James Franklin going with just three scholarship quarterbacks early at Penn State’s spring practice

The quarterback competition this spring at Penn State is limited to three scholarship players, with incumbent starter Sean Clifford showing his talents to Mike Yurcich, his fourth offensive coordinator since he first arrived at Happy Valley in 2017.

The rest of the field consists of redshirt sophomore Ta’Quan Roberson, who has appeared in just two games and has thrown one pass in his first two years in the program, and freshman Christian Veilleux, who enrolled early and reported to campus in January.

Head coach James Franklin has said that he would not be reluctant to look for a quarterback in the NCAA transfer portal but it had to be the right fit, “a guy that can come in and compete and who has some experience.”

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For now, Franklin will work during the 15 spring football practice sessions with the group he has although one of his concerns is having the other quarterbacks provided some competition to Clifford, who has started 20 games the last two seasons.

“We’ve got to make sure we have a two and a three that we feel good about,” Franklin said Wednesday in a Zoom call with reporters. “Also you’d like to get to a point where your two is truly competing and pushing your starter. So all those things are important and I think this spring will help with that, but if I had to guess, that will go into fall camp as well.”

Franklin said the 5-foot-11, 196-pound Roberson has been showing more consistency in the opening stages. Veilleux, a 6-4, 204-pound native of Canada who attended high school in Maryland, “is pretty far along for a true freshman in terms of being able to operate what we’re asking him to do,” the coach said.

Will Levis, who spent two seasons as Clifford’s backup, starting two games, transferred to Kentucky after the season ended.

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Clifford got off to a horrendous start in 2020, committing 10 turnovers in his first five games, all losses, marking Penn State’s first 0-5 start in program history. The Nittany Lions won their last four games with Clifford turning the ball over only twice. He ended the season with nine interceptions and three lost fumbles.

Franklin said Clifford has impressed him in the early going.

“He’s a vet. He’s a smart guy. He asks really good questions,” he said. “He’s had a lot of success and he’s had a lot of adversity and with that comes maturity, comes wisdom, comes experience. He’s a guy that really wants to be good and really works at it, both mentally and physically. I think coach Yurcich has been pretty impressed with him in terms of his ability to take information from the meetings and transfer it to the field.”

Yurcich was hired by Franklin in January after spending the 2020 season as offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Texas. The head coach said Yurcich has shown “an aggressive personality” as both a coach and a play-caller.

“He’s got almost a mad scientist kind of way about him, which I like,” Franklin said. “I don’t think there’s a play or a scheme that he doesn’t like. … He’s got a really good way about him and he coaches the guys hard and he’s aggressive on the field, but he’s also aggressive in scheme.”