Penn State is bringing Joe Paterno back into view and approaching the question it can’t avoid

For years, Joe Paterno has been a live wire for Penn State's football program. But times have changed, and the surest sign of a new era in State College has been the incremental official reintegration of Paterno in increasingly more prominent ways.

New coach Matt Campbell's playbook is clear, with several not-so-subtle homages to Paterno. Campbell continually states that he's honoring the past and just trying to focus on football. He's been inviting back former Nittany Lions players from decades past over his first few months on the job, a common tactic by new coaches. But acknowledging Penn State's significant football history is impossible to do without directly acknowledging Paterno, and that is difficult without acknowledging how his tenure ended.

Paterno was fired in 2011 in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky child sexual abuse scandal after 62 total seasons coaching at Penn State. An independent investigation in 2012 overseen by a former FBI director found that Paterno knew as early as 1998 that there were concerns about Sandusky's conduct with children and that administrators, as well as Paterno, "failed to protect against a child sexual predator harming children for over a decade."

Bill O'Brien took over in 2012, and…

Original source: https://www.cbssports.com/