STANFORD, Calif. — Stanford coach David Shaw resigned Saturday night after finishing his 12th season at his alma mater with a 36-25 loss to BYU that dropped the Cardinal to 3-9.
Shaw, 50, led Stanford to five double-digit win seasons, with three Pac-12 titles and Rose Bowl appearances in his first six years as head coach. He finished 96-54 with the Cardinal and was considered one of the most respected coaches in country.
Shaw arrived unusually late to his postgame news conference and said his decision only came in the last few days.
“It’s been great. It’s been a great run,” he said. “But it’s time for me to step aside. It’s time for the next group to come in.”
The falloff in recent years has been drastic. The Cardinal are 14-28 over the last four seasons as the program has struggled to keep up in a rapidly changing college landscape with players transferring more freely and earning money for name, image and likeness.
Stanford is 3-16 in Pac-12 play the past two seasons, including consecutive losses to rival California.
“We’re not that far away,” Shaw said.
Shaw, a California native who played receiver for Stanford in the early 1990s, replaced Jim Harbaugh as head coach in 2011. He had been offensive coordinator for Harbaugh from 2007-10.
Shaw spent nine seasons as an NFL assistant before joining Harbaugh’s staff at the University of San Diego and then following him to Stanford.
He was part of a remarkable program turnaround under Harbaugh and then under his leadership Stanford became the premier program in the Pac-12 with a physical style dubbed Intellectual Brutality.
As the program declined, Shaw has remained steadfastly loyal to his assistant coaches. The staff has had few changes lately, with Shaw repeatedly saying he felt firing assistants was pushing the blame for the team’s failures from himself to others.
Stanford is a private school that does not disclose contract terms with its coaches so it is unclear how many years Shaw had left on his deal.
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