Life in the Red Group

Posted by: Fear the gathering Blackshirts on November 5, 2009 8:36AM CST Not to mention rivalry games are oh so profitable as more major networks jockey to cover them.

Posted by: Fear the gathering Blackshirts on November 5, 2009 8:39AM CST And the attention that comes with playing nationally televised (or at least regionally televised) games can only help recruiting. Besides, who really doesn't want to see two storied programs go head to head every year.

Posted by: Denver Bob on November 5, 2009 8:41AM CST Interesting Idea. NU-OU MU-OSU KSU-TT ISU-BU CU-UT KU-A&M

Posted by: 4BigRed on November 5, 2009 8:46AM CST For a while, there was talk about having an annual OU-NU game that would be considered "non-conference" and wouldn't count in the standings except for those years when OU was in our regular South rotation. Wonder if that would ever be considered again?

Posted by: Viking Husker on November 5, 2009 8:50AM CST NU-OU on Black Friday. One thing that makes college football so cool is its traditions.

Posted by: Fear the gathering Blackshirts on November 5, 2009 8:50AM CST i cant imagine the other B12 teams complaining too much. I mean, who besides NU really wants to play OU when they don't have to?

Posted by: Big Wave Dave on November 5, 2009 9:00AM CST I am sure for it. The Players would not only love it, but thrive because of it. It would help recruiting too. All those southern division teams got to keep their in house rivalry's, and left NU adrift. Texas got to keep A&M and Oklahoma, but OU-NU was left with a 2 year hiatus. Colorado wanted and declared a rivalry with NU when OU was struggling, but rivalry's happen for other reasons and they are forged through time by factors that Colorado folks have never understood. Yea, it is time to bring OU back every year.

Posted by: Father of future Husker on November 5, 2009 9:17AM CST Denver Bob )) I'm thinking we should probably rank the programs 1-6 in the north and south and then match accordingly, therefore... NU - OU MU - UT KU - OSU KSU - TT CU - A&M ISU - BU The first and last matchups are easy, it's the ones in the middle that we will have to debate.

Posted by: drivebyposter on November 5, 2009 9:37AM CST wagondriver/corn football game is a big 12 game and no longer a rivlary. Perhaps the corn could move to the south and baylor (pretty equal exchange) could move to the north. :)

Posted by: drivebyposter on November 5, 2009 9:39AM CST Actually the big 8 should "crank back up" and let the Texas schools add the other 4 texas schools and they could be the Texas 8

Posted by: huskerNwks on November 5, 2009 9:59AM CST Coach T.O. strongly wanted to maintain this "non-conf." game when the Big 12 was formed and the A.D. at OU would not keep it. One wonders if the A.D. at the then weakened OU understood the implications were harder on NU recruiting then on OU, since an entity is defined by its greatest competition and OU still had UT.

Posted by: Inbread on November 5, 2009 10:54AM CST Not a Berry I still sport the mullett Tramel fan, but he has sound reasoning here. In fact, I dont know if he even still sports the mullett anymore as I simply bypass most of what he writes. However, I wish we would adopt the SEC type of scheduling. Give everyone a "permanent" N/S "rival". It would be better for the conference IMO.

Posted by: NishBigRed on November 5, 2009 11:38AM CST Who would be bettr for recruiting, playing OU or Texas, Bo's imphasis on recruiting in TX, I thinking playing the Longhorns would help our recruiting more. We never should have agreed to entier the Big 12 unless the OU vs NU rivial stayed intact.

Posted by: ScottMa on November 5, 2009 12:11PM CST Darn...I missed the live chat. I wanted to say that if Watson calls ANY quick pass plays out in the flat he should be fired at season's end. I don't care if it is the last play of the game or if the play goes for 90yds and a td. Those plays continue to cost us. I'm sure everyone remembers our 1st play from scrimmage in last year's OU game. I would not be upset, however, if he were to call that play as a fake pump and then throw deep to the same receiver on the 1st play of the game. I think that might work if executed properly and the safety is not in position to stop it!

Posted by: Big Wave Dave on November 5, 2009 12:54PM CST huskerNwks: Interesting point. It was OU who opted out of the yearly game. And the TU Folks were overjoyed that the OU-TU game would have divisional aspects to it. It does seem that Texas Football has benefited more from the creation of the Big 12 than any other school.

