Nebraska Potluck: The Once and Future King?

Here it is, Day Two of Nebraska Scott Frost Week! We hope you’re enjoying it—we know our neighbors to the east certainly are!

Speaking of enjoyment, it would be remiss of us when discussing “The Once and Future King” to not speak of the Runza. Yes, we talk about it during every potluck, but it truly is the King of Nebraska-specific cuisine. Perfectly seasoned beef tucked into a warm pocket of dough makes it a great anytime meal, but an especially perfect gameday accompaniment—it keeps your hands warm while you eat it (pro tip for those visiting Memorial Stadium in November).

Does this make Scott Frost the Runza of football coaches? To be honest, I’m not really sure what that would mean, but sure, let’s go with it. But what we really wanted to know today was:

Is Scott Frost the once and future King? AKA, was this a good hire for Nebraska, and how do you see this panning out for everyone’s favorite team in red?

Andrew Kreasflkajseroasndfasski: Welllll...if Nebraska doesn’t intend to build its future by avenging/reliving its past, hiring a former player may not have been the way to go.

MNWildcat:

Andrew Kreasflkajseroasndfasski: Read a book sometime, thou Philistine.

Dead Read: Is Frost the once and future king? A whole lot of people hope so. Nebby could not have done better. He fulfills a visionary compact (literary criticism, fun!) for husker fans - he links the legend of Osborne to the future of Frost, bridging a time of turmoil to support or reinforce a shared (if mythical) identity. What do I like MOST about him? I like how me makes me feel about myself.

Creighton: Maybe? Frost seems like more of a sure thing than a lot of other coaches to come to the Big Ten from outside the Power-5, but also his resume is razor thin. He’s only been a head coach for 26 games, but those are 26 games that include 19 wins and a claimed national championship from a team that went 0-12 the year before he arrived. I think ultimately he’ll be successful in Lincoln, but my dream scenario is the one where he goes 9-4 for three or four years in a row and fans have to tiptoe around the Bo Pelini shaped elephant in the room because Frost is a nice guy and a local hero.

Boilerman31: If you want the cynical answer, all you need to hear are the words “Darrell Hazell”.

Look, Frost is the sexy candidate. He’s the one Husker fans were all but begging for. That said, he was only at UCF for two seasons, right? The question is whether or not he would’ve sustained the turnaround he made or was it just a fart in a skillet? (Ed. Note: I’m not at all sure what a “fart in a skillet” is or why it would occur. Indiana is a strange place, friends.)

WhiteSpeedReciever: Look, it’s pretty obvious that a B1G school that hires a kid that grew up in the conference footprint and recently went undefeated in conference play in a smaller league is the answer. That’s why so many of us are doing it, and we’ll all be successful because of it.

GoForThree: Is King of Nebraska a thing? And if so, is it a good thing?

StewMonkey13, aka Nebraska’s #1 Fan: It depends on the definition of successful. I think what he managed at UCF was kinda astounding. This was an absolute slam dunk, grand slam, hole in one, hire. And it infuriates me that UNL pulled it off. I think he’ll raise UNL past where their natural level is. But if the measure of success is to bring back the 90’s, win a national championship, supplant OSU as the power of the conference? Well, that’ll never, ever, EVER happen. UNL is not that program anymore. IT AIN’T HAPPENING!

JesseCollins: I realize that my cynicism is probably at an all-time high, but if I’m being objective for a moment, Scott Frost was a great hire. By all accounts, he seems like a perfect fit for Nebraska, and his coaching bonafides are no joke. Will he be successful? Sure, I think he’ll have some success. Will we win a National Championship? Who knows? I don’t think that’s the real question right now. He will probably be better than every coach after Tom Osborne left, and for me, that’s at least a move in the right direction. He may or may not win as often as the other guys, but I also don’t think I’ll feel like he’s going to be straight up outcoached in most games either. So I’m hedging a bit and saying yes, but it’ll be because he’s the right fit.

Aaron Yorke: Not only is Scott Frost a Nebraska alumnus who had great success as a football player for his alma mater, but he’s coming off of one of the most successful seasons that any coach has had at a mid-major program in years. It might take a minute for Big Red’s hero to ramp up recruiting to where it needs to be, but there’s no reason why he shouldn’t be competing for division titles every year.

Graham Filler: The Frost hiring parallels the Harbaugh hiring in about 03030330 different ways (hero from awhile back, success coaching, respected by alumni, tremendous level of excitement and energy following the hire) and there is one thing I want to bring up Harbaugh-wise which will no doubt be true for Frost. Because hiring Jim H was the white whale hiring that Michigan needed/wanted, he’s been given all kinds of rope. Yea they want natty champs etc, but he will be at Michigan for a long time, unless somehow the program tanks under his watch. Michigan knows that if they fire Jimmy too soon, or for a 7 win season, it will kind of admit that even the best of the best, the absolute best fit, will not be able to bring the program back...So I assume Nebraska will follow a similar vein with Frost and allow him some room to succeed without tossing him out for a bad 2nd year. (I believe this is a REALLY GOOD THING because if a coach fits a program and can make incremental improvements and reshape the program, give him some time to succeed!)

BRT: As a noted Bad Fan®, I am pretty comfortable with the idea that the 90s are not a period of football history that can be repeated for Nebraska, for a variety of reasons and factors that anyone who is not part of a certain faction of Nebraska football fandom is already aware of. I am glad we had that decade, it was super fun and great, but it’s not going to happen for Nebraska again (there are really only about two schools for whom this would even be a possibility—it’s just not that football landscape anymore). All this to say, my expectations for Frost are not that he win National Championships, self-proclaimed or otherwise. However, wouldn’t it be nice to see that Wisconsin-Nebraska game mean something? Wouldn’t it be lovely to watch Iowa fans wringing their hands over Kirk’s bajillion year contract while they go 5-7 and finish fourth or worse in the division every year? Wouldn’t it be nice to be competitive with the big guns of the East instead of losing by 40 points? I say yes, and that’s what I where I want to see Frost get Nebraska.

This was, IMO, the right hire for Nebraska. Frost’s resume is relatively slim, but it made sense to hire him. He’s created a tremendous amount of interest and excitement around the program, which it sorely needed. And there’s no one who knows better what he’s getting into in Lincoln than this man (I do, however, feel very sorry for his wife—whatever he said to try to prepare her, there’s no way it could have come close to explaining to her what a circus it would actually be.) I have no idea if he’ll be successful or not, but I think this was the right gamble for Nebraska to make.

Alright, you tell us! What do you think of the Frost hire? How’s this going to work out for Nebraska?