French Riot News

Ninme has been providing about the best coverage I've seen on the Muslim riots in France, although many of the fine bloggers listed to the right have also provided lots of worthwhile information.

As for me, I'm wondering if they're going to start rioting in the streets of Lincoln, Nebraska, following the latest Cornhusker debacle, a loss to my alma mater, Kansas. From the article:

"Kansas finally beat Nebraska, ending a 36-game losing streak to the Cornhuskers with a 40-15 victory Saturday and thousands of fans rushed the field to celebrate one of the biggest wins in school history...
"Midway through the fourth quarter, many of the several thousand Nebraska fans began quietly filing out. One of their last streaks linking them to the glory days of Bob Devaney and Tom Osborne had been severed in the second year under Callahan...
"It's been so long since Kansas has beaten Nebraska, that eight presidents had occupied the Oval Office since the Jayhawks last beat the Huskers, 23-13 in 1968."

I'm gonna go cry now...

Update 1900 05 Nov: OK, I'm better now. Anyway, the other sub-bloggers who have been discussing the European riots include: bothenook, Chapomatic, submandave, Vigilis, and gus van horn. My take: This should serve as a cautionary note to any Western democracy who thinks they can "buy off" their growing Muslim populations simply with an anti-U.S., anti-Israel foreign policy. I expect things to get worse before they get better.

Update 2209 05 Nov: Now that I've gone over the stats of the NU-KU game, I'm not doing so well. Seven first downs?!? Against Kansas?!? Giving up the last 23 points scored? Yeah, that West Toast offense is working out really well, Satan...

(In the interests of fairness, I should provide a link to a website for people who support Satan and the job he's been doing as Nebraska Athletic Director. Interestingly, there doesn't seem to be much activity there for the last month or so...)

Update 2225 05 Nov: Hey, I just noticed that I'm the #1 Google result (of over 64K) for Nebraska Athletic Director Satan (and also #2 on Yahoo). Now I feel better...

Update 0848 05 Nov: They had to close the comment section on the post-game post at one of the Lincoln newspaper's football blogs due to talk of off-field violence... and they closed the comments for the pre-game post as well.

Finally! A 'Husker Win

Nebraska was able to pull out an exciting 27-25 win over Kansas State at home to raise their record to 6-4 and become bowl-eligible; in the process, they avoided the ignominity of a second consecutive losing season (after going without a losing season for 43 years prior to last year).

The game wasn't very pretty, though -- NU gave up two (!) safeties in the 3rd quarter, and would have ended up losing if KSU had just made their extra points (they missed all three attempts).

While this will probably save Nebraska Athletic Director Satan's job for the year, I'm glad to see some influential Nebraskans calling for him to be held accountable. ("Influential" means "former football players" in Nebraskaland.) Scott Frost was the QB for NU in '96-'97; you might remember his throwing the "Immaculate Deflection" (film clip here) that allowed NU to beat Missouri in 1997. (I have a little bit of a local connection with him; Scott's dad, Larry Frost, was the best athlete ever to come out of my hometown of Malcolm, Nebraska.) Anyway, Scott has this to say about Satan and the direction he's taken the program:

"Steve Pedersen brought that on himself when he was so cavalier in making these tough decisions. Right or wrong, hero or villain, he took a big risk and painted himself into a tight corner. Time will tell how everyone is viewed in the history of our program.
"I know I am not the only one who feels this way about all of these issues. Most of the guys that I played with are more vocal than I am about many of these things. It isn’t just former players either... I love Nebraska football. I love the state of Nebraska. I long for the days when the characteristics of the team we put on the field on Saturdays exemplified the characteristics of the hard working people of our state. We used to have the Taj Mahal of college football programs. Now it feels like someone took 40 tons of dynamite to our proud and noble masterpiece and built a three bedroom ranch in its place. I’m not saying all of these things to be malicious or overly critical of anyone, but when it comes to a state institution, people have the right to be judgmental. I just want to share my opinions with all of the Husker fans out there who care as much about the program as I do. "

Go Big Red. I can only hope it will get better, but I don't think it will until we fire the AD and hire former coach Frank Solich in his place. Maybe Nebraska's new governor (after he wins next year's election in a 60 point rout, matching the usual results of the football games he coached) will be able to convince the Chancellor to do just that.