Posted by: Busiekcreek on November 5, 2009 1:10PM CST I cannot fathom a season without my LSU Tigers playing the Gumps. NU and OU games are the stuff college football legends are made of. Bring it back every year and make it count. Non of this non-conference status for odd years. Texas has a tendency to take over everything they are a part of. Let them have the Texas conference and be done with it.

Posted by: Country Husker on November 5, 2009 1:10PM CST huskerNwks & Dave, I agree on the Tx thing. I think, at the time of the formation of the Big 12, OK was on a down streak, and we were on a 3 national championship run, pre Stoops. I wouldn't have wanted to play Nebraska every year if I could get away with it also, back there in the 90's. It took them years to get past the "Switzer getting us in hot water with the NCAA" era. Wasn't OK banned from post season bowls for a while? I think they lost some schollies too.

Posted by: Outside The Box on November 5, 2009 1:13PM CST BWD - Can't argue that. Tech has made some big strides in the past 13 years, but Texas's resurgence has been more pronounced. Okie St has also come on, but that's due more to Boone's bags of money than the Big 12. Ironically enough, the other big school in Texas (A&M) has been regressing since the conference began.

Posted by: Country Husker on November 5, 2009 1:25PM CST Ok, I did some checking, there is a pretty good article on the demise of the Oklahoma football program under Switzer in the late 80's. http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1126571/1/index.htm Tom Osborn and the clean cut image of Nebraska football (true or not, the image was there) made for a great contrast to the "anything goes" nature of Oklahoma football back then. Oklahoma is lucky to have a guy like Stoops, who I think runs a fairly tight ship, as opposed to the good old days.

Posted by: Country Husker on November 5, 2009 1:28PM CST Another example of how the "good old days" maybe weren't so good............for Oklahoma.

Posted by: Islander/Husker on November 5, 2009 2:11PM CST Short answer, the Huskers and Sooners need to play every year. The powers that be need to find a way to get that accomplished.

Posted by: Outside The Box on November 5, 2009 3:25PM CST The sad truth is, this is not going to happen anytime soon, unless they realign the divisions to something other than North-South. OU has two other rivalry games (Texas and OSU) each year their incentive for a third blood match each year (versus a tune up at Colorado or Iowa State) is pretty low. As for the annual "crossover" game exception, that's all well and good for NU and OU, but who else in the conference would be able to take advantage of that? It's not like anybody is clamoring for an annual meeting of Missouri and A&M or has fond memories of watching Kansas - Okie State the second Saturday of each October. If this came to a vote, it would lose 10-2 (or possibly 11-1). With each passing year, the rivalry that was fades away. For some perspective, most of our roster would have been 6-8 years old the last time NU and OU played annually. And you have to go back even farther (early 90s) to when the games actually mattered for the Orange Bowl. We all agree that the loss of this great rivalry is one of the worst things to come out of the Big 12, but there isn't much that can be done now to bring it back.

Posted by: bruNo on November 5, 2009 4:08PM CST Agree 100%, the rivalry should be brought back every year.

Posted by: Islander/Husker on November 5, 2009 4:24PM CST outside the box, you are right in that they would have change how the divisions look. But how hard would it be to put Oklahoma and Nebraska in the same division, might have to include Texas because of their rivalry with the Sooners.

Posted by: Country Husker on November 5, 2009 4:28PM CST It's sad but I agree with outside, there is no way this game is coming back every year. The best thing we can do now is get our team to the top of the north every year. Then we'll be playin' the sooners or longhorns in the championship game. I don't see any way to make the conference results fair if we play the sooners every year. I gotta think the sooners will be south champs around half the time, so now we gotta do our part to get in to that game regularily. Go Big Red.

Posted by: Country Husker on November 5, 2009 4:29PM CST Hmmmm........never thought of rearranging the divisions...........I like it.

Posted by: redone on November 5, 2009 4:36PM CST MU and KU is the best rivalry because its the 2nd longest rivalry in college sports. Nu has never been a rivalry with Oklahoma because NU has never had anything to match Oklahoma.

