09-04-2021, 09:10 AM
(09-04-2021, 04:44 AM)JohnR34231 Wrote: Stanford went through a period of 11 straight winning seasons from 1968-1978. Had today's bowl requirements been in effect they would have probably gone to bowl games in most if not all of those years.
That was an interesting stretch of time in the program for me.
I was just becoming a fan, but lived far away and didn't ever know details of what was going on in the program, and probably too young to care about anything more than game day.
The latter-mid part of that run, Jack Christiansen was the coach. He had five straight winning seasons, finished second or third in the conference four of five years, then was fired. A timeline/result presumably unique in Stanford history. Then after the firing was announced, he was carried onto the field for his final Big Game. So, his players apparently liked him, and he won more than he lost, but presumably his bosses felt more was possible and hired Walsh.
Strangely (to me) Walsh didn't have a better conference record than Christiansen, but was more successful on the non-conference side.