Courtesy Nebraska Athletics
George Darlington, a 30-year assistant coach for Nebraska Football and an assistant on three national championship teams, died at 87 years old Sunday in Lincoln. Darlington was an assistant coach for the Cornhuskers from 1973 to 2002, covering Tom Osborne’s entire 25-year tenure plus Frank Solich’s first five years. In that time, Nebraska was 304-65-3, winning three national titles, 14 conference championships, 21 Top 10 finishes and a bowl game in all 30 seasons he coached.
Darlington coached defensive ends for the first 13 seasons at NU, then took over the defensive backs in 1986. After his tenure with the Huskers, Darlington coached Marshall, Louisiana Tech, Southeast Missouri State and San Diego before retiring in 2010. Before Nebraska, he was a Rutgers graduate who began his coaching career at Johnson Regional High School in New Jersey in 1962. He was coaching at San Jose State before joining Osborne’s first staff in 1973.
After retiring as an active coach, Darlington was a fixture around Husker Football, visiting Nebraska practices and observing Husker games from the press box.