Frank Reich answered the telephone on a number of events during the last 12 months and a half, fielding overtures from numerous NFL franchises who noticed him as a match for his or her teaching staffs. None had been the perfect match for the previous head coach of the Indianapolis Colts and Carolina Panthers.
Reich instructed his spouse, Linda, that to even contemplate getting again into teaching, the guidelines needed to be top-heavy: It merely needed to be the best individual and the best place. So, after the Reichs watched the Philadelphia Eagles win Tremendous Bowl LIX in February, it supplied them with a way of closure. They opted for the following section.
“We had been transferring on with our life,” Reich mentioned.
A bit of greater than a month later, Reich’s telephone rang once more. This time with a Hail Mary inquiry that he’d hearken to within the halls of a Costco in Greensboro, N.C. On the opposite line was his former star quarterback. Abruptly, he was listening to former four-time Professional Bowler Andrew Luck, who pitched the 63-year-old Reich on a singular thought amid a tenuous state of affairs.
Luck, who returned to his alma mater Stanford final November because the soccer program’s basic supervisor, wanted a short-term resolution that he believed wouldn’t hinder the Cardinal’s 2025 season however may additionally function a buffer between eras. Luck introduced final week that former Stanford head coach Troy Taylor had been fired, two weeks after an ESPN report detailed a number of third-party investigations into Taylor’s inappropriate conduct towards feminine staffers.
“It was time for a reset on the head teaching place,” Luck mentioned. “And whereas maybe the timing is nontraditional, it was the best time for this program and for us.”
So Luck wanted a stopgap, and he requested Reich if he would contemplate taking on as Stanford’s interim head coach for the 2025 season. For the following few days, Luck joked that he walked round with all of his fingers and toes crossed whereas Reich considered it. Because it turned out, Luck didn’t want any luck. Every week after Taylor’s dismissal, Luck and Reich sat collectively at a dais in Palo Alto, Calif., carrying matching Stanford pins on their blazers, and spoke of their mixed need to make sure that 2025 could be a launching pad towards a reawakening for Stanford soccer.
“We each agreed that this interim label doesn’t imply a step again, it doesn’t imply hitting the pause button, it means we’re transferring ahead,” Reich mentioned. “The seeds of what a long-term imaginative and prescient might be planted this 12 months so far as tradition, so far as efficiency and so far as successful soccer goes … that’s our plan and that’s our goal.”
Greater than as soon as throughout Reich’s introductory press convention Tuesday, Luck made it clear that hiring his former head coach was strictly on a one-year foundation. He mentioned Reich is “the right steward” for this transitional interval for the soccer program. Luck reiterated that Stanford will rent a full-time head coach after the 2025 season.
A part of Luck’s promote to Reich was that he would restrict Reich’s burden in the case of what most school soccer coaches should do in 2025: recruit, search for gamers within the switch portal and persuade some gamers who’ve entered the portal to remain.
Luck is shouldering the load, whereas Reich’s solely goal for the remainder of 2025 is to educate soccer. Luck mentioned his function as basic supervisor at Stanford continues to prioritize fundraising for NIL and creating new income streams to maintain up on this fast-paced period of school athletics.
(Picture: Emily Steinberger, AP)
