The Solich Curse

Again, keep in mind that the Frank Solich firing had a lot to do with personal Frank Solich off-the-field issues, not just the record he was keeping on the football field.

Could have been handled better, but there wasn't a pretty way out of it.

And of the candidates available in 2003 not named Callahan, I can't say we whiffed on an obvious choice. Houston Nutt? Turner Gill?

PR wise it would have been simple to stick with Pelini in '03. Some thought he might not be well-seasoned for head coaching and recruiting at the time, and that debate continues....

 
Guy Chamberlin said:
Again, keep in mind that the Frank Solich firing had a lot to do with personal Frank Solich off-the-field issues, not just the record he was keeping on the football field.

Could have been handled better, but there wasn't a pretty way out of it.

And of the candidates available in 2003 not named Callahan, I can't say we whiffed on an obvious choice. Houston Nutt? Turner Gill?

PR wise it would have been simple to stick with Pelini in '03. Some thought he might not be well-seasoned for head coaching and recruiting at the time, and that debate continues....
Click to expand...
Horse crap!

Nobody from the program made a big deal of anything off the field. (as they shouldn't have) Not saying that it wasn't a factor or even the deciding factor. But, to say there wasn't a "pretty" way out of it is crap.

All he had to do was to say..."We thank Frank for his service but we need to head in another direction. We think there is talent here to win and the ability to bring in even more talent."

Instead, Peddy thought it necessary to tear down absolutely everything that came before him and build "his" program in his own image.

 
accountability said:
Guy Chamberlin said:
And of the candidates available in 2003 not named Callahan, I can't say we whiffed on an obvious choice. Houston Nutt? Turner Gill?
Click to expand...
Was Urban Meyer not contacted at that point? My memory of that period is very shaky and I've been under the assumption for years that he was.
Click to expand...
We did go after Urban Meyer. He also denied to offer, and said something to the point of "Why would anyone go to a school, where they just fired a winning coach?" That is not the exact quote, but relatively close.

 
HuskerNationNick said:
accountability said:
Guy Chamberlin said:
And of the candidates available in 2003 not named Callahan, I can't say we whiffed on an obvious choice. Houston Nutt? Turner Gill?
Click to expand...
Was Urban Meyer not contacted at that point? My memory of that period is very shaky and I've been under the assumption for years that he was.
Click to expand...
We did go after Urban Meyer. He also denied to offer, and said something to the point of "Why would anyone go to a school, where they just fired a winning coach?" That is not the exact quote, but relatively close.
Click to expand...
That's not quite it - I think that's where 10 years of Nebraska spin can get something blown up. We didn't "go after" Urban. Peterson was after an NFL coach pretty much from the get-go.

http://www.cbssports...l/story/6949457

It seems obvious now that Pederson is pursuing an NFL coach or one still involved in a bowl game. But who? Kansas City offensive coordinator Al Saunders? Pittsburgh coach Bill Cowher? Nick Saban? Utah's Urban Meyer? Oklahoma offensive coordinator Chuck Long, a name that has largely been ignored?
Click to expand...
Here's his recollection of it more recently from Urban. I'm sure 20 other coaches were contacted with "feelers" like this as well. Same goes for when Tom was searching...nothing serious ever game of it. No offer, no decline. Saban wasn't coming here if we'd won 3 games and fired Solich.

We actually were contacted by a third party. Not directly. I remember thinking about it. I had such great respect for Solich — he's an Ohio guy who's a good friend of mine — and I didn't agree with everything that went down. He won 10 games that year, right? That was alarming to me. I'm a coach, and whenever I see that happening to a coach, I think there's got to be something behind Door No. 1 to fire him after he won 10 games. I remember having great respect for the school but being concerned about what happened — and why it happened. If 10 games isn't good enough, I'm not sure what is.
Click to expand...
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Oh definitely

BigRedBuster said:
Guy Chamberlin said:
Again, keep in mind that the Frank Solich firing had a lot to do with personal Frank Solich off-the-field issues, not just the record he was keeping on the football field.

Could have been handled better, but there wasn't a pretty way out of it.

And of the candidates available in 2003 not named Callahan, I can't say we whiffed on an obvious choice. Houston Nutt? Turner Gill?

PR wise it would have been simple to stick with Pelini in '03. Some thought he might not be well-seasoned for head coaching and recruiting at the time, and that debate continues....
Click to expand...
Horse crap!

Nobody from the program made a big deal of anything off the field. (as they shouldn't have) Not saying that it wasn't a factor or even the deciding factor. But, to say there wasn't a "pretty" way out of it is crap.

All he had to do was to say..."We thank Frank for his service but we need to head in another direction. We think there is talent here to win and the ability to bring in even more talent."
Click to expand...
Which essentially says the talent to win is already here (loser!) we want somebody to bring in even more talent (loser!) and "another direction" means a coach who can do better than a 10 - 3 season (loser!). And we can't tell the college football world the real reason for firing a winning coach and will be using the language our lawyers approved. If there remains a bit of animosity aimed at Frank Solich in this dismissal, it's because Frank bears some responsibility for putting the University in this position.

Like I said, not pretty.

And yeah, it's not like every available coach was ours for the taking. Many potential candidates made it clear via backchannels that they weren't interested in the job, saving us the embarrassment, but leading to a pretty small field of good options as the season approached.

I don't know that Peddy only had his eye on a pro coach. My understanding is that he went hard for Houston Nutt and waved a lot of money at him. After a few too many public rejections, having a guy available who coached a Super Bowl team the year before was a defensible option, but the choice of Cally always had a whiff of last-second panic.

 
Who said anything about lawyers? My point is there are ways to handle this that motivates the players and sets up the incoming coach for success. Peddy failed in absolutely every area of doing this.

I don't give a flying rip about telling the football world exaclty why someone was fired. Quite frankly, it is none of their business and it really isn't even the business of the fans even though most think it is.

 
BigRedBuster said:
Who said anything about lawyers?
Click to expand...
I did.

BigRedBuster said:
I don't give a flying rip about telling the football world exaclty why someone was fired. Quite frankly, it is none of their business and it really isn't even the business of the fans even though most think it is.
Click to expand...
But it is the business of lawyers, which is why I brought it up.

There were marginally better ways to have handled it, but none of them were great. Nebraska had just fired one of the most successful coaches in college football after a 9 - 3 season and prior to a bowl game. It clearly didn't help our coaching search. But the truth may have had a lawsuit attached.

 
Back
Top