Frank Reich has no illusions about a long-term future as the 36th head coach of the Stanford football program.
Next year, general manager Andrew Luck will hire a 37th head coach and everybody knows it.
“We didn’t skirt around that issue,” Reich said Tuesday at his introductory news conference at Stanford. “We said, `This is unique. Let’s embrace it together and 2025 can be a very special season. This is the perfect scenario for both of us.”
Reich was announced Monday as the one-year solution after the firing of Troy Taylor, who was dismissed by Luck last week in the midst of ESPN reporting that he had bullied and belittled female staffers during back to back 3-9 seasons after replacing David Shaw.
Hired last November to oversee the football program, Luck’s first call upon firing Taylor was to Reich. The two were together in Indianapolis in 2018, with Luck as the quarterback and Reich as the head coach of the Colts.
Reich, 63 and also a former NFL quarterback, was shopping at Costco with his wife in Greensboro, North Carolina, when he received the call. He was anticipating remaining out of football after turning down NFL opportunities “at various degrees and levels.” Reich was fired as the head coach of the Carolina Panthers during the 2023 season.
Reich, who coached exclusively in the NFL from 2006 through 2023, added, “I told Linda going into this cycle I would only consider something if it was the right person and the right place. We were pretty much moving on with our life. The timing of this was different. So when Andrew called, it was the right person, and it’s the right place.”
Luck afforded the opportunity for Reich to be minimally involved with things that don’t include the field of play.
“Normally, a head coach of a program like Stanford you have a lot of other responsibilities off the field,” Reich said. “My focus is football. Andrew is going to assume a lot of the things that maybe a normal head coach would have to take. That was one of the attractive things about it.”
Bringing in Reich, 63, allowed Luck to retain the coaching staff rather than hire a coach to a multi-year deal that would want his own people and it allowed the players to continue in the structure to which they’ve been accustomed for the last two years.
“Andrew made it clear he’s got confidence in who is here,” Reich said. “There’s no additions. I’m kind of thankful for that even though there is some great people out there who I know I could bring in. But that also makes it more complicated. We’ve got everybody we need in the boat and we’ve got to start paddling in the same direction.”
It’s clear that the program belongs to Luck, and will continue that way even when Stanford hires an athletic director to replace the departed Bernard Muir.
Luck will deal with the potential of an NCAA settlement of revenue sharing coming down next week. He’ll deal with Name, Image and Likeness. He’ll deal with recruiting. Reich will act as a coaching steward during the week and on Saturdays.
Reich was an NFL quarterback for 13 seasons with Buffalo, Carolina, the New York Jets and Detroit with 20 regular season starts. A third-round draft pick from Maryland, Reich once led his team from a 31-0 deficit to a 42-40 win over Miami. He authored the biggest postseason comeback in NFL history when subbing for the injured Jim Kelly, he led the Bills from a 35-3 deficit to a 41-38 overtime win over the Houston Oilers in 1992.
Stints as an assistant included being offensive coordinator for Philadelphia when it won Super Bowl LI in 2017, which led to being head coach in Indianapolis from 2018-2022 where he was 40-33-1. Reich was hired as the head coach for Carolina in 2023 and was dismissed with a 1-10 record.
Reich and Luck exuded excitement and optimism as they sat side by side at a live-streamed press conference. They’re close enough that when Luck got married six years ago, Reich, an ordained minister, officiated the wedding.
Still, Luck said “no” when asked if there was a chance Reich could stay beyond a single season if they were happy with the way things were going.
“That was maybe the third sentence out of my mouth and the response from Frank was, `That’s perfect,’ ” Luck said. “This year is what works for (his) life, this year is what works for Stanford football. It reaffirmed why Frank was the first call for me.”
With spring practice underway, Reich said he met with the team to outline expectations.
“Yesterday in the first team meeting, we detailed that and made it crystal clear,” Reich said. “We went over what our seven standards will be for the 2025 season and those are standards every player and coach is responsible to know and embody and embrace with a lot of excitement and passion around it.”
Luck said hiring Reich for a year shouldn’t be perceived as a stall in the direction of the program as they await a hire of the next head coach. Stanford not played in a bowl game since the 2018 season when it faced Pittsburgh in the Sun Bowl.
“Jay Green, one of our upperclassmen safeties called me and when we didn’t know what was going on yet and it hit me,” Luck said. “I said, `Jay, this isn’t the NBA, man. We’re not tanking for the first pick in the draft. We need to win. We need to win this season.”