It’s December 29th, 2011, Art Briles had just led the Baylor University Football team to their first bowl win since 1992. Heisman Winner Robert Griffin III had played his last game for the Bears, but the program was on the rise. After struggling to replace RGIII in 2012, Baylor finished the 2013 season at 11-1 and as Big 12 champions. Despite a loss to Central Florida in the Fiesta Bowl, Baylor seemed ready to compete annually for the Big 12 title with the Oklahoma Sooners. Briles and the Bears opened the 2014 season ranked 10th in the country and reached as high as 4th during the season. A one-point loss to the Michigan State Spartans in the Cotton Bowl was a disappointing end to a second straight Big 12 title-winning season, but Baylor had shown that they were for real. 2015 saw the Bears open the season ranked 4th before reaching the number 2 spot during the season. Briles lead Baylor to heights that the football program had never seen before. Three straight 10+ win seasons and 4 out of 5 seasons with 10+ wins had everyone in the country thinking Baylor was for real. No one was anticipating a rebuild of Baylor Football. Then it all came crashing down.
In January of 2014, former Baylor linebacker Tevin Elliot was sentenced to 20 years in prison for sexually assaulting a former Baylor athlete. Then, in June of 2015, Boise State transfer Sam Ukwuachu was indicted for sexually assaulting a Baylor Soccer player. On January 31st, 2016, Outside the Lines reported that one of the victims claimed that she informed a member of the Baylor faculty but was told that the University could take no action without a court decision. Just two days after the University put “Real Men Respect Women” placards around their practice field, Shawn Oakman was accused of sexual assault. Two weeks later, another woman came forward claiming that Oakman had sexually assaulted her in 2013.
In May of 2016, Outside the Lines published a report claiming that one victim reported her assault to Head Coach Art Briles and Chancellor Ken Starr, but neither took action. Less than a week later, Baylor announced that Briles had been suspended and would be terminated. Jim Grobe, a former chairman for the AFCA ethics committee, was hired as head coach within the week. In June, numerous Baylor commits requested and were granted release from their commitments. Everything that Briles had built was collapsing. Throughout the rest of the summer of 2016 and into the football season, more news came out of young women being sexually assaulted by Baylor football players. Multiple people, including Lee Corso and Paul Finebaum, called for Baylor to discontinue their 2016 season. Colin Cowherd went a step further and called for the football program to be shut down a la SMU.
Despite everything going on around the program, Baylor began the 2016 season 6-0 and reached #8 in the country before losing their last six regular-season games. After compiling a 57-21 record from 2011-16, the most successful stretch in school history, someone needed to rebuild Baylor Football. With Baylor being in the news for all the wrong reasons, talented players jumped ship. The Big 12 voted to withhold 25% of future revenue payments to the university. Just three days after the conclusion of the Bears regular season, former Temple University head coach Matt Rhule was hired by Baylor to rebuild the football program and its reputation. The worst, however, was yet to come.
On January 27th, 2017, a Baylor graduate filed a lawsuit against the university, claiming she was raped by two football players in 2013. The suit alleged that between 2011-2014, 31 players committed 52 rapes. The coaching staff allegedly had a “show em a good time” policy for recruits where alcohol, illegal drugs, and some of the assaults happened at parties that recruits attended.
Matt Rhule, by all accounts, inherited a disaster of a football program in 2017. Rhule did, however, have experience reviving football programs. When Rhule took over as head coach at Temple, in 2013, Temple had experienced more one-win seasons, 6, than winning seasons, 3, since 1990. Add in a constant conference shuffling, and Temple football looked hopeless. In year one at Temple, Rhule looked like the coaches before him, scuttling to a 2-10 record. Rhule, however, works quickly in changing the direction of a football program. Over the next three seasons, Rhule brought in 32 3-star recruits and developed his current crop of players. By his third season at Temple, Rhule had the Owls ranked in the polls for the first time since 1979. His success also led to the first time Temple had won 10 or more games in consecutive years in program history.
Rhule’s first season at Baylor, similar to his tenure at Temple, started poorly. Baylor won just one game in 2017 under Matt Rhule. The program appeared to be in for a lengthy rebuild. In March after his first season, Rhule suspended four players, three for an alleged sexual assault incident. None remained with the team, showing a no-tolerance policy from Rhule.
As the 2018 season started, Baylor seemed to be coming out of the worst of the scandal. Not only was the University improving, but the football program also took a leap forward. Led by an improved offense, Baylor won six regular-season games and became bowl-eligible. After defeating Vanderbilt in the Texas Bowl, Baylor finished the 2018 season 7-6, much better than anyone could have expected.
Coming into 2019, Baylor was seen as a middle-tier Big 12 team that was a couple of years away from challenging Oklahoma for the Big 12 crown. Led by quarterback Charlie Brewer and arguably the best defense in the Big 12, Baylor is sitting at 9-0 with the biggest game of the season coming up. #13 Baylor is hosting #10 Oklahoma on Saturday with the winner likely becoming the Big 12 champion. If Baylor were to win, Matt Rhule and the Bears would have a realistic shot at making the College Football Playoff, just two years removed from a 1-11 season.
Matt Rhule inherited a difficult situation, turn a program around that was at its lowest point and make it a winner. All before the administration lost its patience. Rhule had to rebuild Baylor Football from the ground up. Boy did he deliver. Matt Rhule is officially the best coach that not enough people are talking about. A win against Oklahoma could change that. A move to Tallahassee could change that for good.
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