Post-script: In the excerpt from Scott's blog post, notice how he spelled Satan's "human" name wrong. I'm pretty sure this was intentional -- it's said that if you spell his name correctly, he might be able to steal your soul.

Update 1821 12 Nov: Satan speaks.

Update 2305 12 Nov: And for those who think NU football isn't really more important to the locals than any other school's fans... please note the 1000+ comments on the "open thread" for today's game in the local newpaper's football blog (actually one of three football blogs there).

Bubblehead Predicts The Future

My prediction for the top story later this week in the Lincoln (NE) Journal-Star:

"Nebraska AD Burned In Effigy"

"University of Nebraska Athletic Director Satan was burned in Effigy last night by a mob of angered football fans. Their anger stemmed from the fact that the Cornhuskers, who had routinely led the nation in rushing offense during the last 25 years, were held to a miserable (-)2 yards of rushing in a ridiculous 41-24 loss to Missouri last Saturday. Fans were understandably outraged that Satan had decreed a shift to the "West Toast" offense after he fired a coach who had the gall to go 58-19 over six years with an option offense.
"Effigy, a small town just south of Lincoln, is where the fans caught up with Satan as he was trying to flee the state."

Get Thee Hence, Satan!

Today, October 15, 2007, is a day which will live in famy (the opposite of infamy) for the denizens of 'Husker Nation. Our long national nightmare is over; Satan has been fired as Nebraska's Athletic Director.

Long-time readers will know that I've been warning for some time that Satan had assumed human form and was serving as the AD at the University of Nebraska. His plan, which was obvious to me from the beginning, was to destroy all that was good and holy in one state -- Nebraska -- as the beginning of his part of the Apocalypse. He did this by firing a coach who had gone 58-19 over the previous six years, and bringing in a foreigner who would run the "Wet Toast offense" rather than the power option attack that had served the 'Huskers so well over the previous decades. This year, Satan tried to finish the job by making the school's beloved Blackshirt defense into a bunch of non-tackling dummies -- probably by putting something in their food -- and that was his downfall. The state rose up, and Satan was overthrown. O Happy Day! Now, it is our fervent hope that the state's Messiah, Dr. Tom Osborne, will come out of retirement to take the AD job (at least on an interim basis -- after all, he is 70 years old), and use it to do what is right -- get rid of the carpetbaggers currently occupying the coach's offices and bring back a true 'Husker hero to be the next head coach: Turner Gill.

So let it be written, so let it be done.

Update 0129 17 Oct: Hallelujah! Dr. Tom has answered our prayers, and agreed to serve as Nebraska's interim AD. It's like manna from heaven, except it's in the form of footballs.

Update 1944 17 Oct: Here's the most recent picture of Satan, supposedly taken on "O" Street in Lincoln earlier today:

Going To The Bowl Game

Everyone with a Y chromosome in the Bubblehead family is off to watch the world-famous MPC Computers Bowl here in Boise tonight. Because my sons appreciate absurdity as much as I do, we're going dressed as Nebraska fans to a game between Nevada and Miami, Fla.

While 26,000 tickets have been sold to the game (the stadium holds just over 30K) I'm not sure how many people will actually be there -- I think most of the tickets were sold to Boise St. season ticket holders as part of their initial ticket purchase, before BSU went undefeated and got a bid to the Fiesta Bowl. If there aren't many people there, we probably have a good shot at getting on TV. Look for the idiots holding up the Nebraska flag.

Update 1428 01 Jan 07: The game was a lot of fun; the stadium was about 3/4 full, and we were 16 rows up from the field, so we weren't able to attract any TV attention I could see. As for the game itself, it proved once again that you should never go for 2 before the 4th quarter; Nevada scored early in the 2nd quarter to go up 8-7 (they scored on a safety earlier) and missed the two-point conversion try that would have put them up by 3. They ended up losing 21-20 -- that extra point would have been very useful at the end.

