Greatest Husker to wear 0: Nash Hutmacher, Defensive Tackle, 2020-2024
As the Scott Frost era at Nebraska was crashing and burning in 2022, Matt Rhule was having a similarly painful experience as the head coach of the NFL's Carolina Panthers. Rhule was fired after starting 1-4 (11-27 overall) - a shocking run after his successes at downtrodden programs Temple and Baylor.*
*I've stated this elsewhere, but I'll repeat it here: I don't put too much stock in Rhule's failure as an NFL coach. If you've ever listened to him talk about why he is a coach and what he's passionate about, it is easy to see that his skillset is a poor match for an NFL franchise. If I - a football novice who has never met Rhule in person - can figure this out, it should raise red flags that Panthers owner David Tepper was convinced that Rhule's family-centric, players-first model would be successful in the cutthroat world of the NFL.
I don't blame Rhule for trying to be an NFL coach - it's the freaking National Football League, for crying out loud - and Tepper paid Rhule handsomely to give it a shot. But - and I'll say it once more for emphasis - Matt Rhule is a college coach.
Nebraska's 76-day coaching search that led to Matt Rhule was one of introspection for Nebraska fans and (then) athletic director Trev Alberts.
For one of the first times since Bob Devaney was hired in 1962, there was no clear-cut contender. There was no Tom Osborne or Frank Solich to be promoted from within. There was no slam-dunk option like Scott Frost circa 2017. There was no "coach with Nebraska ties" like Bo Pelini (and everybody else mentioned so far). And unlike the "outsider" hires of Bill Callahan and Mike Riley, there was a sense that Alberts - a Cornhusker All-American under Osborne - would pick the right coach to lead the program back to prominence.
Alberts picked Rhule based largely on his reputation of his turnarounds at Temple and Baylor. At each, he took a dreadful program and turned it into a 10-game winner that competed for conference championships. More importantly, Rhule had a reputation as a coach who could not only spot hidden talent but develop it into NFL-ready players.
As we have seen throughout the previous 99 entries, player development was a gigantically critical pillar of the success that Devaney and Osborne had. In a state like Nebraska - which typically does not produce a lot of high-end high school prospects - being able to develop talent is absolutely crucial. The transfer portal was - and still is - changing how schools fill out their rosters, but being able to maximize the potential talent in the building is something that hindered - in one way or another - every coach since Osborne retired.
Most - if not all - of the advantages we've talked about Nebraska enjoying over the course of this series (strength & conditioning, walk-ons, four-station practices, consistency of scheme, excellent assistant coaches, TV appearances and more) have either been eroded or matched/surpassed by rival schools.
Every year that passes without success, Nebraska gets closer and closer to being another face in the college football crowd. Closer to the status of a Minnesota (a team that once was a perennial national contender but has not won a conference title in almost 60 years) instead of a blue blood program in a bit of a dry spell.
The 2025 season is shaping up as a pivotal year for Matt Rhule and the Cornhuskers. / Dylan Widger-Imagn Images
2025 - Matt Rhule's third season at NU - will be enormous for the future direction of the Cornhusker program. Year 3 is when Rhule's teams took off at his previous two college stops. But the 18-team Big Ten Conference of 2025 is different from the American Athletic Conference of 2015 or even the Big 12 of 2019. Everybody is trying to win. Right now.
The road to national relevance is harder today than it was in 1962 or at any point since. Nebraska's administration, coaches, players and fans all want to win.
