Nebraska football posted its first winning season in almost a decade last year as the program wrapped up its second season under Matt Rhule.
That it wondered college football's wastelands for so long hardly was lost on Rhule, who refused to criticize or condemn the comments of former Nebraska coach Scott Frost -- whom Rhule replaced and who had been a beloved All-America quarterback for the Cornhuskers as a player.
"First of all, I have a ton of respect for Scott and I've always been very empathetic for what he went through because this was his home," Rhule said at Big Ten media days in Las Vegas. "Like, if you guys fire me tomorrow I'm just going to go back to Cape May (New Jersey) and sit on the beach. But this was (Frost's) home. This offseason, we put up a huge picture of Scott -- as a player -- in the coaches' area. I took a picture and I sent it to Ryan Callaghan down there, because I can't imagine what that feels like for him. I know what it felt like to get run out of Carolina. And I would say to people, 'I don't think I took the right job for me. It wasn't the right fit.' That doesn't mean it's a bad (job)."
But Rhule said Nebraska was not not a bad job when he arrived prior to the 2023 season.
"Now, I will say this: this was not a good job when I got here," said Rhule, whose collegiate stops include stints atop Temple and Baylor and for the NFL's Carolina Panthers. "Like, we were behind on NIL, the facilities weren't what they were, everything was behind. Trev (Alberts) convinced me, 'Hey, Matt, this is gonna ... by the time we get to the point where we're able to pay players, this is the only Big Ten school with no debt.'"
Nebraska rallied to close last season at 7-6, its first winning campaign since 2016, and it won the Pinstripe Bowl. Rhule now considers his current post a good job -- with even more potential. Especially in the revenue-sharing era that's unfolding after the enacting of the House Settlement on July 1.
"Right now we're talking about 20.5 (million dollars), it's going to go up percentages every year," Rhule said, "and we're at a place where we have the best facility in football, we have everything that we could want; we make more of an investment in nutrition than any other team in the country. Look at all of our sports, look at how they're all blossoming right now because of the investments we're making in nutrition, sports science. There wasn't a sauna in the facility when we first got there. Now, you've got to pick between a steam room, a sauna, an infrared sauna, your personal sauna. Those were investments. Scott came at a time, he had COVID and all of those things. So, I can't talk about his time but what I can say was, 'This wasn't a good job. It was not a good job.' But, we've made it a good job and we're about to make it a great job.
"This will be one of the best jobs in the country. That's why sometimes recruits will say, 'Coach, if you win, what are going to do?' I'm going to stay right here. The only thing I ever think about is getting a lake house on one of these lakes in Nebraska I keep hearing about."
The Cornhuskers open their 2025 season with one of the earlier non-conference, Power Conference clashes in FBS when they battle Big 12 program Cincinnati Thursday, Aug. 28, inside Arrowhead Stadium, home of the NFL's Kansas City Chiefs.