As far as today's Nebraska-Auburn game, it was the 2nd game in a row the "Wet Toast" offense that Nebraska Athletic Director Satan forced on the 'Huskers failed to score in the 2nd half. The good thing is that we're heading in the right direction; in our loss to Oklahoma in our last game, we passed 50 times and scored 7 points. Today, we passed 26 times and scored 14 points. I see a trend here -- maybe if we'd passed 13 times we'd have scored 28 points; 6 passes = 56 points. (The math kind of breaks down after that.) Still, I bet we didn't pass anywhere near 26 times the last time we played Auburn (a 41-7 win in 1982). Satan sucks.

Update 2308 01 Jan: Well, the BSU-Oklahoma game was exciting, to say the least. After OU tied the score at 28 with a 2-point conversion with about 1 1/2 minutes left, and then took the lead on an interception return for a TD with just over a minute left, I figured that BSU had suffered a hard-fought loss. But then a hook-and-ladder on 4th and 18 in the closing seconds tied it, and a 2 point conversion on a Statue of Liberty play (after a 4th down halfback pass for a TD) won the game for Boise St. 43-42. Of course, since I've spent the last month explaining to all the BSU fans I know how Boise St. didn't stand a chance to win, I expect much (well deserved) abuse at work tomorrow.

Football's Really Starting Up

With seven college football games tomorrow featuring match-ups between Top 25 teams, it looks like the season is really getting into full swing. The game that most interests me is, of course, the Nebraska - Southern Cal game, which kicks off at 1800 MDT tomorrow in Los Angeles. Those who have been reading my blog for a while know that I wasn't happy when the new Nebraska Athletic Director, Satan, dictated a shift from an exciting option attack to the pass-centric "West Toast" offense three seasons ago. While I'm still patiently waiting for Satan to get run out of Lincoln on a really uncomfortable rail, I still hope the team does well -- a Nebraska fan's loyalties are too strong for even a psychotically evil AD to destroy.

As it turns out, Nebraska's been doing pretty well so far this year, with dominating wins over La Tech and Extreme Northwest Nicholls State Teachers College for the Criminally Incontinent. Tomorrow's game against USC should be another story, unfortunately. While I'd like to see Nebraska win, I think we're about a year (and home field advantage) away from challenging the Trojans. Bottom line: This year, I'm just hoping we can beat the 18 1/2 point spread.

Next year, though, the game's in Lincoln, so I've got that to look forward to.

Update 2150 16 Sep: NU beat the spread! Woo-hoo! Just wait 'til next year, Trojan fans, and we'll have a chance of beating you for real.

Navy Settles An Old Score

Navy's 3OT win over Notre Dame yesterday ended a 43 game losing streak to the Fighting Irish -- the longest losing streak of one team to another in NCAA history. The avenging of this streak (which I sure has left ND-fan WillyShake quite shaken) means that the U.S. Navy has now atoned for every embarrassement with the exception of the HMS Leopard / USS Chesapeake encounter of 1807.

Of interest, the 2nd longest win streak by one team over another was Nebraska's 36 consecutive wins over my alma mater Kansas through 2004; Kansas got their 2nd win in three years over Nebraska yesterday in a really humiliating fashion. The 76 points given up by Nebraska were the most ever surrendered by a 'Husker team, proving that defensive coordinator Kevin "Idiot" Cosgrove should really consider studying the Japanese samurai culture and the Bushido code for what to do in the face of intolerable failure. Luckily, he and the other coaches brought in by the previous Athletic Director, Satan, will be gone in a few weeks; 'Husker fans are apparently buying as many tickets to the Colorado game as they can to give them a fitting farewell -- and ensure they don't come back to Nebraska when they're fired by Saint Tom after the final gun. Here's a picture of one of the coveted tickets to that game:

Oh, well, it's almost basketball season...

If It's A Saturday In Late November, It Must Be Time To Talk About College Football

I've always loved college football. From growing up in Nebraska to graduating from Kansas (where I could cheer for Nebraska when they came to Lawrence) to living now the next city over from Boise State University, I've always been close to the game, but especially to the teams from KU, BSU, and above all NU. All three are in the news today.

