Penn State Football: Nittany Lions To Hire Tom Allen As Defensive Coordinator

The Nittany Lions made a splash a few weeks back by bringing in a top target to be their offensive coordinator.

Unfortunately for the program, the outstanding success of DC Manny Diaz had not gone unnoticed and he has departed to become the head coach of Duke football, leaving a vacancy for defensive coordinator later in the hiring cycle than Penn State would have hoped.

James Franklin will once again opt for experience, bringing in a former head coach that just did not have success in that role. It worked excellently with Manny Diaz and the staff hopes it will work again.

This time, it seems they will be focusing on former Indiana head coach, Tom Allen.

Sources: Penn State is targeting former Indiana coach Tom Allen to be the school’s next defensive coordinator. Deal is being finalized and is expected to come together in the upcoming days.

— Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) December 17, 2023

Much like the Manny Diaz hire, his stats will not pop out at you from his previous school.

In fact, they were worse than Diaz at Miami, though that’s to be expected given the fact that Miami played in the ACC where there’s only usually one Top-10 team and Allen was at Indiana, where he had to face Ohio State, Michigan and Penn State every single year.

There is no buyout for hiring Allen, however, as he was let go earlier in the offseason so Indiana could target JMU’s staff.

Allen brings experience and potentially a longer-term option than someone like Diaz for Penn State given the point he’s at in his career.

He is also a big culture guy and that will fit well into the family atmosphere that James Franklin, his staff and the players have all worked together to create in Happy Valley.