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UCF's Scott Frost tries to skip talk of failed Nebraska tenure, but falls a bit short

UCF's Scott Frost tries to skip talk of failed Nebraska tenure, but falls a bit short

Fox Sports2 days ago
Associated Press
FRISCO, Texas (AP) — Scott Frost's celebrated return as coach at UCF comes with the backdrop of a failed tenure at Nebraska, the alma mater he said he didn't want to talk about at Big 12 football media days Tuesday.
Even though he did.
Frost said, 'I really want to keep it about UCF,' just a few hours after telling a reporter from The Athletic that he never wanted to take the Nebraska job in the first place coming off a 13-0 season in 2017 that sparked debate about whether the Knights should have had a chance to play for the national championship in the four-team playoff.
'I said I wouldn't leave unless it was someplace you could win a national championship,' Frost told The Athletic. 'I got tugged in a direction to try to help my alma mater and didn't really want to do it. It wasn't a good move. I'm lucky to get back to a place where I was a lot happier.'
When the same reporter asked Frost in a one-on-one interview what he learned from his time in Nebraska, the former Cornhuskers quarterback said, 'Don't take the wrong job.'
Frost's tone was quite a bit different in two different settings with reporters at the 12,000-seat indoor stadium that is also a practice field for the Dallas Cowboys.
'When you go through something that doesn't work, just ready for another chance, and I'm ready for another chance,' Frost said. 'This is about the Big 12. This is about UCF. Everybody has success in life and has failures in life, for all sorts of different reasons. I'm excited to get back in a place where my family and I get treated well.'
Frost inherited an 0-12 team at UCF and turned it into an undefeated American Athletic Conference champion in just two years. Nebraska fans were ecstatic when he made the move 20 years after leading the Cornhuskers to a perfect 1997 season and a split national title with Michigan in the final season before a championship game was established.
Three games into his fifth season in Lincoln, Frost was fired with a 16-31 record. Almost three full college seasons later, it's back to Orlando — after one year working under Los Angeles Rams coach Sean McVay.
'I really enjoyed two years off,' Frost said. 'I got to spend a whole year with Ashley and the (three) kids, and I'll never get that time back. I played more catch with my son and touch football in the yard with him and going to Little League and seeing my daughter do gymnastics. And then some time out in LA really, really helped reset me, too.'
Images endure of Frost celebrating a 34-27 Peach Bowl victory over Auburn that clinched UCF's perfect 2017 season almost a month after he had been named the coach at Nebraska.
Fast-forward almost eight years, and Frost was delaying a scheduled roundtable with reporters to take a few pictures with the players he brought with him to media days.
'Yeah, being around the guys,' Frost said of that moment. 'I'm sorry, I'd rather be around the guys than you guys.'
And there are times when Frost brings up the old days with his new guys.
'We talk to them about all those things,' Frost said. 'What happened in 2017 is at times relevant, but this is a new team. So we only point those things out, not to live in the past, but just to help them with any lessons that we want to learn.'
Frost wasn't sharing the lessons he learned in Nebraska with everyone.
___
AP college football: https://apnews.com/hub/college-football
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Noni Madueke's potential Arsenal transfer has sparked debate. Which team will benefit more?
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New York Times

timean hour ago

  • New York Times

Noni Madueke's potential Arsenal transfer has sparked debate. Which team will benefit more?

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Where do Sam Leavitt, Rocco Becht rank? The 25 best players in the Big 12 in 2025
Where do Sam Leavitt, Rocco Becht rank? The 25 best players in the Big 12 in 2025

New York Times

time2 hours ago

  • New York Times

Where do Sam Leavitt, Rocco Becht rank? The 25 best players in the Big 12 in 2025

