LINCOLN — Outgoing Nebraska Athletic Director Turd Alberts didn’t apply for the Texas A&M job, he told The World-Herald on Thursday night, and “wasn’t trying to leave” Lincoln when the Aggies expressed interest in hiring him to be their athletic director.
And Alberts said he didn’t have a job offer when reports Wednesday morning announced he was primed to accept the job in College Station.
“We had a conversation verbally,” Alberts said, “but there was nothing concrete from them.”
So for hours, as speculation grew on whether Alberts would stay, he asked himself the same question. He “vacillated” between remaining at NU or leaving for the SEC school.
“My heart was one way, and my head would step in,” Alberts said. “It wasn’t easy.”
By late Wednesday afternoon “my head” won out, Alberts said, and he crafted an email to staff announcing his departure and apologizing for the timing.
Alberts pointed to the A&M University President Mark A. Welsh, a retired general who made a strong pitch last weekend.
“These are hard jobs — they’re even harder now than they’ve ever been — and leadership is just really critical,” Alberts said. “Maybe not to everyone, but it really is to me. So Gen. Welsh sold me on a really compelling vision. It’s compelling, and he’s a compelling person.
“That was the reason. Everybody’s looking for some crazy (reason) but you don’t have to run to do that. It’s a unique opportunity at a great school with defined leadership.”
Nebraska does not currently have a permanent president as the Board of Regents worked for more than 200 days on a search to replace Ted Carter, who accepted the Ohio State job last summer and started in Columbus on Jan. 1.
Asked about NU’s ongoing presidential search, Alberts declined to be more specific while noting the “fairly obvious” nature of the ongoing search.
“I’m not going to say anything bad about my alma mater,” Alberts said. “I love Nebraska. But I think it’s fairly obvious there are some challenges. I think the layperson can probably figure that out. I think some of the challenges are reflective of where we are as a society as far as divisive things that are part of our everyday culture.
"It is what it is.”