Head Coach
Following the sudden death of Sooner head coach Jim Mackenzie in April 1967, Fairbanks was promoted to head coach of the Oklahoma Sooners. Over the next six years, Fairbanks led the team to three Big Eight Conference titles, with 11–1 records during his final two seasons. Three months after Fairbanks mid-contract departure to the New England Patriots, Oklahoma was forced to forfeit nine games from the 1972 campaign after evidence of recruiting violations involving altered transcripts of student-athletes was found. Fairbanks denied knowledge of the situation. The scandal under his watch prevented the Sooners from playing in bowl games for two years after his departure and also kept them from challenging for the national championship. Despite the probation, the Sooners, under his successor Barry Switzer, won two national titles in 1974 and 1975.
Read more about this topic: Chuck Fairbanks
Famous quotes containing the words head and/or coach:
“Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“President Lowell of Harvard appealed to students ‘to prepare themselves for such services as the Governor may call upon them to render.’ Dean Greenough organized an ‘emergency committee,’ and Coach Fisher was reported by the press as having declared, ‘To hell with football if men are needed.’”
—For the State of Massachusetts, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)