, Michael Irvin, says, I don't know how these ball players live now because if we would have had social media and everybody watching every move like they did, man, I would have been off that campus in my first year. So this is not a thing of, oh, my God, players behaving badly is a new thing and universities protecting them

and insulating them from the consequences of them behaving badly because they can throw far, they can run fast, they can jump high, they can catch a ball, they can block the hell out of folks, they can attack the quarterback like nobody's business. This is not new. Why we're pretending like this is new is beyond me.

The only thing that's new about this is Texas Tech going on this terrible press run of pretending like, oh, why is everybody acting like he committed murder? I just don't know what's the problem. The only way to treat him is to have him play football. Yes. Yes. And you know, that's the only new thing. All of the rest of this, we have. seen it a hundred times and even that to some extent is not new because if you watch the swamp

king's documentary urban mire very tearfully and emotionally SEC head coach by the way former SEC and former big 10 coach by the way said you know i let a player go and his life had ended shortly after that and from then i said whatever i got to do you know we said do we got to get rid of them or can we fix him and after that i erase get rid of him off the board every time So again, we all know if those players were a half-pitched shorter than Urban Meyer thought, if they ran a 40 and 10th of a second slower than he wanted them to, if they ran the shuttle 1-15th of a second. All of that changes things, right?

Yeah. But the reality is this is something that we were already on pace for, and the Big Ten and the SEC are looking for any reason. They're looking for anything. It's like when your parents don't want you to do something, you got a 4.0 on your report card. everybody says you were great. Then that one teacher gives you a two for behavior.

It says, your son's bright. He just talks a little too much. No, no, now we can't go. We can't do the thing now. Oh, man, that sucks. That's what the Big Ten and SEC are doing here. Because, again, none of them have any right. None of you, with what Ole Miss is doing right now with Forelli,

you have no right to sit up here and scream. We need to separate tomorrow yesterday. Didn't LSU get old Mrs. coach while Old Miss was still playing? what are we talking about here? Georgia, we need to give them all tractor-trailer cars so they can't speed anymore. And they have no room to talk. And they're still going to do it amongst a myriad of other teams that historically or currently have bad behavioral problems. I just find it very odd that one behavioral problem from one school outside those two conferences is now we're going to the supercar.

I beg to differ with you on that a little bit because what, what Soresby was doing directly impacts the integrity of the actual games being played. And like I'm, you know, I guess maybe you could argue the same thing about tampering with Forelli. But to me, it's like the idea that your starting quarterback who touches the football in every offensive play is a compulsive gambler and can theoretically, and I'm not saying he would do this Sorsby, but can theoretically manipulate those outcomes. it's not the same thing as guys getting, you know, repeated traffic citations. Like it's just like, and I'm not saying any of it's good, but it's not the same. Okay, but what about your head coach talking to your conference rival while you're in season? Would that affect your team competitively?

Yeah, you're on to something there. That would. Again, I'm not, I'm not sitting here and saying, I'm not excusing Sorbsby at all. What Sorbsby did is a level of bad for the integrity of the game. It's through the roof. let him pay the consequences. And let it, I a thousand percent agree. But what I'm saying is there is coaches and players all throughout the game doing stuff that

that affect the integrity in a meaningful way across the Big Ten and SEC in a way that it is not unique to this one situation that this has happened. This may be the most egregious era and the most egregious era by a player. I'm not going to deny that, not going to sit up here and pretend that that's not the case. but what I would argue is more clear here is the SEC and Big Ten are looking for any angle to say, ah, ah, yeah, that's it. That's it. Ah, they don't take the integrity of this thing.

Say, ah, we got to break away from those two. Because what the hell does the ACC have to do with this? I haven't heard anything about when we formed a Super League. We're just leaving the Big 12 out because Cincinnati knew about Swordsby's gambling. Allegedly. And so did. Allegedly, of course. I'm sorry.

Let me clear out. Cincinnati allegedly. knew about the gambling and so did Texas Tech, but they're still going to let them play. That's an affront two times about the same conference. Donno, you're an ACC guy. What is the ACC done to question this? Nothing but keep Bill O'Brien higher.

It could be considered point-shaven. We just got good old-fashioned dog crap football in the ACC by the bottom team. That's all we got. That's the only thing you can say violating the integrity. So again, if you were talking about the Super League from a serious standpoint, it cannot be the Big Ten and SEC arguing we have to break away from the ACC and the Big 12 because at that point that's collective punishment, which is a war crime, by the way. Obviously we're not at war, very different circumstance, but you get the point to say that the ACC gets lumped in with the Big 12 because the two Big 12 institutions have sponsored a gambling addict. And not to mention he started at Indiana.

that's where the gambling started in the Big Ten, but somehow the ACC is the conference that also gets grouped in with the conference that allowed them to do this at two separate schools. That doesn't make sense to me. Well, I think we've said a lot on this episode, and I can't wait to see what happens next with James Franklin, Matt Campbell, and with the Super League. Huge thank you and shout out to Zach Seiko,

who's doing his thing every day on Lockdown, Nittany Lions. follow him at Zach underscore Saco on X. Kenton Gibbs, who hosts Locked on ACC with me and Locked on Wolfpack, follow him at TGIF underscore Kenton. I also host Locked on Cains. Follow me at Alex Dono. And we'll talk to everyone next time on the number one sports podcast network, the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day.