Steve Peterson first force Solich to fire several long time assistant coaches which Solich did. Then he fired Solich a coach with a record of 59 wins 19 loses a year latter (Frost record 13-21) . Then Peterson according to him did not want to turn the big twelve over to Texas and Oklahoma so he hired Bill Calahan. Bill Calahan may be the best offensive line coach ever in football in developing a offensive line for a excellent rushing attack. Bill Calahan a track record of having a offensive line with a excellent rushing attack was coming to Nebraska which football program was known and having a team built around a strong rushing attack. So what does Peterson plans for Nebraska is to scrap the rushing team and turn Nebraska into a passing team. The results are in Solich went to two bcs bowls and played for the national championship and in the 19 years since Nebraska fired Solich has never been to a bcs and in several national predictions this year
is picked to finish 14th place in the big ten this year a conference with 14 teams.
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Yes, I agree with Nono here. No doubt the program would be better off than it is now had Frank just continued to coach. The program now is in one of it's all time lows so it's easy to look back and assume better.
At 115-82 (58% winning) Solich was Ohio's all time best coach so I think it worked out well for him. But he also never won a conference title and was 5-6 in bowl games. In 15 full seasons he never had less than 4 losses and had double digit wins once. 6 times he won 9 games or more. Any of the best coaches from non-power five schools generally do something relatively quickly and move on with great success at a power five school. Whether he was courted much to other schools, I don't know. But it seems he and the Bobcats had a good, long term relationship that was successful enough for both sides.
Frank's problem is he did not recruit well and was so predictable on offense. While it is true that he was in fact the best coach Nebraska has had since Tom, I do not think the Huskers would have progressed any further under him. Billy brought the "West Coast Offense " to Nebraska. I remember the spring game during his first year and it was a pass first offense from the get go IMO. Since then, I think they have remained a pass first team. It seems I remember important people saying we have to be able to pass because rushing the ball is not the way of the future. Heck, this year we have heard that the staff wants our RB's to average three yards a carry? That's not even funny.
If it wasn't for broken pass plays and AM scrambling abilities, we wouldn't even have a rushing game. The sad thing is, other programs seem to excel after a change is made and we just keep stumbling, bumbling and fumbling along even after spending 35 Million I think.
Really is this mrs steve peterson by any chance. you are one of these fans who makes things up. no one ever said anything of the nature that harvey perlman hired steve peterson to fire frank solich. is this mrs peterson
This is from the basement of the Huskerspot archives:
"More ominously, Chancellor Harvey Perlman hired Steve Pederson as athletic director with the understanding that Pederson would fire Solich. In response to the disappointing 2002 season, Solich shook up his staff and hired some young, promising assistant coaches. Bo Pelini, Barney Cotton and Marvin Sanders joined the Nebraska staff in early 2003."
Let's remember Pederson was a Tool not the handler!