Matt Campbell’s rise to Penn State

On Christmas mornings while growing up in Northeast Ohio, Matt and Scott Campbell were excited to fulfill what became a yearly tradition. Most kids raced toward the Christmas tree to open presents and celebrate the holiday, but not the two brothers, who were born four years apart. They raced out the door to get a football game in, even when snow covered the ground.

Those games were one-on-one, mano a mano. Matt “had quite an impressive [size] advantage on me,” Scott said. The memory proved instructive of his older brother’s competitiveness, as Matt steps into his third college football head coaching job.

“It was not uncommon to get your favorite football jersey for a Christmas present. And then Riddell was giving out all those football uniforms that came with shoulder pads, leg pants, and helmets,” Scott Campbell told The Inquirer of his earliest football memories with Matt. “Then you go outside [to play against Matt].

“I never won these games.”

Football runs deep for the Campbells. Rick Campbell, Matt and Scott’s father, was a high school coach at Jackson High School in Massillon, Ohio, and later went into administration.

The sport quickly became the center of Matt’s life, too.

He would attend two-a-days with his dad before his school day started.

“My greatest childhood memories are being in the locker room and being on the football field with my dad, watching him lead and coach a football team,” Matt Campbell told The Inquirer in July. “I wanted to help give back and make a difference [as a coach] because so many people had done that for me.”

From those early days in their backyard, to stops at Pittsburgh and Mount Union as a player, then coach, and several other stops before landing his highest-profile opportunity yet at Penn State, Campbell has remained the same, his former teammates, players, and coaches across his 24-year coaching career say.

“Anybody that knew younger Matt or played with him or crossed paths with him, I don’t think anybody is surprised [by] the success he’s had,” Indianapolis Colts tight end coach Tom Manning said by phone shortly after Campbell was hired at Penn State. “Obviously, he’s a very good football guy in terms of X’s and O’s, but I think the thing that makes Matt dynamic is his ability to inspire others, certainly a great teacher, but he has this ability to have a relationship with everybody that is authentic and real.

“He creates this culture of unification, of toughness, of having a chip on your shoulder. And I think that every person that’s ever played [in] his football program or coached for him, they just feel like they’re part of something a little bit bigger than themselves.”

Campbell, now 46, developed into a standout defensive end at Perry High School in the 1990s. Matt was coached there by Keith Wakefield, who is “as inspirational as anybody in his life,” Scott said.

Out of high school, he accepted a scholarship from Pitt, but after the team went 2-9 his freshman season in 1998, he transferred to Division III Mount Union — a move that not only defined his playing and coaching career, but moved him closer to home.

Campbell won three D-III titles from 1999 to 2002 at Mount Union, was named an All-American twice, and was the Ohio Athletic Conference defensive lineman of the year in back-to-back years in 2001 and 2002. But it was during his playing days there, under legendary coach Larry Kehres and alongside lifelong friends and coaching contemporaries, where Campbell first showed an inkling toward his future career.

“The connection of understanding the value of ‘People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care,’ and you go back and you say, ‘Man, why? What made the great coaches that you had impactful in your life?’” Campbell said. “It was a transformational experience rather than a transactional journey. And you’re talking about two of the winningest coaches in the history of Ohio high school football, and certainly in all of college football [in Wakefield and Kehres].

“I think their greatest gift was their gift to connect … and find a way to help make their players better, because their belief [of], ‘Man, they cared about them and they wanted to have a real relationship with them.’ So I think that foundation has been huge.”

Often understated about Campbell’s background is how impactful he was on the field for the perennial title contender. His 182 assisted tackles and 55 tackles for loss rank fourth in school history, his 26 career sacks are seventh, and he is 19th in total tackles (256).

His on-field success, though, was anchored by film study. Campbell would know “the play that was coming by whether it was the formation or certain motions that they do into the boundaries, and he was calling the plays out,” said Scott, who joined his older brother on Mount Union’s football team in 2002. Campbell’s teammates also took notice.

“All of them knew the way that Matt prepared for football games was abnormal,” Scott said.

But what made what Matt was doing abnormal?

“I don’t think it’s uncommon for a player to be obsessed at watching film,” Scott said. “Some people get really good at honing their skills and they want to do it. It’s abnormal when they bring people along with them. So when you might get a kid, like a very talented defensive tackle … and some of these guys that he played with, they’re meeting on a Sunday night and doing hard core [film study] because they want to be ready for the next week.

