It’s typically a good thing when a true freshman is good enough to play meaningful snaps for your team. That’s absolutely the case with Jackson Ford, whom D’Anton Lynn confirmed on Tuesday is going to be a part of the edge-rusher rotation going forward after he played 18 snaps in Week 3. And it’s especially notable for a player who signed with Penn State prior to Matt Campbell being hired and who is a bit of found money in Campbell’s 2026 class.
However, aside from a few notable exceptions of first-year superstars, their snaps often carry a bit of a negative flip side. That’s probably also true for Ford, whose rise up the depth chart shines a spotlight on a position where Campbell and general manager Derek Hoodjer probably overestimated their depth this offseason.
Matt Campbell didn’t do enough at edge to convert from 3-3-5 to 4-2-5
When Matt Campbell left Iowa State for Happy Valley, he brought most of his coaching staff from Ames with him. However, his longtime defensive coordinator Jon Heacock, who famously ran the 3-3-5 defense, opted to retire. That forced Campbell to make an outside hire, landing on Lynn, a former Nittany Lion who left USC, and transitioning to Penn State’s traditional 4-2-5, which Lynn has always run.
That transition meant that while most of the Iowa State offense could easily transition under offensive coordinator Taylor Mouser, former Cyclones on the other side of the ball didn’t have it that easy. That’s not just learning a new scheme either; it's body types as well.
Lynn and Campbell hired Ikaika Malloe as defensive line coach, and he spearheaded an overhaul of the interior defensive line, moving away from the undersized gap-shooters Deion Barnes favored for 300+-pound run stuffers. That also moved any remaining tweeners to the edge, a position that Penn State didn’t address much beyond retention.
The two biggest moves at defensive end were bringing back Max Granville and Yvan Kemajou. The staff clearly bet on those two young players making a jump, and it doesn’t help that Granville is now out for the season. However, there clearly wasn’t enough behind them.
Campbell and Hoodjer transitioned former Cyclone Ikenna Ezeogu to the edge, a move that has taken some time, and added Alex McPherson from Colorado. That looked to be a thin rotation, but they professed confidence right up until they moved linebacker Caleb Bacon to the edge in fall camp. Now, Bacon is a full-time starter opposite Kemajou, and Ford has worked his way into the mix.
That means Penn State’s current edge rotation heading into Big Ten play in Week 4 includes a true freshman, a former linebacker, and a former interior defensive lineman (two if you count Liam Andrews along with Ezeogu). That might be a problem, especially when the defensive tackle group is built to eat blocks and keep linebackers free in the run game, rather than penetrate the backfield.
D’Anton Lynn is familiar with an underperforming edge room
The good news is that Lynn has been here before. Just last season, USC ranked No. 118 in pressure rate despite having the 29th-highest blitz rate on passing downs. That’s not great, and USC’s defense ranked No. 73 in points per drive, so it was far from an elite unit, but at least he generally understands the levers he needs to pull to try to create anything resembling a dangerous pass rush.
And there’s no guarantee that this will be an underperforming group. It hasn’t been dominant against lesser competition so far, but the first three weeks were largely a preseason for Penn State, as players like Ezeogu and Bacon work through a considerable learning curve at a new position and Kemajou adjusts to being the primary focus of an offense’s protection plan. So it could get better.
If it doesn’t, though, and Lynn is forced to rely heavily on the blitz, it could be a lower ceiling on this defense than anyone expected, and for all his exciting talent, Ford probably isn’t going to help the Nittany Lions smash through that, at least not in 2026.
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