Howard Schnellenberger obit

Howard Schnellenberger, FAU Football Architect and Former Miami Coach, Dies at 87

 

He was not on the list.

Howard Schnellenberger, the architect of the FAU football program and head coach who led the University of Miami to its first national championship, has died, FAU announced on Saturday. He was 87 years old.

Schnellenberger's career in coaching spanned more than 50 years, starting as an assistant in 1959 at his alma mater Kentucky and ending in 2011 with Florida Atlantic, where he started the university's football program and turned it into a Division I program in four seasons.

Perhaps his most renowned coaching achievement came in leading the University of Miami to its first national championship just years after the program's future was being reconsidered by university officials.

After serving as offensive coordinator for the Miami Dolphins under Don Shula, Schnellenberger was hired by the Hurricanes in 1979 to turn around their football program. Five seasons later, Schnellenberger coached Miami to an upset victory over No. 1 Nebraska in the 1984 Orange Bowl to win the national championship.

In 1985, Schnellenberger returned to his hometown where he reinvigorated a fledgling University of Louisville football program, culminating in a win over Alabama in the 1991 Fiesta Bowl.

"Howard always allowed me to be a part of his football life," Schnellenberger's wife Beverlee said in a statement released by FAU. "Watching him on the sidelines was an opportunity that gave us a special closeness—win or lose—that not many wives get.

"... Howard always treated me special, like a queen, and was truly a husband that every Canadian girl dreams of. You will always be my love, now and forever. I'm proud to be your wife. You were a great leader of men and the leader of our lives."

Schnellenberger is survived by his wife of 61 years, Beverlee, sons Stuart and Tim, three grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. He was preceded in death by his son Stephen. Schnellenberger's cause of death was not released.

Schnellenberger was born to German-American parents in the tiny hamlet of Saint Meinrad, Indiana. Schnellenberger graduated from Flaget High School in Louisville, Kentucky, where he played football, basketball and baseball before earning a scholarship to the University of Kentucky. Schnellenberger was a 1955 (AP) All-American end at Kentucky and worked as an assistant coach at Kentucky under head coach Blanton Collier in 1959 and 1960. There he joined the Pi Kappa Alpha Fraternity. Schnellenberger also served as offensive coordinator under his college coach Bear Bryant at Alabama, helping Alabama win three national championships in 1961, 1964 and 1965 before leaving in 1966 to take a job in the NFL as receivers coach of the Los Angeles Rams under George Allen, then was hired by Don Shula in 1970 to become the offensive coordinator for the Miami Dolphins, where he helped coach the Dolphins to a perfect 1972 season and a Super Bowl victory.

Schnellenberger signed a three-year contract to succeed John Sandusky as head coach of the Baltimore Colts on February 14, 1973. He was reunited with general manager Joe Thomas, both of whom had been colleagues with the Dolphins. He joined a team in the midst of an influx of younger players.

The Colts went 4–10–0 in his one full season but managed to upset the defending Super Bowl champion Dolphins towards the end of the 1973 season, though the Dolphins second team played most of the game.

His time with the Colts ended after a 30–10 defeat to the Philadelphia Eagles at Veterans Stadium on September 29, 1974 which extended its season-opening losing streak to three. While stalking the Colts sideline during the second half, team owner Robert Irsay, who had a preference for Bert Jones as the starting quarterback over Marty Domres, asked Schnellenberger about when he was going to make such a change. Schnellenberger's sarcastic reply resulted in his postgame dismissal. Irsay had first gone to the press box to inform Thomas that he was the new head coach and then to the locker room to announce his actions to the Colts players before breaking the news to Schnellenberger in a heated discussion in the coaches office.

He returned to the Dolphins coaching staff the following year and remained there until he was offered the head coaching job at the University of Miami.

chnellenberger arrived to a Miami program that was on its last legs, with the program having almost been dropped by the university just a few years prior. Drawing from the boot camp methodology learned from mentors Bryant and Shula and a pro-style pass-oriented playbook not yet the norm in college football, Miami developed a passing game that allowed them to have advantage over teams not equipped to defend such an attack. By his third season at Miami, the team had finished the season in the AP Poll top 25 twice—something that had not happened there since 1966.

Schnellenberger revolutionized recruiting South Florida high school talent by building a metaphorical "fence around South Florida" and recruiting only the "State of Miami." His eye for talent in this area led to many programs around the nation paying greater attention to south Florida high school prospects. Under his "State of Miami" plan, Schnellenberger's teams took the best from the three-county area around the city, went after the state's best, then aimed at targets among the nation's elite recruits; it became a model of how to recruit in college football.