Posted by: Country Husker on November 5, 2009 4:45PM CST redone Apparently you were not born yet in the 90's when NU won 9 out of 10 years from 1988 to 1997. 7 straight wins for NU from 91 to 97. 73-21 win in 96 69-7 win in 97 Ouch for the Sooners. Oklahoma's AD was damn happy to see the big 12 come along in 1998 so they would not have to play NU every year.

Posted by: Country Husker on November 5, 2009 4:52PM CST ..........and then came the Frank Solich, "I wonder if we can win without recruiting" experiment...............................followed by HWNSNBM's "NFL playbook in college, no problem, and by the way, who needs defense anyway?" Thus NU fans have had unlimited amounts of issues to agrue about ever since.

Posted by: bruNo on November 5, 2009 5:04PM CST Well, when sCUm leaves the conference that will open up a slot for us to schedule OU every year. ;)

Posted by: ScottF on November 5, 2009 5:47PM CST The way this conference is set up, playing Oklahoma each year would be a big advantage for Missouri, Kansas, or the rest of the Big 12 North who wouldn't have to play them every year and a big disadvantage to Nebraska. And I'm sure that Texas would love it if OU had an additional tough conference game every year with a North team. Wouldn't be better to petition the Big 12 to have NU play Baylor every year? Let's face it, this rivalry is now part of history and will never come back on an annual basis. Too much at stake for both teams to ever try and renew it.

Posted by: Jackson1 on November 5, 2009 5:48PM CST The State's of Texas & Oklahoma could have one hell of a Conference. Everyone would play each other plus have a couple of non-conference games. The Texhoma Conference 1) UT Current AP Rank 2nd 2) TCU 6th 3) Houston 13th 4) SMU 5) T A&M 6) TT Receiving votes 7) Baylor 8) OSU 18th 9) OU 20th 10) Tulsa

Posted by: hskrnut on November 5, 2009 7:02PM CST The big 12 was made for texas no one else was helped half as much as them they should never whine about anything, they have their own confrence!!!

Posted by: hskrnut on November 5, 2009 7:05PM CST CU is built on hatred OU Respect hmm...

Posted by: huskerNwks on November 5, 2009 7:32PM CST With the talk of a TX and OK conference, the T.V.s that drive the finances and the expressed power of the southern members to vote in a block to their favor where does a NU land if such a thing happened? Purely hypothetical of course ;)

Posted by: Busiekcreek on November 6, 2009 9:53AM CST test 1 sparkling tiger

Posted by: huskerdog/colo. on November 6, 2009 9:35PM CST The "DOG" doesn't respect the Okies - he hates them worse than the sCUm! However, everybody to they're own opinion! I remember those "hillbillies" dancing on the sideline! Particularly after '86 & '87 victories @ ( Memorial Stadium-Lincoln) - a quirck in the schedule (?) had 2 games in a row in Lincoln. I thought they were ARROGANT, Until the premedonna TxASS shorthorns came along!!!

Posted by: huskerdog/colo. on November 6, 2009 9:55PM CST The main deal the Huskers have to deal with each year is the LACK of POPULATION! We have 10 Div. 1 prospects each yr vs TxASS & Okies having 200 - 300 in their backyard! Obviously, Florida & USC have that same luxury! Nebr. pop is the smallest in the B12! Of course this has always existed, but the playing field has changed! Less scholarships, better head coaches (TX, OU, FL), formation of B12 & overall parity!

Posted by: Bornhusker on November 7, 2009 5:01AM CST Nebraska - Oklahoma is a game that SHOULD happen every year. When the Big 12 was formed, Nebraska tried to make it happen. But at that time, Nebraska was "up" and OU was "down" -- and they were against it. Now that they're up and we've been down for a few years, maybe they'll reconsider. One of the ideas back then was to have it count as a non-conference game in the "off" years. Not a bad idea, since I doubt Colorado wants to play Texas every year as was proposed earlier.

Posted by: Bohemian Ace on November 7, 2009 4:28PM CST OK - I think we need the OU-NU game every year. I would change the Big 12. First Ship CU off to another conference. Insert Iowa. Notre Dame could replace Iowa. Make the conference schedule 9 games every year. right now the Big 12 is losing to the SEC. We need more big games, and this would do it. Iowa / Iowa State could become a big game. Move NU / OU to the day after Thanksgiving.