The Nebraska Cornhuskers have parted ways with their embattled head coach Scott Frost on Sunday afternoon, just hours after an embarrassing home loss to Georgia Southern. Making history in the wrong ways during his tenure at Nebraska, Frost ends his time at his alma mater with a disappointing 16-31 record that included an even worse 10-26 conference record.
Scott Frost fired at Nebraska
The beginning of the end started overseas when the heavily-favored Cornhuskers lost their Week 0 game to Northwestern in Dublin, Ireland. However, unlike years past, Nebraska’s offense seemingly turned a corner and made the first half exciting against Northwestern.
That only seemed to buy him another two weeks, however, as the Huskers narrowly avoided defeat against North Dakota in Week 1 and fell flat in the waning moments against Georgia Southern in Week 2. As embattled as his tenure was, the second chances turned to third chances, and the Nebraska brass seemingly wanted to make the hire work.
Frost himself did everything he could — off the field, mind you — to make it work as well, taking a reported $1,000,000 pay cut after his first few seasons didn’t go to plan. But the Georgia Southern loss was too much to overcome, dropping the game 45-42 despite Nebraska closing as a 22.5-point favorite.
As bad as that was, the nail that finally sealed Frost’s coffin: It was Nebraska’s first loss in 214 games when scoring at least 35 points.
On Sunday, Nebraska athletic director Trev Alberts announced the decision and Frost’s successor.
“Scott has poured his heart and soul into the Nebraska football program both as a quarterback and a head coach, and I appreciate his work and dedication,” Alberts said. “After the disappointing start to our season, I decided the best path forward for our program was to make a change in our head coaching position.”
Mickey Joseph will now serve as the Cornhuskers’ interim head coach for the remaining nine games on their schedule.
Bringing Frost back in 2022 was controversial on the surface, but digging deeper into his contract showcased a bit more detail into the potential thought process. Frost had a contract buyout in his original deal that went from $15 million to $7.5 million on Oct. 1. But the team and Alberts had had enough following the loss to Georgia Southern that the decision to part ways happened in early September.
Nebraska gave up 642 yards to Georgia Southern and dropped their ninth straight one-score contest dating back to last season.
For Frost, his head coaching record stands at 35-38, dating back to his two years at UCF, where he led the Knights to a 13-0 record in 2017 and parlayed that success into the job at Nebraska. Catching lightning in a bottle is one thing. Sustaining it is another.
For a program that was promised sustained success and got nothing but sadness under Frost, the time was now to pull the trigger on his firing.