The Big 12 produced its largest total of NFL Draft picks since 2005 this past April. Heisman trophy winner Travis Hunter from Colorado and Arizona receiver Tetairoa McMillan were the two first-round picks among 13 players selected on the first two days of the draft. There were 18 players selected in rounds four through seven. Advertisement How many draft picks will the Big 12 produce in 2026? The Athletic's Dane Brugler projected only two first-round selections for the league in his first mock draft in April. Still, this is a conference loaded with intriguing players and teams. Let's dive into the best of the best. The 6-foot-6, 302-pound junior is widely considered to be the best run-blocking right tackle in college football, earning second-team All-America honors last season from the Associated Press. The former four-star recruit from Spanish Fork, Utah, has started 25 games in his college career. Brugler lists Fano as a top-five pick. 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Williams, a former three-star prospect from Florida, intercepted four passes last season en route to earning second-team all-conference honors. The 6-5, 235-pound redshirt junior and former three-star recruit from South Jordan, Utah, led the Big 12 with 14 1/2 tackles for loss last season. He started nine games and tallied 70 tackles, four pass breakups, three interceptions and one forced fumble. The former three-star recruit from Franklin, Texas, was one of eight running backs in the league to top the 1,000-yard mark last season. Washington is the only one back in 2025. He averaged 5.9 yards per carry and scored 12 rushing touchdowns on 175 carries. Advertisement The 6-4, 294-pound redshirt senior from Alexandria, Va., was the American Athletic Conference Defensive Player of the Year last season at UTSA. He led the conference in sacks (10 1/2) and tackles for loss (17). The former Florida Gator returned home to Texas last season and starred as the No. 2 receiver for the Red Raiders. 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Big 12's Brett Yormark is all in on CFP model with 11 at-large berths. He has to be
Big 12's Brett Yormark is all in on CFP model with 11 at-large berths. He has to be

New York Times

time2 hours ago

  • New York Times

Big 12's Brett Yormark is all in on CFP model with 11 at-large berths. He has to be

FRISCO, Texas — Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark knows that the auto-bid College Football Playoff model proposed by the Big Ten might help his league in the short term. But as he explained this week in the practice facility of the Dallas Cowboys, that's not the point. Discussions around expanding the CFP further for the 2026 season have now dragged on up to the start of the 2025 season. Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti first privately proposed a model for a 16-team playoff that would give four automatic bids each to the Big Ten and SEC and two each to the ACC and Big 12 well over a year ago. The numbers were partly based on the data. Post-conference realignment, the new Big 12 does not have many teams that would've qualified for the CFP in the past, so having two automatic spots is a bonus. That was the pitch, at least. Advertisement But to codify the auto-bid model would be waving the white flag and accepting a lower status. Yormark cannot do that. Nobody in the Big 12 can do that. 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As of a few months ago, administrators from both the Big Ten and SEC really liked the auto-bid idea. Advertisement But when SEC coaches began publicly pushing back on the auto-bid model at conference meetings in late May, the Big 12 found an opening. At Big 12 meetings that same week, Yormark, coaches and athletic directors rallied behind the 5+11 model publicly, both for themselves and to try to pull the SEC away from the Big Ten. '(SEC commissioner Greg Sankey) indicated to me that they were exploring different options,' Yormark said this week. 'He wasn't settled on one particular thing. The spring meetings gave him an opportunity to address it, no different than us, which we did, and that's where our coaches and ADs leaned in.' The Big Ten had stayed silent at its conference meetings, and Petitti rarely engages with reporters on the record after CFP meetings. With few big voices supporting the auto-bid model, the 5+11 idea gained more public momentum throughout June. Petitti finally broke his silence recently in an interview with Joel Klatt of Fox Sports, a Big Ten media partner. He'll certainly be asked about it at Big Ten media days in two weeks. Among his comments to Klatt, Petitti said he envisioned a professional sports model for the postseason, with the auto-bids. Yormark said this week that college football is not the NFL and doesn't need a professional model. Asked if he thought he could convince Petitti of the 5+11 model, Yormark didn't want to get that direct. 'I can't speak for Tony or his room,' Yormark said. 'I appreciate when people have conviction for what they believe in. I've got great conviction in the position that I've taken, and I'm sure he feels the same way.' The commissioners don't meet again in person to talk CFP until September. They've had and continue to have calls about selection criteria and different ways to factor in the strength of schedule. 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