Earlier in this stream, we noted tweets from some Penn State reporters with the team in Dallas who talked to acting athletic director David Joyner on Thursday night about the football program's coaching search during the team's dinner at Gilley's
Now, thanks to Nate Bauer of BWI, we can offer you some more full comments. Click on the link for Bauer's full transcript.
In summary, Joyner told reporters that the search for Joe Paterno's replacement is where he thought it would be at this point. He used the words "purposeful" and "deliberate" to describe the process before offering this when asked about the number of candidates interviewed.
"I don't want to give you an exact number, but I'll just say it's been a fair number of people," Joyner said. "It's more than one and less than 40. How's that?"
Well then...
Joyner dismissed a theory that has popped up on message boards in recent weeks that Penn State has its man and is simply waiting until after the bowl game to name a replacement. He also said it "would be nice" to have a coach in place for the upcoming three-week open recruiting period that begins on Jan. 4, but he won't rush the process for it, either. He said the committee is not finished conducting interviews.
He was then asked, generally, why the search is taking so long.
"Because we're looking at people in a systematic way and looking for some very important qualities that this program has been known for for many, many years," Joyner said. "I'm not saying that there aren't other programs out there that are high quality, I'm not saying that about anything else, but we have a very special place that has been for a long time and we want to continue being a special place like we have been. I feel like rather than speed, it's more important there's accuracy."
For the latest on the Penn State coaching search, stay tuned to SB Nation Pittsburgh.