Maryland Terrapins football under Jim Tatum
During his tenure at Maryland, Tatum became one of the most successful head football coaches in school history. In nine seasons, he led the Terrapins to two national championships, three conference championships, and five bowl game appearances. His teams compiled a 73–15–4 record without a single losing season. To date, he remains the winningest Maryland football coach of the modern era with a winning percentage of 0.819.
Maryland Terrapins football
In 1972, Jerry Claiborne took over as head coach of the Terrapins, which had only nine wins in the past five years. In his first season, Maryland improved to 5–5–1, and the following year, they reached their first bowl game in almost two decades. The team steadily improved until his fifth season, 1976, when they finished the regular season with an 11–0 record, their first perfect mark since Tatum's 1955 squad. Boomer Esiason later described Claiborne's coaching style as "vanilla", and said his strategy was "run right, run left, run up the middle, punt, and play good defense." He went on to say, "But, there's no question he made me a tougher player . . . We'd do drills where the quarterback had to take on a linebacker. It was like he had a sign on our back, 'Hit us, we're stupid'. It made you a tougher player."