The term “dog days of summer” is normally associated with Major League Baseball pennant races but it can apply to college football too.
Sure teams around the country are in full swing with official fall practice schedules but let’s face it, the real fun starts with the opening kickoff of the first game. In Nebraska’s case that would be Sept. 3 against Tennessee-Chattanooga.
However, just to kill some time, the question begs, which Big 10 team has the greatest potential to be Nebraska’s rival? Keep in mind, the Huskers enter their first Big 10 season but rivalries don’t just happen, they develop over time.
When I think of rivalry, I mostly think of a few things: a) There is definite polarization as in there’s no way in hell you could root for the other team, b) The game usually means something when the two teams play, c) Fans will watch the game even if they don’t care about either team and d) The game carries equal meaning for BOTH teams.
Michigan-Ohio State, Alabama-Auburn, Texas-Oklahoma and others fit that description. OK, sure, you can say Harvard-Yale but how many people are going to drop whatever they are doing to watch that game?
For years, Nebraska was rivals with Oklahoma. The interesting thing is that OU has generally considered Texas its biggest rival but Nebraska-Oklahoma was the traditional game that took place the day after Thanksgiving. Plus, both teams were good at the same time for many years, combining for 12 National Championship (OU has seven, NU has five) and dominated the Big Eight conference, which later expanded to the Big 12.
With that expansion, both teams played each other two years out of every four since Nebraska is in the Big 12 North and Oklahoma is in the Big 12 South. Since 1993, the two clubs have only share three good seasons (2001, 2010 and to a lesser extent 2006). The two teams met in the Big 12 title game in 2006 and 2010. OU suffered some fallow years from 1994-1998 before Bob Stoops arrived to resurrect the program. Nebraska suffered mostly subpar years from 2002-2007 but appears to be on its way back to prominence under Bo Pelini.
Colorado, Kansas State and Missouri had elements of the notion “rivalry” with Nebraska the last 15 or so years as the meetings have been testy at times. Bill McCartney was known for “red lettering” Nebraska on the schedule but a large segment of Husker fans even to this day did not consider it a rivalry. Colorado is now a member of the Pac 12.
So now that Nebraska has vacated the Big 12, which team will become its biggest rival? On paper most would say that Ohio State because of their recent conference dominance and the fact that Pelini played there in the 1980s. However, the two programs have very little history against each other, having played head-to-head just twice and those meetings came in 1955 and 1956.
You could make an argument for Michigan because of the recent history involving Nebraska’s 2005 Alamo Bowl 32-28 win tha represented the height of the Bill Callahan era and split 1997 national championship. The Wolverines have been in a downslide in going 15-22 the last three years after the ill-fated move of firing head coach Lloyd Carr and replacing him with Rich Rodriguez. Brady Hoke was hired to replace the since fired Rodriguez. However, Michigan is ot going to stay irrelevant forever.
Penn State has possibilities for the Huskers being rivals with because the two teams share some nonconference history. Remember 1982 in Happy Valley when Nebraska fought back from a 21-7 deficit and finally pulled into the lead on an 80 yard drive with 1:18 remaining? Yet, the Nittany Lions drove right back and handed the Cornhuskers their first and only loss of the season when Penn State completed a controversial pass deep into Nebraska’s end zone with just four seconds left on the clock. Penn State tight end Mike McCloskey, who was the receiver of the game winning catch, admitted he was out of bounds on the play and should have been ruled ineligible 16 years later. If the catch had been flagged properly, Nebraska’s position for National championship consideration would have been much stronger.
Then there was 1994 when both teams were unbeaten but Nebraska was voted National Champion in both the AP and coaches poll. Keep in mind, Penn State’s move to the Big 10 prevent both teams from playing each other because at the time the Big 10 and Pac 10 champion was automatically tied to the Rose Bowl. However, it should also be noted that Nebraska beat two top five teams (Colorado and Miami) while Penn State did not. The two teams also played a home-and-home series in 2002 and 2003.
Wisconsin and Nebraska have the geographic proximity and similar color scheme (red) to be rivals. The Badgers were the most aggressive, at least publicly, as head coach Bret Bielema contacted the Big Ten office about scheduling an end-of-year series with Nebraska just hours after the Huskers were voted into the league. ESPN.com quoted Bielema as saying: “With Coach (Tom) Osborne’s and Coach (Barry) Alvarez’s history, maybe we can start a little trophy game. Call it the Alvaborn Cup or something like that. We don’t have a season-ending finale game, so maybe we can start a tradition here.”
Osborne and Alvarez are both former head coaches turned athletic directors at Nebraska and Wisconsin respectively. Alvarez also played linebacker for Nebraska in 1960s. Wisconsin could use a regular rival on the final Saturday of the season, now that the Minnesota game has been moved earlier as opposed to the day after Thanksgiving.
Speaking of which, Nebraska will play Iowa the day after Thanksgiving in what will be called the Heroes Game. The two teams have played each other 40 times, however, all but five came in the pre-Bob Devaney era (1960).
The two states are neighboring and there is a genuine dislike between the two fans bases but this series, to me, is more of Iowa being the new Colorado in that the Hawkeye fans view as a rivalry more so than Nebraska.
Former Colorado football coach Bill McCartney made Nebraska the Buffaloes’ “red-letter game,” thus from Colorado’s perspective, igniting the rivalry. The Huskers, who routinely throttled Colorado home and away, considered Oklahoma its rival. The Huskers and Sooners, after all, usually settled the Big Eight championship with their game at the end of November.
Essentially, I view Iowa as the new Colorado. However, it will be different in this way, while CU would only occassionaly win the game and was thus not a real rival, Iowa’s rivalry will be tied to how close Nebraska is to them. Yes, Nebraska boarders Colorado but Boulder seemed light years away from Lincoln. Nebraska shares the Missouri River with Iowa and there are major metro areas on each side and more natural competition for fan support. So, Iowa seems much more natural then CU ever was as a rival.
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