He coached Miami to a national championship in 1983, defeating Nebraska in the Orange Bowl. Following the season, Schnellenberger resigned to become part-owner, president, general manager and head coach of The Spirit of Miami of the United States Football League—a relocated Washington Federals franchise. In August, however, the USFL announced that it would shift to a fall schedule. The owner-to-be for the Federals backed out of the deal, knowing he could not hope to compete head-to-head with the Miami Dolphins. A new backer moved the team to Orlando as the Renegades, but Schnellenberger opted not to follow the team to Central Florida. Schnellenberger was replaced as head coach of the Hurricanes by Jimmy Johnson.

Schnellenberger was interviewed about his time at the University of Miami for the documentary The U, which premiered December 12, 2009 on ESPN.

Schnellenberger was inducted into the University of Miami Sports Hall of Fame in 1993.

In 1985, Schnellenberger returned to his hometown to coach another struggling program, the University of Louisville Cardinals. Schnellenberger inherited a situation that was as bad, if not worse, than what he'd inherited at Miami. The Cardinals had not had a winning season since 1978, and only two winning records in the previous 12 years. They played at Cardinal Stadium, a minor-league baseball stadium, and often hosted crowds so small that the school was forced to give tickets away. They also played in the long shadow of the school's powerful men's basketball team. The situation was so grave at Louisville that officials were considering dropping the football program down to I-AA. Nonetheless, at his opening press conference, he stunned reporters and fans by proclaiming the program "is on a collision course with the national championship. The only variable is time."

After going 8–24–1 in his first three years, Schnellenberger was able to turn the program around and go 24–9–1 the next three seasons. In 10 years, he led the Cardinals to their fourth and fifth bowl games in school history. They won them both, including a 34–7 thrashing of the Alabama Crimson Tide in the 1991 Fiesta Bowl, capping a 10–1–1 season and the school's first-ever appearance in a final poll (11th). The Fiesta Bowl appearance was the school's first-ever New Year's Day bowl game.

Schnellenberger left Louisville after the 1994 season. He recalled in a 2012 interview that his departure was a direct result of the impending creation of Conference USA:

    I didn't leave because of money. I wasn't looking to go anywhere until that president (Dr. Donald Swain) pulled that baloney and put us in that conference that I didn't want to be in. I wasn't going to coach in a conference where I didn't have a chance to compete for the national championship.

Schnellenberger was replaced by Ron Cooper. Although Schnellenberger's record at Louisville was two games under .500 (largely due to his first three years), he has remained in the good graces of Cardinal fans due to the poor state the program was in when he arrived, giving him a reputation as a "program builder." He is also credited with laying the foundation for the program's subsequent rise to prominence. The Cardinals went to nine straight bowl games from 1998 to 2006. The Howard L. Schnellenberger Football Complex at the current Cardinal Stadium is named after him; Schnellenberger initially proposed building the on-campus stadium during his tenure at Louisville and is credited with keeping the project alive.

Late in the 1994 season, Oklahoma head coach Gary Gibbs was forced to resign, but was allowed to finish out the season. Schnellenberger was hired to replace him on December 16, 1994. Repeating his bluster upon taking the Louisville job, Schnellenberger declared, "They'll write books and make movies about my time here." He also traveled across the state, with the stated goal of renewing the enthusiasm in what he called "Sooner Nation." After watching his new team for the first time in the 1994 Copper Bowl (in which Oklahoma was routed by BYU 31–6), he alienated his soon-to-be players by declaring them "out of shape, unorganized and unmotivated" and that they disgraced Oklahoma's rich football tradition.

After a few years out of the limelight, Schnellenberger resurfaced in 1998. At age 64 he was named director of football operations for Florida Atlantic University, with the task of building a football program from scratch: coming up with a strategic plan, raising funds and selecting a coach. He was able to raise $13 million in pledges (equivalent to $20.39 million in 2019) , lobbied the state legislature, and by the time then-FAU President, Anthony Catanese, asked him to find a coach in 1999, Schnellenberger selected himself. Schnellenberger described his interest in FAU by noting "This one is so different. The others, we were working with adopted kids. These were our kids."

Schnellenberger married Beverlee Donnelly in 1971; they met when Howard played for the Toronto Argonauts.

For the next two years, Schnellenberger led the fledgling team through fund-raising, recruiting and practice. For their first practice in 2000, the Owls had 160 walk-ons and 22 scholarship players. FAU football played their first game on September 1, 2001, losing to Slippery Rock 40–7 after the FAU administration failed to certify 13 Owls starters in time to play. The very next game the Owls upset the No. 22 team in I-AA, Bethune–Cookman, finishing their first season 4–6. They regressed to 2–9 the following season, but went 11–3 and made the I-AA semifinals in their third. During their fourth season, the Owls posted a 9–3 record while transitioning to Division I-A, but were ineligible for both a bowl game and the I-AA playoffs because of their transitioning status.