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The season Tom Herman coached for $5,000 and a meal card

Tom Herman was officially named the head coach of the University of Texas football program this past weekend. It was the culmination of an amazing rise to the top for Herman, who was a graduate assistant for the Longhorns in 1999 and 2000.

But to understand exactly how far Herman has come, one must go back to 1998, when he got his start coaching wide receivers for Division III Texas Lutheran University.

Having no ties to the coaching community, Herman hopped in his 1994 Honda Civic (without power steering) and drove 1,428 miles from his college, California Lutheran in Thousand Oaks, California, to Seguin, Texas, where the 23-year-old found himself coaching for a school that was resurrecting a football program after a decade.