Penn State Football Hires Boston College’s Savon Huggins As Running Backs Coach
Update, January 13, 6:20 p.m.:
Penn State Athletics officially announced Savon Huggins’ hiring as Penn State football’s next running backs coach, per a release.
Original story:
Penn State football is hiring Savon Huggins as the team’s running backs coach, per CBS Sports’ Matt Zenitz. Huggins is making the move from Boston College, where he held the same role.
Huggins, a Jackson, New Jersey, native who played three years at Rutgers from 2011-13, got his first college coaching job as the assistant wide receivers coach at Buffalo in 2020 before becoming the running backs coach at UMass the year after.
In 2022, he took the same job at Boston College, serving in that role for the next four seasons, including the last two under former Penn State head coach Bill O’Brien. In his time there, he coached All-ACC running back Pat Garwo in 2022 and the second-best rushing attack in the ACC in 2023 behind Kye Robichaux.
His best work may have come in 2025, when sophomore Turbo Richard emerged as one of the most dynamic backs in the ACC, racking up 962 scrimmage yards, 5.2 yards per carry, and 11 total touchdowns before transferring to Indiana as one of the best running backs in the transfer portal.
At age 32, Huggins will have big shoes to fill in a rebuild running back room, attempting to follow up the tenures of Ja’Juan Seider and Stan Drayton, who helped future NFL draft picks Kaytron Allen and Nick Singleton become the best running back tandem in program history. The Nittany Lions currently project to have a three-headed monster in the backfield in 2026, prominently featuring returning running back Quinton Martin Jr., Ohio State transfer James Peoples, and Iowa State transfer Carson Hansen.
The hiring of Huggins completes the core positional staff for Matt Campbell’s initial staff at Penn State, as the team has compiled coaches from a variety of different stops, including several Penn State alums, to fill the staff. Before Huggins was hired, Central Michigan running backs coach and Iowa State alum Sheldon Croney Jr. was hired as an assistant running backs coach.
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