Sports

There Is No Spoon: Instead of Keys, Time for Nebraska to Just Play

To escape analysis paralysis, enjoy the tradition of two historic teams

by Samuel McKewon

October 25, 2007

Courtesy University of Texas

Colt McCoy and a glut of Husker pursuers, in last year's 22-20 thriller won by Texas.

We interrupt the Big Red bloodletting for a special announcement.

It's Texas week. And Texas is still Texas. Consider that a tender mercy in a season of turmoil.

Texas is still one of the best programs in college football. Still makes an orange uniform look good. Still has guys named Colt and Mack. Still has Bevo. Still a team whose history - the national and conference titles, the option offense, the tradition of great running backs - mirrors Nebraska.

There have been six games in the last 10 years, and all but one of them have been terrific.

James Brown's "roll left" in 1996. Ricky Williams and Major Applewhite - groggy from a concussion - breaking NU's 47-game home winning streak in 1998. A year later, it was UT's 24-20 upset of Frank Solich's best Husker squad, and NU's hard-hitting, 22-6 revenge in the Big 12 title game. Solich's great blunder, and J ammal Lord's awful interception , in a 34-31 loss in 2002.

And, of course, that 22-20 snow angel last year.

"They're two programs that really love their football," Longhorns’ Coach Mack Brown said. "And both teams sell out every week. It's just been amazing to watch the games between our two teams. You go back to last year's game where it was 22-20, and it was one of the best games that I have ever been associated with, and that's the same Nebraska team that will come in here this weekend."

If it feels criminal to shake off your depression over a lost season and worry that a good Cornhusker showing means Coach Bill Callahan might be closer to saving his own hide, well, get over it.

Don't cringe Saturday afternoon. Smile. Deep In the Heart Of, something special will happen. No, not a Nebraska victory. Just a renewal of a crucial intangible, if only for the opening kickoff. You know - that thing that makes you rub your hands and whoop and fidget with anticipation.

Sadly, some won’t. They'll follow the current culture of college football that tends only to validate rankings, records and big names. Nostalgia gets nudged aside for ESPN's mission, for example, to shove the Big East Conference down your throat because many of the teams reside in large markets near the network’s headquarters.

And Nebraska's players haven't had time to enjoy the traditions this year in the midst of their poor play and Athletic Director Steve Pederson's firing. Instead they’re lamenting over idiots - probably college students - who stand near the team benches or outside the stadium and yell the first negative thing that come to their drunken minds.

Rather than celebrating another game between two powers, we're hand-wringing over the burned redshirt status of some freshman and wondering, outrageously, whether Callahan is trying to sabotage the team. He’s President Bush in Huskercane Katrina, is that it? Or Mayor Nagin? Or maybe, he’s just a big ol’ Callahana Superdome. No longer wearing red, mind you.

Adversity breeds tunnel-vision from a team and crisis coverage from the media. It's natural. The way of things.

Fortunately the Longhorn players haven't forgotten.

Is Nebraska as important as Oklahoma? Of course not. Texas A&M? Not quite. But, beginning at the top with Brown, UT is aware of this game's significance.

"We don't get into their record and what's going on in their program, but we know that they've got talent and we know any given Saturday anything can happen," defensive end Brian Orapko said. "They could be 0-7 and still come in here and play us perfect."

"It basically is a rivalry game because we went down there and stole one from their hometown, so they're going to come in and put up a great fight," UT receiver Nate Jones said.

"Just a big tradition, Texas and Nebraska," cornerback Ryan Palmer said, "and it doesn't matter what the records are or what the rankings are, it's just a big fun game. A lot of kids dreamed about going to Nebraska or Texas, so it's going to be fun."

Understand that Longhorn players talk like this in part because their coach is a guy who began his Monday press conference with a 2,300 word opening statement, some of which reminisced about Tom Osborne, former Texas coach Darrell Royal and Brown's assistant coaching days at Iowa State. Brown can chat, that's for sure. He always could. He's able to verbalize his love for college football. Which is great for his team and great for fans.

Appreciating history is part of what college football’s about. What Nebraska's about, too. Or it used to be. Sometimes, it can be hard to tell.

Wikipedia.org

Sometimes, college football message board seem like a trading floor on Wall Street

Since Solich's final, tumultuous season, NU fans have constantly been taking the temperature of this program, the recruits, the athletic director, the coach and their own level of emotional and financial commitment.

Nebraskans have bit hard for the new, online world of college football. They're all over every aspect of it. Sometimes you wonder if there are Big Red fans who have memorized the all the times Kirk Herbstreit and Mark May will appear on ESPN. You wonder if it's a little odd that we've begun to refer to 17-year-old kids not only by the first names, but as traitors for considering other schools after some invisible, non-binding verbal commitment that nobody - not even Nebraska - recognizes.

Some fans micromanage their relationship with Nebraska football the way Steve Pederson micromanaged the athletic department. Like Pederson, they know every flaw on every tree. And like Pederson, they miss the forest.

The result is unhealthy. I love the NFL for its speed and ferocity - guys up there know how to hit andtackle - but heaven forbid college football devolves into the grim nonsense of the NFL and its roster moves, injury reports and Bill Belichick act-a-likes. Not to mention Belichick himself. Football was never designed to be treated like national security. The secret of its wonders is not contained in a dossier, or even “Run To Daylight.”

And college football should not be like the stock market, with fans scurrying around message boards like a trading floor. “Bo up, two points!” “Sell Callahan down to 5-7!” “Short boosters, long on T.O.”

Ugh.

Nebraska's team suffers the same syndrome, for what it's worth. The Huskers have examined themselves silly and rendered themselves rudderless. Callahan, too. The media has sure done its part. Me, included. Analysis paralysis.

And so, in that spirit, no keys this week. Not a one. There's probably 30 out there to choose from, and none of them really favor Nebraska. Well, they don't. On paper, UT was a better team at the beginning of the year. And since then, the Huskers have been blasted from one end of the field to the other, in part because of low self-confidence and questionable effort. Before any strategy works, those twin monsters have to be put back in the closet.

Maybe a game against a traditional power like Texas will ignite the lacking chemistry. Or maybe it will be an afternoon in which NU fails its pedigree again, mourns its troubles and Callahan asks for pity on his team and apparently "excellent" coaching. The effort, the emotion, the execution…that's all up to the Huskers. If they don't want to fight for it in front of these supposed rotten, unloving home crowds, maybe now, blinders removed, they can do it for themselves.

As fans, whether in Austin or on a couch, the smartest, calmest thing to do is enjoy the scene. If Nebraska can't bring it, appreciate the effort of Texas, which has always busted its hump - even as the underdog - to knock off NU. Enjoy what matters. Because it still does.

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