Great coaches take teams to heights they've never reached before and are above their historical place in the world. That's what Spurrier and Meyer did.
Frost did no such thing. UCF was always at the top of that conference and had won it many times. I said it back then and I'll say it now Frost didn't inherent a program that was as bad as it's previous year's record. He didn't significantly improve their recruiting. By year two he had them back to how they usually are but with the addition of the perfect QB for his system. They only played one P5 school (Maryland 4-8) who they beat but UCF has beat P5 schools before. If you want proof just look at how UCF is rolling through their usual fare of nobody's without Frost.
In any case I didn't think he was all that then and I think Nebraska is going to find that out eventually.
Disagree. UCF hadn’t done squat before George O’Leary became available after his resume controversy bounced him out of taking the Notre Dame job. A few good players like Daunte Culpepper, a couple of major upsets (they are 1-0 vs. Bama), but they’d floundered for most of their history. USF blew past them almost immediately after establishing their program in 1996.
O’Leary made them pretty good, ultimately having an exceptional season in 2013 after which they shocked Baylor in the Fiesta Bowl. He won 4 conference titles in 12 years but also had 2 winless seasons, including the one before Frost came. After that Fiesta Bowl win, recruiting tanked and 2 years later they had no wins at all.
You wrote, “he didn’t significantly improve recruiting” then the very next sentence acknowledge he recruited the perfect QB for his system. Milton is fantastic. He also recruited other key players. O’Leary laid the foundation, stayed too long, then Frost launched it from there. He hasn’t been a HC long enough to back that up, but his history is solid.
I think Frost will turn it around at Nebraska. A lousy first season just means the transition is hard. My question is whether Nebraska, being so remote & bleh as a state, is now consigned to South Carolina’s lot.
But, honestly, when I look at all that this morning and remember what I was thinking about a year ago (We need Frost! Mullen? No!)... SMH at myself. We got our guy.