He was a guy that was probably more talented than most of the people that he played, and he still had the work ethic and the attention to detail as a player that I think helped him separate himself even further.

“When you have gravitational pull to bring the people that either you’re leading, which we are seeing it with him as a coach, or the ones that you’re going to war with as a football player … for them to match your intensity, they were buying into that and they saw, ‘Well, Campbell’s doing that. We have to do it.’”

Added Manning, Matt’s teammate for two years at Mount Union: “He was always in the film room. He was always trying to find an edge, in terms of being a player, and he was a guy that was probably more talented than most of the people that he played, and he still had the work ethic and the attention to detail as a player that I think helped him separate himself even further.”

When Campbell finished his playing career at Mount Union in 2002, he went to Bowling Green to work as a graduate assistant, but returned to Mount Union in 2005 and was its offensive coordinator and offensive line coach for the next two seasons.

The program won back-to-back titles, with a staff that included Eagles coach Nick Sirianni (2004 to 2005), Campbell’s college teammate and former roommate, as defensive backs coach in that first year. Connecticut coach Jason Candle (2003 to 2008), another former teammate, and Syracuse defensive coordinator Vince Kehres (2000 to 2019), Larry Kehres’ son, were on the staff both seasons.

Campbell returned to Bowling Green for two more seasons before landing at Toledo in 2009, first as an offensive line coach and run game coordinator. By 2012, he was the program’s head coach at 32 years old, making him the FBS’s youngest coach at the time.

What impressed Manning, who also worked at Toledo as a graduate assistant (2009) and later as its director of football operations and offensive line coach, was how quickly Campbell connected with players and recruits.

“What I really recognized the most was that he was different in recruiting, [he had a] dynamic personality, but I was always impressed, and probably what stuck out the most was that when he had recruits, whether up on campus or visiting him, he had a real relationship with a ton of kids,” Manning said. “I was like, ‘Man, I don’t understand how this guy after just a couple brief contacts, has the ability to know so much about him, have real conversations with him.’ … I knew Matt as a younger guy, and now I knew him in the professional world. I was like, ‘Man, the biggest thing about Matt is he’s just as authentic as he was the day that I met him.’”

And that started with his own teammates. Mount Union was “a player-led program,” and Campbell — along with other leaders like Sirianni, Candle, and Kehres — would open their house and “nurture the young kids because that’s the next generation of leaders in that program.”

“That’s what that whole program was,” Scott said. “It was a program that was giving way before we even knew it was giving to us.”

Matt Campbell worked closely with Candle, who followed him to Toledo in 2009 as slot receivers/tight ends coach, especially when the former assumed play-calling duties under Tim Beckman.

Candle, who considers Campbell a “true friend” and a “great mentor,” recalled the early “camaraderie of the young assistant coaches that we had at the time.”

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“Lots of times you don’t get to work with or alongside with or for your college teammates,” Candle said. “And we’ve been through a lot of battles together as players and certainly as young assistant coaches. [Matt’s] been a guy that I’ve learned a lot of football from and a guy that has certainly earned to write to lead one of the top programs in the country.”

Campbell went 9-4 in his first season leading Toledo, and he compiled a 35-15 overall record before moving on to Iowa State at 36 years old.

Campbell “surrounded himself with young and hungry people,” Manning said, particularly on his offensive staffs at Toledo — which featured future Cincinnati coach Scott Satterfield, future Auburn coach Alex Golesh, and Candle. But it was Campbell “doing things the right way” and never being “anybody that he’s not” that stood out.

“Working for him is was one of the greatest experiences of my life,” said Manning, who worked with Campbell for a total of 12 years between Toledo and Iowa State. “You felt like you were doing something. … You were coaching the whole player. It was about character. It was about teaching kids attitude and effort, the ability to be consistent, and to give a little bit more themselves and to play in a unified front — that’s what he does so well.”

In the 10 years before Campbell took over Iowa State, the program had just one winning season and had finished with more than seven wins once since 2000.

He accomplished those milestones by Year 2. In 2017, the Cyclones went 8-5, their best record in 16 years, and upset No. 3 Oklahoma, 38-31, a memory that is forever etched in the mind of Manning, who was the team’s offensive coordinator and offensive line coach.

