New WRs Coach Stubblefield to Focus on Setting Foundation in Spring
Taylor Stubblefield’s accomplishments as a player are undeniable.
A four-year contributor at Purdue, when Stubblefield wrapped his senior season in 2004, he held the NCAA FBS record for career receptions with 316 for 3,433 yards, scoring touchdowns on 19 of them. The mark stood until Ryan Broyles notched 349 catches for his career spanning the 2008-11 seasons.
As a position coach, Stubblefield’s pupils have produced some prolific numbers of their own. At Illinois State, Eyad Salem became a first-team All-Missouri Valley Conference selection with his school-record 92 receptions, while Stubblefield’s Wake Forest stop included a second-team All-ACC honor for Michael Campanaro during the 2013 season.
To some degree, his prior accomplishments, both as a player and coach, had everything to do with James Franklin’s decision to bring him on board to the Nittany Lions’ staff this offseason.
“(He’s) a guy that not only has coached but also done it himself at a high level. You look at what he was able to do in this conference and nationally, pretty impressive, and also a guy that didn't do it, no disrespect to him, based on raw athleticism. He did it on techniques and fundamentals and mentality and understanding and things like that,” Franklin said. “If you go back and check his testing numbers from his pro day and combine, we're not recruiting Taylor Stubblefield here to Penn State right now. But to me… (he’s) a guy that, based on his training and his preparation and his mentality and techniques and fundamentals, was able to play at a really, really high level.
“Now if you can take the combination of going out and finding some really talented skilled players and then give them the training of a guy that found a way to be successful without that, you've got a recipe for a lot of success. That's going to be obviously important.”
As the Nittany Lions’ 2020 season approaches, the program is banking on it.
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Returning a redshirt junior starting quarterback in Sean Clifford, a second-team AFCA All-American tight end in Pat Freiermuth, a stable of experienced running backs in Journey Brown, Noah Cain, and Devyn Ford, plus a capable, veteran offensive line returning all but one starter, Franklin recently laid out the case that this is an offense potentially “in position to take the next step.”
Save for one caveat, he continued, “Except for obviously the question mark that we all know: Wide receiver. That needs to happen.”
It will be largely Stubblefield’s responsibility to make sure it does.
And in following the decision by K.J. Hamler to forgo his final two seasons of eligibility in favor of the NFL, Stubblefield will need to do so with a group of largely untested pieces at the position.
Junior Jahan Dotson represents the top returning receiver following a sophomore campaign in which he finished third on the team in receptions with 27 for 488 yards and five touchdowns. Given the late-season transfer of Justin Shorter, with Freiermuth, Nick Bowers, Brown and Ricky Slade interspersed, the Nittany Lions’ next-leading returning receiver is redshirt sophomore Daniel George, who finished eighth on the team with nine catches for 100 yards last season. Fellow redshirt sophomore Cam Sullivan-Brown, meanwhile, is the third-leading returning receiver following his eight catches for 56 yards in just four games of action, his season cut short due to unspecified injury.
That leaves another four scholarship players without a career reception - redshirt freshmen John Dunmore and T.J. Jones, plus early enrollee freshmen Jaden Dottin and KeAndre Lambert - for Stubblefield to work with this spring.
Zeroing in on the components within his control, the receivers coach said he will set out to establish the fundamental elements critical to the group’s future success, regardless of collective experience.
“No matter what stage you're in, whether it's a new offense coming together, or even if Coach Rahne would have been back, you want to improve,” Stubblefield said. “And so, the group that we have right now, there are some younger guys in this group, maybe not a lot of catches in the books in regards to what guys have done on the football field.
“So it is going to be important coming out of spring ball that we make sure that we really know the offense; that we can leave this spring saying you know what, I know it and I'm gonna make sure that I know what to do so now I can really perfect how to do it. (And) we're going to talk about consistency and catching the ball and making plays.”
Adding that his deal-breakers, things like always being on time, going to class, finishing through the line, and bursting after the catch, all would remain consistent regardless of age or experience, Stubblefield insisted that his early interactions with this crop of wideouts demonstrated the ingredients from which he’s looking to build.
“The thing that's been really pleasing for me is seeing the mental side of them, asking questions, wanting to get together, the personalities enjoying one another. Even in the first workout, being able to instruct and see them correct fairly quickly. That, to me, is what has been awesome,” he said. “I think the staff has done a good job of trying to find the guys that are the right fit for this program and it's been really good getting to know these guys.
“We still got a long way to go, but yeah, there's some guys in there that just want to be great. And if you want that, we can start laying down the process and what it takes to be great. If they have that motivation, that that drive, that determination to understand that hey, things aren't gonna be fun, but let's keep going, then those are the kind of guys I want to work with.”
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