Inside Matt Rhule’s plan to rebuild Nebraska, one baby shower and fullback camp at a time

LINCOLN, Neb. — With an elk’s head mounted on the wall and the Farm Service Credit score of America luncheon on the calendar, Elks Lodge #1790 in Ainsworth, Nebraska, looks as if an uncommon place for a blueprint for the revival of Nebraska soccer to disclose itself.

Neglect restoring the championship glory of Tom Osborne, successful the Massive Ten West or, heck, even determining a strategy to get previous Minnesota within the opener. To resuscitate the Nebraska soccer program from a generational low level, new coach Matt Rhule first needed to win the offseason one handshake and selfie at a time.

A number of months in the past, Rhule flew into Ainsworth, which is the house of the state’s prime highschool participant, blue chip tight finish Carter Nelson. Consuming choices are restricted within the city of two,000, so Rhule and some staffers knocked on the door of the Elks and have been greeted with the information {that a} non-public child bathe was unfolding inside.

Midwestern hospitality quickly collided with the belief the brand new Cornhuskers coach stood on the door, and Rhule and his assistants lunched with the household, took photos and acquired to know the oldsters who’d pushed in from Iowa and the Dakotas.

“All over the place we go we attempt to go, we sit down someplace and we’ve got lunch and have dinner and meet all of the folks within the cities,” Rhule instructed ESPN in his workplace lately. “As a result of whenever you go throughout Nebraska, it actually hits you, these persons are relying on us, relying on us to win and produce this system again to the extent that is been.”

Nebraska’s $74 million guess on Rhule is that the grasp school rebuilder can lead the twin comeback of each his personal profession and Nebraska’s floundering soccer program. Within the wake of Rhule’s firing from the NFL’s Carolina Panthers in the course of the 2022 season after amassing an 11-27 report, he is tasked with each restoring his personal status as one in every of school soccer’s most promising coaches and Nebraska’s relevance on the nationwide panorama.