What went wrong? Part 1

[Black Dean]

I think we can all agree on that it was Tom Osborne going against Bill Byrne’s wishes and announcing Frank Solich as the next head coach instead of doing a proper coaching search.

 

[Goskers07]

I dont think there's any doubt about that. There wasn't a coach in the country that wouldn't have jumped on the job at the time.

 

[jaihawk]

I dont think there's any doubt about that. There wasn't a coach in the country that wouldn't have jumped on the job at the time.

Especially if the old rumor that Byrne really wanted Stoops at the time...

 

[Kaladin]

1. Naming Frank.
2. Recruiting got a little worse.
3. Then we blew up the program and got rid of all of our systems - the offense, the defense, the ST, Husker Power, etc.
4. Then we blew it up again. Pelini came back but he never really built any kind of foundation for the program. No systems were put in place. Everything was about Pelini.
5. Recruiting got worse.
6. We blew it up again. Changed the offense again. Then changed the defense. S&C became an afterthought.
7. Then we blew it up again. New system on offense. Same defense as the year before but we didn't have the personnel. Return to Husker Power S&C system.

 

[Kaladin]

Especially if the old rumor that Byrne really wanted Stoops at the time...

I thought it was Mack Brown that wanted to come here?

 

[Tyneb23]

Mack Brown wanted to come here and Urban Meyer after 2003.

 

[Black Dean]

Mack Brown wanted to come here and Urban Meyer after 2003.

I thought they asked Urban about the Nebraska job after Solich was fired and he said it was insane a coach would be fired after a 9-win season and said he could never coach at a program like that?

 

[lee_carvallo_12]

nothing went wrong. after 20+ years of bowl losses and frustration, Doc Tom summoned Satan and sold his mortal soul for 3 MNC's. in exchange, the devil got TO's soul and DONU would wallow in mediocrity for decades. how else do you explain going from Alabama to Rutgers in less than 10 years? no other way that is possible.

 

[Pipe Line]

Follow up question to OP, would you guys take a Bo Pelini like tenure for Frank and retire here handing the reins to Frost after 20 years of 9-3/10-2 football and NY6 bowl games, knowing what you know now given how some feel about Frank and what people's standards were at the time? Oooooooooorrrrrrrrr go through what we've gone through the last 20 years to where we're at now? But continue to get pissed off about standards of the program.

 

[Pipe Line]

Knowing what we know now, firing Frank is what went wrong in my opinion. I'd take 10-2/9-3 for the last 20 years even if we never made another natty appearance just to avoid some of the shit we've seen.

 

[KidsSeeGhosts]

The Nebraska offense was a house of cards from '98-'02. We didn't have very good RB play after Ahman. We increasingly became super reliant on the QB run game as our only real means of moving the ball and Crouch was never a super good option QB, even if he was a great runner. With a dip in talent, the loss of people like McBride, and a substantial increase in the level of play in the Big 12, we couldn't expect to dominate everyone.

Callahan innovated in the right way in terms of recruiting organization and emphasis, but unfortunately he had a pretty unfriendly college offense and wasn't prepared to to handle the shift to the spread in the B1G. It's pretty annoying that college football made a slowly made wholesale shift to spread run concepts, which we had been dabbling with since Frazier, and instead of staying ahead of the curve w/ a trajectory we were already fucking on we 1. went with Barney fucking Cotton as an OC in '03 and then 2. ran away from an offensive direction that we were naturally attuned to.

The only thing more annoying would be finally getting the offensive direction right, but scrapping that in favor of an offensive shift in the complete opposite direction to try and become Wisconsin lite.

 

[RedSavage]

Knowing what we know now, firing Frank is what went wrong in my opinion. I'd take 10-2/9-3 for the last 20 years even if we never made another natty appearance just to avoid some of the shit we've seen.

I don't think Frank would have been able to sustain that level of success. I think he'd be closer to a .500 level coach (maybe a little above) in a P5 conference. I think making Frank the guy was what went wrong and it all spiraled from there.

 

[Pipe Line]

I don't think Frank would have been able to sustain that level of success. I think he'd be closer to a .500 level coach (maybe a little above) in a P5 conference. I think making Frank the guy was what went wrong and it all spiraled from there.

So let's use this example: Wisconsin in modern day football with spread offenses essentially kicks the shit out of everyone physically, besides Ohio State, because they're Ohio State. And Cockeye is poor man's Wisconsin. Big 10 title game appearances, Rose Bowl appearances, ya know they know what they do and they do it.


Let's insert Frank and the old school option offense into today's football, like Wisconsin, and put us back into the Big 12 where it's all spread and fun and gun. Assuming we're using the same Nebraska formula we had always used, does that knock equal 9-3/10-2 in today's Big 12?

 

[RedSavage]

So let's use this example: Wisconsin in modern day football with spread offenses essentially kicks the shit out of everyone physically, besides Ohio State, because they're Ohio State. And Cockeyes is poor man's Wisconsin. Big 10 title game appearances, Rose Bowl appearances, ya know they know what they do and they do it.


Let's insert Frank and the old school option offense into today's football, like Wisconsin, and put us back into the Big 12 where it's all spread and fun and gun. Assuming we're using the same Nebraska formula we had always used, does that knock equal 9-3/10-2 in today's Big 12?

If we ran it like Wiscy, probably. The biggest question I would have is would Frank recruit the horses to run it like Wisconsin? He sure wasn't when he took over.

 

[KidsSeeGhosts]

So let's use this example: Wisconsin in modern day football with spread offenses essentially kicks the shit out of everyone physically, besides Ohio State, because they're Ohio State. And Cockeyes is poor man's Wisconsin. Big 10 title game appearances, Rose Bowl appearances, ya know they know what they do and they do it.


Let's insert Frank and the old school option offense into today's football, like Wisconsin, and put us back into the Big 12 where it's all spread and fun and gun. Assuming we're using the same Nebraska formula we had always used, does that knock equal 9-3/10-2 in today's Big 12?

Callahan is more likely to get you to that level than Solich was IMO.

 

[BingoDingo]

What's part 2 going to be about?

 

[Pipe Line]

If we ran it like Wiscy, probably. The biggest question I would have is would Frank recruit the horses to run it like Wisconsin? He sure wasn't when he took over.

Do you think Frost could recruit to run it like Wisky? I think so.

 

[Pipe Line]

Callahan is more likely to get you to that level than Solich was IMO.

But he didn't......

 

[Black Dean]

What's part 2 going to be about?

cocaine and waffles

 

[Driveway Jordan]

Especially if the old rumor that Byrne really wanted Stoops at the time...

Mack Brown, who was at NC at the time, was his first choice. We chose Frank, Mack went to Texas...the rest is history.