Matt Rhule: 'I'd rather lose than do things the wrong way'

Nebraska Cornhuskers head coach Matt Rhule recently had a sit-down interview with Fox’s Joel Klatt on the Joel Klatt Show: A College Football Podcast. During the interview, Rhule reflected back on year one at Nebraska and shared his thoughts on the future of the program.

The Cornhuskers headman is known as a program builder at the college level, something that Klatt acknowledged during their conversation. That prompted Rhule to reflect on his history of program building, revealing why he has been so successful in previous ventures.

“I think so. I think it’s because our staff are not afraid of failure; we are not afraid to go 2-10 our first year; 1-11 our first year,” said Rhule. “Everyone talks about building a culture and don’t even know what that is sometimes. Well, to me, it’s getting the best people possible and setting high standards for how you do things. And if that means that— ‘hey, I’m gonna play the guys who will do things right early on and we might lose. Or because we’re trying to recruit freshmen, not take a quick fix, we’re willing to go through that.”

“Our bad year here was 5-7 instead of 2-10, which is much better, like thank goodness. I think once the players realize, hey, these guys are for real, man; Coach Rhule would rather lose than win by doing things the wrong way. We’re going to buy into doing things the right way… so in those triage years, we are setting the program up quietly to have long-term success.”

Rhule’s last collegiate stop is arguably the most telling of his success as a culture developer and foundation builder for a program. After the Baylor program was in disarray following the firing of head coach Art Briles due to his mishandling of sexual assault allegations, the Bears appeared to be on a fast track back to obscurity. But Rhule was able to keep the program afloat and help it ascend to new levels. That ascension didn’t stop after he accepted the Carolina Panthers head coaching position in 2020. And the former Baylor head coach knows exactly why that is.

“Baylor won a championship after we were gone with those same kids because they had been trained the right way,” said Rhule. “The first thing you want to build a building; you gotta dig, and you have to go down. You actually have to go the wrong way to go the right way, and not everyone’s willing to do that, especially nowadays with NIL, the portal, and all that.”

From his comments, it is clear that Rhule is not looking for quick wins and shortcuts when it comes to resurrecting the Nebraska program. He is keen on building a foundation of culture that will withstand the test of time. If he is successful in doing so, he could turn Nebraska into a perennial threat for the national championship year in and year out, like Nick Saban did for the Alabama Crimson Tide and Dabo Swinney has done for the Clemson Tigers.