In a four minute span on Wednesday afternoon, the Penn State football team landed two new position coaches. Ricky Rahne and Josh Gattis both announced on Twitter that they’ll be joining the Nittany Lions coach staff. Rahne will serve as the quarterbacks coach, Gattis will coach the wide receivers.

Rahne served as Vanderbilt’s quarterback coach for three seasons. Under his guidance, Vanderbilt quarterback Austyn Carta-Samuels completed 68.7 percent of his passes, the best completion rate for the Commodores in 60 years. James Franklin and Rahne go way back: Rahne was an offensive graduate assistant at Kansas State when Franklin was the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach there in 2006 and 2007. Rahne will replace Charlie Fisher, who left the program in December.

#We are … PENN STATE! pic.twitter.com/sxsrARqOoV

— Ricky Rahne (@RickyRahne) January 15, 2014

Another previous Vanderbilt coach, Gattis was the Commodore’s wide receivers coach for the past two seasons. Under his tutelage, Jordan Matthews rose to fame as one of the most prolific receivers in team  and conference history, catching 206 balls for 2,800 yards and 15 touchdowns in two seasons under Gattis. Before arriving at Vanderbilt in 2011, Gattis assumed the same position at Western Michigan. At both Vanderbilt and Western Michigan, Gattis molded his players into All-Americans, in the span of only two years. Gattis will take over for previous wide receiver coach Stan Hixon, who joined Bill O’Brien’s staff with the Houston Texans.

It’s time to bring Championship’s to The Penn State University! Its going down! #WeAre #OneTeam pic.twitter.com/b4HCjOXxQ6

— Josh Gattis (@thenewVUgattis) January 15, 2014

While not all of the issues in Penn State’s aerial attack have been resolved — the team still needs to find a suitable replacement for Allen Robinson — it now knows what two coaches will be tasked with leading the Nittany Lion passing game into the future.

About the Author

Ben Berkman

State College, PA

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