Turner Gill

Turner Hillery Gill (born August 13, 1962) is an American college athletic administrator and former football player and coach.

Behind Gill, the Huskers demolished Colorado 59–0, thus setting off an unbeaten run through the Big 8 conference, which Nebraska would win outright for the first time since 1971.

During the season's penultimate game against Iowa State, however, Gill suffered what initially appeared to be an innocuous leg injury.

Gill arrived on campus in 1980 and saw limited action in mop-up duty as a freshman, which at the time was still relatively unusual, as freshmen had only been recently allowed under NCAA rules to participate at the varsity level.

A standout shortstop, Gill had been drafted by the Chicago White Sox in the second round of the 1980 MLB Draft at age 17 and again by the New York Yankees in the eighteenth round in 1983 at age 21.

Nebraska started the 1981 season poorly, losing two of its first three games and performing anemically on offense at times in all three.

Gill had found himself third on the depth chart prior to the Huskers season opener, behind Mark Mauer and Nate Mason.

Down 3–0 to Auburn at halftime during the fourth game, with the season on the verge of slipping away, Osborne inserted Gill into the game.

The Huskers pulled out a 17–3 victory, and Gill was given the starting job the following week.

Instead, doctors discovered nerve damage that sidelined him for the remainder of the 1981 season.

Although the Huskers would beat Oklahoma without him, they were not able to overcome a stingy Clemson defense in the Orange Bowl, where a win may have given the Huskers a possible national championship.

Gill came back strong during 1982 and led the Huskers to a second consecutive outright Big 8 title and a 12–1 record overall, losing only a controversial game at eventual national champion Penn State in September.

During that season, he suffered the first of many concussions in a game against Missouri that would ultimately shorten his playing career.

During his senior season, Turner would call the signals for one of the most prolific offenses in college football history, averaging 52 points and 401 rushing yards per game.

Gill finished fourth in the voting for the 1983 Heisman Trophy, which was won by teammate Mike Rozier.

In college, he batted .284 in 48 games for Nebraska during the 1983 season.

The Huskers came within a whisker of a national championship, falling to the University of Miami, just one point short following a failed two-point conversion attempt in the 1984 Orange Bowl.

Overall, Gill finished with a 28–2 record in his three years as a starter, winning three consecutive outright Big Eight championships with a perfect 20–0 mark in conference play.

Despite this, he was unable to lead the Huskers to a national title, falling agonizingly short in each of his three seasons.

Gill bypassed the NFL and instead signed a lucrative contract with the Canadian Football League's Montreal Concordes.

In two seasons with the Concordes, Gill had 727 pass attempts with 411 completions for 4,928 yards and 23 touchdowns to 24 interceptions.

He also had 826 rushing yards on 173 carries and seven touchdowns.

Gill was just beginning to reach his potential as a professional player when he suffered three concussions, two of them coming in back-to-back games against the BC Lions and Saskatchewan Roughriders.

Although he managed to keep the starting job until September, post-concussion issues prompted him to undergo a large battery of neurological tests during the 1985–86 offseason.

On May 21, 1986—two days after the start of training camp—doctors informed the renamed Alouettes that Gill's post-concussion problems were serious enough that he would never be medically cleared to play football again, ending his career at the age of 23.

At the time Gill had one year plus an option remaining on a three-year contract reportedly worth CAN$1.2 million.

Turner decided to return to baseball.

Gill was signed by the Cleveland Indians in May 1986 and spent three years in their organization (Gill played for the Class A Waterloo Indians in 1986 and the Class AA Williamsport Bills in 1987 and 1988) before deciding to quit professional sports as a player and return to football as a coach.

In 1989, Gill began his coaching career at the University of Nebraska, his alma mater, serving one year as a graduate assistant coach.

After spending a season each at the University of North Texas and Southern Methodist University, Gill returned once again to Nebraska, where he coached quarterbacks from 1992 to 2003 and wide receivers in 2004.

Gill served as position coach for two first team All-Americans, Tommie Frazier and Eric Crouch, with Crouch also earning the Heisman Trophy under Gill's tutelage.

The Cornhuskers earned three national championships in Gill's time as an assistant there.

In 2005, Gill was hired by the Green Bay Packers as Director of Player Development to help players become acclimated to playing professional football in Green Bay and to direct players to resources concerning community involvement, continuing education, financial management, and retirement planning.

He also served as an assistant wide receivers coach and an offensive assistant coach through December 2005.

Gill has served as head football coach at the University at Buffalo (2006–09), the University of Kansas (2010–11) and Liberty University (2012–18), compiling a career college football coaching record of 72–84.

He was one of 11 black head coaches in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision at the time of his hiring at Kansas.

Gill graduated from Arlington Heights High School in Fort Worth, Texas, where he was an all-state, all-county and all-district quarterback for Coach Merlin Priddy.

During his senior season, Gill was courted heavily by Nebraska, as well as arch-rival Oklahoma, and Texas.

Nebraska won the spirited battle for Gill, in part because they would allow Turner to play baseball as well as football, but also because head coach Tom Osborne had managed to quell any rumors about Nebraska supposedly being reluctant to play an African-American at quarterback.

He is the Executive Director of Student-Athlete and Staff Development at the University of Arkansas, a position he assumed in 2019.