Last week, the Penn State Nittany Lions suffered a season-ending loss to the Notre Dame Fighting Irish in the College Football Playoff semifinals.
Now, as they begin their offseason preparations for next year, it sounds like they’ll be needing to replace one of their coaches.
According to a report from college football insider Pete Thamel of ESPN, Clemson is poaching Penn State defensive coordinator Tom Allen, who is also the former head coach of the Indiana Hoosiers.
“Sources: Clemson is working toward a deal to hire Penn State DC Tom Allen as the school’s new defensive coordinator. He’s the top target and a final decision is expected in the upcoming days,” Thamel said in a post on X, the social media website that was formerly known as Twitter.
“Allen is the former head coach at Indiana and has been a DC at Indiana and South Florida. He also spent three years at Ole Miss as an assistant.”
Allen had a strong season leading Penn State’s defense this year as the Nittany Lions ranked No. 8 in the nation in scoring defense, allowing just 16.5 points per game, and ranked No. 7 nationally in opponent yards, allowing just 294.8 yards per game.
That dominant defense helped lead the way for Penn State as they made their first-ever College Football Playoff and advanced to the semifinals with wins over SMU and Boise State.
It’s not clear who Penn State will choose as his replacement, but this does seem to be a rather significant loss for the Nittany Lions as they look to repeat the strong season they had this season.