The biggest news comes out of Lincoln, where Nebraska football messiah Tom Osborne fulfilled his destiny by firing the coaching staff after a horrible 5-7 season; the now-former Head Coach Bill Callahan had, in four years after being hired by former NU Athletic Director Satan, "led" the 'Huskers to their only 2 losing seasons since 1961. While many in Nebraska (including at least one whose diapers I used to change) are calling for the hiring of former NU Defensive Coordinator Bo "Sooner" Pelini, those who have a longer appreciation of 'Husker history and tradition know that 'Husker hero and current University of Buffalo Head Coach Turner Gill is the only honorable option for the job. (And although most people don't want to mention it, having an African-American head coach will surely help in bringing some talented players to Nebraska.) I'm sure Tom Osborne, who was Best Man at Turner's wedding, will make the right choice.

Here in Idaho, people are feeling deflated after Boise State lost the de facto WAC championship game to Hawai'i last night. I admire the BSU coach and many of the players, and am amused by many of the local fans who don't quite understand what real big-time football is all about. (For my Idaho readers who wonder what they're missing, compare the number of comments in the main local paper in-game thread for the NU-Colorado game vs. the BSU-UH game to see what high-level football is all about. For those who don't want to click, the comment count is currently at 875-43 -- plus over 550 comments on the NU site for the former HC's post-game remarks.)

Today's game between #2 Kansas and #4 Missouri marks the biggest-ever game in the "Border War". As the excellent article in this week's Sports Illustrated points out, these two fan bases really, really dislike each other; the hatred leads back to the Quantrill Raid on Lawrence by Missourians in the 1860s. While I still have a hard time believing KU is for real in football, I'd really like to see them kick Mizzou's butt. Rock Chalk Jayhawk!

Go 'Huskers, Beat Sooners!

It just needed to be said.

Also:

Go Navy, Beat Army!

Update 1918 01 Dec: Unlike last year, there don't seem to be a lot of "Spirit Spots" out for this year's Army-Navy game. To make up for it, here's a nice video from last year that celebrates the history of the series (from a Navy perspective):



And for Nebraska fans, here's a video of the Johnny Rodger's punt return in the '71 NU-OU Game of the Century (no quotes required for a statement of fact) that has Lyle Bremser's radio call. Guaranteed to bring chills to any Big Red fan.

And, although it's really not applicable to tomorrow's game, but just because I like seeing it again, here's a video of Tommy Frazier's 75 yard run against Florida in the '95 National Championship game. Why, oh why did we ever give up on the option offense?



Update 2237 02 Dec: 50 passes, 7 points. That's why I don't like the new "West Toast Offense" that Nebraska Athletic Director Satan forced on the 'Huskers three years ago.

Well, at least Navy won. And at least I won't have to spend the next month with rabid Boise St. fans giving me crap for wearing Nebraska stuff.

Satan Flexes His Political Muscle

Regular readers of this blog know that I'm not a conspiracy theorist. I always look for logical explanations for events, and have found that if I apply Occam's and Hanlon's Razors, I can usually get to the truth of the matter. That's why I'm kind of surprised at myself for the conclusions I've reached about the results of this week's Nebraska Republican gubernatorial primary.

The race matched the sitting governor, who took over when when elected Governor was picked to be Secretary of Agriculture, against a living legend, Tom Osborne. It should have been no contest -- the sitting governor, Dave Heineman, may have done a good job as Governor, but he never won 255 games as a coach. I mean, seriously, Osborne went 60-3 in his last five seasons; there's no way he could lose an election in Nebraska! And yet he did.

So, armed with this inpenetrable logic, I needed to figure out how Osborne could lose -- especially since the main region he lost was his own Congressional district, where he'd never gotten less than 82% of the vote. Some say it was because he took controversial positions on two major education issues. Another possible explanation comes from my exclusive correspondence with M. Kennedy, noted Nebraska political observer (Hi, Mom!):

"He looked older than his age (he will be 70 next February) but argued that point with the fact that Ronald Reagan was that age when he became President. You wanted to say, "Tom, you are no Ronald Reagan" to that one. He does not look healthy."

Those explanations might be right, but they still don't convince me. This leaves me with only two possible explanations: Rovian Mind Control Rays, or Satanic influence. I needed to figure out who would benefit most by altering the election results. Karl Rove doesn't seem like he'd have anything to gain -- Osborne has always been a strong supporter of the President. That leaves Satan. Satan, as long-time readers know, is currently on Earth in the guise of the Athletic Director at the University of Nebraska (I discussed this alarming development here, here, and here). I'm convinced that he knew that Osborne, had he been elected Governor, would have taken steps to remove the man who single-handedly made Nebraska move from the power running option game to a "passing" offense. Therefore, he put forth all his unholy power to defeat the One who could stop him. Now that Osborne has been vanquished, who can stand in his way?

