Penn State football officially replaces Trace McSorley with Sean Clifford

The Penn State football program has finally found the QB that will replace Trace McSorley. A former four-star recruit, Sean Clifford.

It’s been quite a wild ride to get to this point for Penn State football. Months ago, they were ready to turn the page with the quarterback position as Trace McSorley was off to the 2019 NFL Draft. It didn’t seem like it was going to be this tough to find his replacement though.

Initially, Tommy Stevens was being coached up as McSorley’s eventual replacement. While James Franklin wouldn’t confirm that was the case, there was a really good chance at that happening. However, Stevens wasn’t open to waiting on hearing whether he’s truly McSorley’s successor or not. Therefore, he packed up and left for the SEC.

That left the Nittany Lions with one of two options. Either play the redshirt sophomore, Sean Clifford. Or play the freshman, Will Levis. The decision wouldn’t get made that quickly, though. Just like Coach Franklin told Stevens before he departed, you’ve got to earn the spot in practice.

So both Clifford and Levis were more than open to battling it out in an open competition. Given that Clifford had some seniority over Levis at the position, he garnered most of the first-team reps throughout the summer. However, to get accurate test results on the battle, Levis was issued some QB1 reps as well — he just didn’t get them as frequently as Clifford did.

The decision has been made

Earlier in the week, many expected James Franklin to reveal the decision during his final press conference of training camp. To no surprise, Franklin wouldn’t confirm a winner yet. As a matter of fact, he claimed it wasn’t even discussed as of Tuesday.

Out of nowhere on Friday afternoon though, Penn State football’s Twitter account decided to make the announcement for Franklin. So the account posted a quick summer highlight video of Sean Clifford throughout the summer, naming him QB1 of the Penn State football program.