When Trev Alberts was running the athletic department in Lincoln, there were plenty of accusations that he wasn’t always the most approachable guy in town. Those allegations were mostly loudly leveled by former Nebraska football coach Scott Frost during his first press conference with UCF.
“Yeah, Terry's been great. I'm so grateful to have an AD that's on my side and working alongside me. When you're in the other situation, it's really difficult. And it's really debilitating, to be honest with you, when you feel like you're working and you don't have somebody right there alongside with you. Terry and I are on the same page. He's trying to give us everything that he can to be successful. And it's a good partnership.”
To some degree, Nebraska football faithful could dismiss that kind of complaining because Frost was looking to blame anyone else for his struggles. However, reports after Texas A&M - where Alberts is now - lost their basketball coach sounds like perhaps NU’s old AD has a pattern.
Is former Nebraska football AD repeating past mistakes at Texas A&M?
“Coaches change jobs for a lot of different reasons,” ESPN Analyst Seth Greenberg recently said when talking about Aggies coach Buzz Williams departing College Station for Maryland. “Coaches change jobs to get a better job, just like players change schools to get a better job. That happens. That’s not a problem. I’m going to use Buzz Williams as an example. He hasn’t talked to his athletic director in a year. In one year, he hasn’t talked to his athletic director.”
It’s perhaps especially surprising that this report was surfacing from Texas A&M, which has been to the NCAA Tournament every year that Alberts has been there. Certainly it would seem the ex-Nebraska football player and AD would want a good relationship with a good coach.
It’s worth pointing out, however that Alberts has also had to replace his head football coach and head baseball coach since arriving in the program. Like basketball, his baseball coach left of his own accord, after making a run in the postseason. He wasn’t fired.
The idea that Alberts didn’t talk to Williams in over a year is of course, a one-sided claim. But former Nebraska football coach Scott Frost likely agrees the Athletic Director can be hard to get ahold of at times.