The world wonders...

Restore The Order

I'm a conservative, which generally means I get uncomfortable when the established order is overturned. For me, the main constant when I was growing up was that the Nebraska football would always dominate every conference opponent that wasn't Oklahoma. This especially included Colorado.

Lately, though, the established order has been overturned. After NU won 18 consecutive games against CU during my formative years, Colorado won a few games in the late 80s and early 90s, but then we turned around and won 9 straight. During the last four years, though, it's like the world has turned upside down: Colorado had beaten us three of those four years.

I didn't expect much out of today's game. Nebraska was a 16 point underdog on the road, and wasn't really playing for anything other than maybe a "better" bowl game. Colorado, on the other hand, needed the win to clinch the Big 12 North title. I figured that our "West Toast offense" would find a way to throw enough interceptions that we'd lose easily.

Shows you what I know. The Boys in Red showed that they have the heart, character, and skill to lay a traditional beat-down on the Buffalos, winning 30-3 in a game that wasn't really that close. Outgaining the Buffs 497-212 was the way it should be -- and tonight I don't even mind that 392 of the yards were through the air. The best thing I saw, though, was the players showing off the "Restore The Order" T-shirts the coaching staff had given them when the game was done. This shows me that the new coaching staff is maybe starting to realize that Nebraska tradition means something.

Another thing that was the same was the behavior of the Colorado crowd:

"With just more than 10 minutes left in the game, Sections 115 and 116 of the CU student section were asked to leave the stadium after continually throwing bottles, tennis balls, and even golf balls, onto the field.
“They probably felt the same frustration that all of us felt today and they just had some things they could throw,” said Colorado coach Gary Barnett. “They’re just a microcosm of what we were feeling inside as well and we just couldn’t do anything about it.”

The University of Colorado, previously best know for whackjob professor Ward Churchill and rioting over not being able to drink underage, now gets national attention for having idiotic fans. Good for them!

And for those who were wondering: Yes, I still thing NU Athletic Director Satan should be fired. Had we not scrapped the option for a passing offense, we probably would have won 51-3.

Going deep...

Oh, How The Mighty Have Fallen

I expect to get a lot of grief from this post, but what I have to say is important, so bear with me...

There's a lot of trouble going on in the world: wars and rumors of wars, natural disasters, and various and asundry examples of man's inhumanity to man. For us farm boys from Nebraska, though, all of this tends to goes away when fall comes, and we focus on what's really important: Nebraska football.

Nebraska climbed to 4-0 this weekend with an exciting 27-20 double overtime win over Iowa State, who was ranked 23rd at the time. You might expect me to hoot and holler over such a result -- if you do, it just means you haven't interacted with 'Husker fans very much. This season has been turning into a horrible nightmare for many Nebraska fans, and I'll tell you why.

You see, this is the 14th straight time we've beaten Iowa State in Lincoln, and the all-time series record is now 82-16-2 in Nebraska's favor. The fact that the game was close at all is just a further example of the depths to which NU football has fallen since we moved away from an option offense to the "West Toast Offense" that the evil NU Athletic Director, Satan, has forced on us.

Before this game, NU ranked something like 107th in the country in total offense -- this was after games against Maine, Extreme Northwest Wake Forest State Teacher's College for the Blind, and Pittsburgh. The Nebraska that I grew up with and loved would routinely run for 500 or 600 yards against teams like Iowa State.

Some people like exciting football games -- my Mom is one of them. I like exciting games, too, as long as they don't involve Nebraska. I like to see 'Husker games where the opponent leaves a demoralized, broken shell of a team. I like to see games against Iowa State like we had in 1997, when the score was 63-7 -- at the end of the first half. I like to see NU win National Championship games by 38 points. I long for a return to the times when NU went 60-3 in a five year stretch in the 90s and people complained because we didn't make it to the National Championship game in 1996.

It's not easy to satisfy a Nebraska fan...