'Maniacal approach' led Urban Meyer to success, fatigue and the College Football Hall of Fame

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Urban Meyer told his assistants for years — nearly two decades, actually — that “reflection is a sign of weakness.”

“When you’re looking back, you’re not looking forward,” Meyer recalled.

If that’s the case, Meyer has never been weaker. The three-time national-championship-winning coach was chosen as part of the 2025 College Football Hall of Fame class Wednesday and will be formally inducted in Las Vegas in early December.

Meyer reflected on his coaching legacy during a charity event at Steve Spurrier’s restaurant in Gainesville on Friday night. Meyer mingled with fans and a few former players — sharing countless stories about his glory days in Gainesville — to raise money for the HBC Foundation, Desire Street Ministries and the Tim Tebow Foundation; his wife Shelley worked as a celebrity bartender pushing Meyer's tequila brand.

Meyer's career includes a 187-32 record over 17 seasons at Bowling Green, Utah, Florida and Ohio State. He won 22 of 24 games at Utah before taking over at Florida, where he won national titles in 2006 and 2008. He landed at Ohio State in 2012, won another championship in Year 3 and went 83-9 over seven seasons with the Buckeyes.

His .853 winning percentage trails only Notre Dame greats Knute Rockne and Frank Leahy in major college football, and it’s nearly 50 percentage points higher than former Alabama coach Nick Saban, who will join Meyer in the 2025 class.

“I've got to remind him. He won’t buy it,” Meyer quipped.

When Meyer looks back, the losses stand out more than the wins. It's something he’s still trying to come to grips with six years after he coached his final game at Ohio State.

“I’m a loss guy. I got to try to get off that,” he said. “There’s been some bad losses that I wish I had back. If you lose a game that you can say, ‘You know what, that team was a little better than us.’ But we also had some that you’re like, ‘Dammit, we want that one again.’”

Meyer calls his “maniacal approach” one of the key factors in him becoming one of greatest coaches in college football history.

“To the point where you don’t sleep, you don’t eat, you don’t act like a human being most of your life because you’re so fanatical about making sure everything’s done right,” Meyer said.

He recalled a moment after his first title when he was standing in a tunnel at the University of Phoenix Stadium in Arizona, with his father and his mentor, Earle Bruce, by his side and said, “Holy cow, man. For the rest of my life, I get to do this for fun. We did it.”

It didn’t work out that way.

“It’s one of those good news and bad news things,” Meyer said. “I got good news: you won it all. The bad news is you won it all. You become miserable when you’re not playing at that level, and that’s what happened.”

Meyer relived his most memorable victory in Gainesville — against Spurrier and South Carolina in 2006 — and his biggest recruiting victory: edging USC for dynamic receiver Percy Harvin before that same season.

“There’s still nothing ever like him that I’ve seen, still to this day,” Meyer said. “I know (Ohio State star receiver) Jeremiah Smith, I get it. Percy Harvin.”

Seconds later, Meyer sulked about his most painful recruiting loss: when running back C.J. Spiller spurned his hometown Gators for Clemson that same year.

“Terrible recruiting job on him, 30 miles from here,” Meyer said. “It wouldn’t have been fair if we got him.”

Meyer currently works as a college football analyst for Fox Sports — he's picking Ohio State to beat Notre Dame in the title game — and has no plans to return to the sidelines amid the ever-changing landscape of college football that includes paying players for use of their name, image and likeness.

“It’s all great, but it’s also not for me,” Meyer said. “I’m not saying it’s bad. It’s just different. ... I worry about when you’re 28 years old and you’re not running 4.3 anymore, what happens? NIL — I hope they know it — it’s going to run out at some point.”

Meyer also ruled out returning to college as a general manager; he acknowledged having “a couple opportunities" recently.

“Think of that job: to deal with the high school kids’ agents,” he said, mockingly.

Meyer still regrets the way he left Gainesville — amid health issues and with no succession plan — and would be “honored” to land in the school’s ring of honor. He's the only player or coach eligible who’s not already inducted. He believes Spurrier is “swinging behind the scenes” to make it happen.

Florida officials had discussed inducting Meyer to open the 2022 season, with the Gators hosting Utah and Meyer expected to be coaching nearby with the Jacksonville Jaguars. But Meyer’s NFL tenure ended in scandal after 13 games in 2021, so the timing would have been somewhat awkward.

Now, though, everyone seems to be onboard. Florida can even get him in before he’s officially in the College Football Hall of Fame.

“I’d be honored to do it,” Meyer said. “I have incredible respect for Florida. Worked our (butts) off. Wish I didn’t leave. That’s one thing I regret for the rest of my life is the way I left. Not in a bad way. I was blown out. I had to take a year off. … We worked our tails off to the point where I got ill. I couldn’t get out of bed at times. I did the right thing.”

Ohio State isn’t complaining.

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