Nebraska just fired its AD over ‘on-field performance,’ which isn’t good news for Mike Riley

Nebraska just fired athletic director Shawn Eichorst, the school announced Thursday:

The University of Nebraska–Lincoln has announced it has begun a search for a new director of athletics. The university has ended Shawn Eichorst’s employment, effective immediately.

“Shawn has led Nebraska Athletics in many positive ways, but those efforts have not translated into on-field performance,” Chancellor Ronnie Green said. “Our fans and our student-athletes deserve leadership that drives the highest levels of competitiveness, as well as excellence across all facets of Husker Athletics.”

Eichorst joined Nebraska in October 2012, and has about $1.7 million remaining on a contract that runs through June 2019. Green and President Hank Bounds decided to seek a new athletic director and met with Eichorst on Sept. 21. Green and Bounds also met with Husker coaches Sept. 21 to share the decision.

Eichorst hired head football coach Mike Riley before the 2015 season. Riley is just 16-13 in Lincoln, including 1-2 this year after a loss to the MAC’s NIU last weekend. It won’t come as any surprise if Eichorst’s successor decides to move on from Riley.

Riley initially signed a five-year contract, but the university announced before the NIU loss that it had extended his deal by one year. (The extension came earlier this year.) So Riley’s under contract through 2020, and the school’s president said it planned to give Riley another one-year extension sometime in December.

Riley had a $1 million buyout on his initial contract with Nebraska, but according to The Athletic’s Chris Vannini, that’s now set at $6.9 million. Firing a football coach in the power conferences almost always carries a financial penalty, but $1 million seems unlikely to be prohibitive, should Nebraska decide it wants someone new.

There are exceptions to this rule, but in general, new athletic directors prefer to hire their own football coaches. Before hiring Riley, Eichorst fired Bo Pelini, a head coach he’d inherited from Nebraska’s previous AD. Pelini is famously irascible, but he had a .713 winning percentage. Riley’s .552 is a far cry from that.

The people in those positions often have their fates intertwined. Some ADs can get away with one lousy coach hiring, but few can get away with two. In Eichorst’s case, he only made one (so far) underwhelming hire. But he fired a coach who won more games to bring in Riley, who (again, so far) hasn’t come close to measuring up.

Nebraska hired men’s basketball coach Tim Miles in March 2012, a few months before Eichorst got onboard. It’s harder to guess what Eichorst’s firing will mean for him, but the best prediction is “nothing good.” AD firings don’t tend to help those ADs’ coaches.