“That week, we kind of put in a whole new defense,” Manning said. “We had our middle linebacker who [also] was a quarterback. He played about 40% of the snaps at quarterback. He’s playing both ways. We got a walk-on quarterback who essentially ends up winning us the game, and [Matt’s] belief the whole week, his belief during the game, never wavered. A lot of guys tell themselves like, ‘Hey, we’re going to win this game.’ My man thought we’re going to win the game the entire week, and then we end up winning the game.

“… And to me, it was culture over scheme. Maybe our players collectively weren’t as talented and as good, but, ‘Hey, if we’re united, we have this culture of winning, we do things the right way.’”

That unwavering belief was reflected by his players, too. Among them was former Iowa State quarterback Brock Purdy, a four-year starter who could sense Campbell’s “loyalty” and praised his former coach “who had a vision for [him in] place.”

“Coach Campbell’s coaching style is huge on culture. It’s important because he sets up an organization that is able to withstand adversity, the good, the bad,” said Purdy, who’s now the San Francisco 49ers starting quarterback. “And it’s all about being a real team that trusts in each other, goes through things with each other. And then at the end of the day, he is going to prepare us better than anybody in the country in terms of scheme and making sure our bodies are right for a long season.”

Those Iowa State teams often punched above their weight. Campbell’s highest-ranked recruiting class with the Cyclones was the Class of 2026, which was 48th before he departed for Penn State, taking much of that class with him.

Wide receiver Xavier Hutchinson, who played three seasons at Iowa State from 2020 to 22, said Campbell recruited players that were “like-minded.”

“Everybody went to Iowa State either because you were underlooked, you weren’t valued, or just people thought [other players] were better,” said Hutchinson, who’s now on the Houston Texans with four other former Cyclones who played for Campbell. “We all had like a dog mentality — and I felt like that’s Coach Campbell’s mentality. It’s like the rough side of the mountain. … He wanted guys who have something to prove and had a chip on their shoulder.”

There were plenty of highs in his 10-year run at Iowa State: Two Big 12 championship appearances (2020, 2024), the most wins in a two-year stretch (19 wins across 2024 and 2025) and double-digit wins for the first time in program history, 12 of his 17 Associated Press Top 25 wins came in that time frame, and he became the program’s winningest coach.

Even in the down years — Campbell and Iowa State missed bowl games just twice in 10 years, once in his debut season (2016) and another in 2022 — Hutchinson says his former coach “never let the success or the failures define him as a coach.”

“He’s taken them all on the chin,” Hutchinson said. “When we’ve had the greatest success, he was there. He still had the same motto even when we started [struggling] a little bit. He was still the same guy every day. And I think when your head coach is the same guy, and he doesn’t get frazzled by the success or the failures — it’s going to bleed into the into the team.”

Campbell will emerge from the Beaver Stadium tunnel for the first time this weekend, marking the next chapter for him and the program. His team has 24 former Iowa State players who followed him to Happy Valley.

At the root of his confidence in leading Toledo, Iowa State, and now Penn State is what he learned from his father, Wakefield, and Kehres, his coaching mentors: “Not trying to be somebody else.”

“I love learning. I love being humble and growing, but I’m just trying to be me, the best version of me,” Campbell said. “What I found is we’ve been able to build trust, loyalty, togetherness in our football program, whether it was at Toledo, whether it’s at Iowa State, and obviously that’ll be a great challenge as we build this Penn State program.

“The attitude and the effort and the consistency to show up every day, and be able to be the same person every day, and allowing your staff and the players on the team to know exactly what they’re going to get … I think those are what I learned and took as a player and a coach from [Kehres and Wakefield], and it’s what I’ve tried to emulate everywhere I’ve been as a football coach.”

His former players, Purdy, Hutchinson, and offensive lineman James Neal III, have no doubts Campbell is ”going to give [Penn State] everything he has" to help it reach new heights. It beings with Marshall on Saturday (3:30 p.m., FS1).

Scott, who joined Wakefield at a Penn State practice on Aug. 13, says his older brother is doing “what he loves.” And it’s why he believes Campbell has sustained success throughout his career.

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“If somehow you’re able to get, say, the 400, 500 people that at some point came across Matt Campbell at Mount Union College that played with him or whatever, I would probably say in the high 95 percentile range, every one of them would have told you he was going to be a head coach and a successful head coach at some point,” Scott said. “Matt’s elite trait that he has is that he is beyond competitive.

“He just doesn’t say, ‘We’re going to do this’ because why else would you do it? No. Matt envisions this and believes it. He’s not going to tell you if he doesn’t [believe it.].”