It has been customary for me to begin big game columns with a description of game day atmosphere stuff: the color of the sky, the weather, the tone of the crowd. I see no reason to stop this sensible and sound journalistic practice now, just because I’ve been booted from the press box.
Though it seems a fine fall day outside, the temperature inside my living room is a stuffy 75 degrees. As ABC totally botches the opening segments, losing both video and audio feeds from Austin, I rush to re-ignite the dormant AC. I was never ready for the game to begin when I covered these things, no matter how early I arrived; game-day notes were scattered, my glasses somewhere. Old habits remain. As the network switches ominously back to the studio, I am searching for my old radio, which I find, after some time, under the covers in my unmade bed.
What to listen to, the radio or the TV? This debate is a constant source of friction in the home press box. My wife (doubling today as spotter) is distracted by the vagaries in audio direction caused by the radio being on. Additionally, she “likes the little stories” they tell on TV. I prefer the nuts-and-bolts approach of radio. I can do without inane sideline “reports” and videos extolling the virtues of education (Give me a break!) at the University of Nebraska. As with most disputes in this house, I rarely win this one. She’s not home yet, however, so la-de-da, the radio it is … except it turns out the batteries are dead. Damn!
What’s happened to the gorgeous, verdant turf at DK Royal Stadium? The lush, multimillion-dollar natural turf field appears on my television screen as a dull, gray, well-worn artificial surface, as if it were brought in from Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia. There’s Nebraska coach Frank Solich doing an idiotic-looking pre-game interview with his headset on. Sure glad I didn’t miss that one. Where are those damn batteries?! The crowd noise seems distant and gentle over the TV. With my daughter out somewhere in my truck and Kelly still not home, the only noise in the house is my dogs snoring and drawers frantically slamming as I, becoming increasingly agitated, continue to hunt for the AA batteries.
As a brief historical digression, allow me to note this: As a long-ago alumnus of a Big Eight college, there’s little fondness in my heart for Los Niños de la Corn. The Cornhuskers have been kicking the shit out of the rest of the league for generations. Nebraska, with their obnoxious legions of hog farmers clad oh-so-proudly in Santa Claus red and their dull, cold little red-brick burg of Lincoln, can disappear — tonight would be okay — into a prairie sinkhole for all I care. My shallow, grass-thin allegiance to Mack Brown’s football team has been, I’ll admit, stretched to the point of ambivalence due to this press credential dispute, but not today. I’m almost ready to stand up and show my horns.
To demonstrate the extreme to which my anti-Nebraska venom has carried me, consider this: This week I made my first wager — ever! — on a University of Texas team. My father long ago unsuccessfully cautioned me not to bet with my heart. Coming from Chicago this can be a fatal, though perfectly understandable, flaw. Betting with a heart black as coal is just as dangerous, maybe more so (since it’s my belief that hate trumps love) than wagering with a cheerful heart. Convinced my logic is sound, I take Texas and the points.
My “logic” is predicated on one simple yet irrefutable fact: Nobody threw a pass in the old Big Eight (except out of sheer desperation) since some years prior to the Great Depression. The big, hulking, iron-pumping, steroid-bulging ploughboys from the Platte River simply tossed aside whoever was across the line, like another bale of summer hay, and looked for some poor bastard with a ball. It had been thus for half a century.
But the times, it’s said, are a-changin’. Texas first demonstrated this at the inaugural Big-12 championship ball in the TransWorld dome. The Huskers scored, and as is their wont, and scored again. But instead of the scoreboard reading a comfy 27-0, the pesky Longhorns — featuring an offense capable of passing and running and even putting a man in motion from time to time (a sight seldom seen in the old Big Eight) — had the brazen impudence to score themselves. In truth, though we thought the win a fluke, Coach Mackovic’s offense moved the ball at will against the staggering Huskers. Texas players saw the fierce red monsters gasp for air. They bled. They made mistakes. They could — if the world was right — be beaten. That was the key. Without this win, the other two wouldn’t have happened.
Scene Two played out last year in Manhattan, Kansas, where K-State was looking for its first win over the Big Red in 20 years. This time Nebraska faced a decent defense, which could at least slow down their power option, an adequate running game, and a QB who could toss a football into an open toilet bowl on the dead run from 60 yards, and (this just didn’t seem fair at all) receivers who could catch. The results were the same as in St Louis. Nebraska’s offense couldn’t keep up.
Which lead to the Carnage in the Land of Corn. Mack Brown’s defense played just well enough in Lincoln last October to make Nebraska work for their points, continued to befuddle the farmers with the forward pass, while smacking them in the snout with Ricky Williams.
A trend seemed clear. The Husker power option attack — a thing of staggeringly efficient, simple beauty (as even I will admit) — isn’t designed to score lots of points … unless you can play Iowa State every week. It is, by definition, a slow, grinding, statistic-chewing monster. It will out-first-down you. It will out-time-of-possession you. Nobody really stops the Nebraska option. But if you can put up enough resistance to slow the monster down, and if the great defense it needs to survive is breached, and if the machine has to play catch-up, it’s in trouble. In St Louis, in Manhattan, and in Lincoln, The Beast ran out of time.
In theory, all well and good. With Texas down by 10 at half, I was happy that I ran out of space last week so another ludicrously wrong prediction didn’t appear in print. Nebraska’s defense was better than I thought. I bet you have to go back to the dark days of David McWilliams to find the last time a Texas offense went 3 and out four straight times. The steel-eating Cornboys were stoked.
And then something changed. Applewhite hit a few big throws. Mitchell ran just enough to make Nebraska think. The Texas offense ate a little clock, keeping the increasingly effective option off the field. The score tightened up, putting pressure on the Husker offense to keep moving the ball and eating the clock. Texas got a few breaks. Suddenly Nebraska had to play from behind. The pattern re-emerged.
If the game had gone another quarter, I’m sure the Cornboys would’ve won. They’ll keep stuffing that run down your throat until you choke to death. Alas, again, they ran out of time.
Fans of Texas can’t possibly appreciate what their team has done. The Tigers of Old Mizzou haven’t beaten Nebraska in 20 years. The Longhorns have done it three times in a row.
So for all the long beleaguered victims — Cowboys in Stillwater, Jayhawks in Lawrence, Tigers in Columbia, Buffs in Boulder, and Cyclones in Ames — this one’s for you. Kick ’em in the eyes, kick ’em in the snout, kick ’em in the belly ’till the corn runs out!!!
This article appears in Carol Keeton Rylander.