December defeat laid groundwork for hungry Huskers
LINCOLN — Walking off the turf after that heart-shattering loss to Texas last year, the Nebraska players never thought they would one day look back positively on a game that was so devastating.
Following the 13-12 defeat, the Huskers wanted to forget it all — the extra second added back on the clock by a video replay, the last-second field goal that they couldn't block, the elated Longhorns celebrating at midfield as they awaited their Big 12 trophy presentation.
Tight end Mike McNeill knows what emotions overwhelmed him. “Angry. Upset. Sad. In some ways, we felt like we were wronged,” he said.
The shellshocked team then piled on a plane for its ride home. As Kyler Reed put it, they were “still in disbelief.”
But somewhere, the bitterness dissipated. In its place crept motivation.
And now, as NU players prepare for Saturday's rematch with the same team that caused their emotional flat-line, they seem much better off. Since that painful outcome, they've won all six games by an average of 30 points, dramatically boosting their confidence level and recapturing the nation's attention along the way.
Nobody here is going to thank Texas, but it's clear that December night contributed mightily to Nebraska's improvement.
“It would have been nice to win, but maybe, maybe that was for the better,” said Reed, a sophomore tight end. “After that loss, we took a step back and looked at what we needed to do. That game was kind of a pivotal point for us.”
Senior Rickey Thenarse said he noticed a change. He missed the championship game because of injury, but was on the NU teams that suffered narrow defeats to Texas in 2006 and 2007. There was always some unmentioned uneasiness about the spotlight, until last year's title game, he said.
“I kind of believe that somewhere on the team there was a little doubt — that we can't beat them, we can't win a big game,” he said. “We've always been underdogs and been trying to bring the program back. After last year's game, it just finally (did) sink in to everyone ... We can beat anybody.”
But to defeat the top-tier teams, it takes a 60-minute effort. That was the lesson the Huskers learned the hard way against Texas.
To help emphasize that, players printed out sheets of paper that read “:01,” and passed them out during winter conditioning. Some were taped to various facility walls.
Bracelets — with “.01” and “Finish” engraved on them — were distributed by the summer. Brandon Kinnie looks at his wristband all the time — before games, even in class sometimes. Cody Green never takes his off. Neither does Will Compton.
But the players say revenge isn't the idea behind those motivational tactics. They're trying to avoid any vengeful thinking.
“When you go out and you hold this grudge against a team, that's when you play outside of what you've been coached,” linebacker Alonzo Whaley said.
Husker fans seem to have a different attitude toward the rivalry, though. And the team has heard plenty of that perspective during the past 10 months.
Sophomore Eric Martin says the Texas talk has come from “just everyone,” friends and family included. It didn't end when the season started either, Martin said. That's why Thenarse said he's ignoring phone calls and avoiding Facebook this week.
One of Whaley's friends has been driving around for some time now with “beat Texas” stamped to his license plate.
Green said it got to the point during the offseason where he and his teammates heard so much from fans about Texas, they became numb to the hype. “We don't care,” he said. “We're zoned in. Stuff just bounces off our ears.”
Coaches have done their best to keep players isolated from the public buildup for Saturday's showdown, downplaying the big-picture dialogue at every opportunity. Players have bought in to that approach, according to McNeill.
“That's something that's become part of us, just taking things one week at a time and staying focused and playing attention to little details — all the things that we get harped on about all the time,” McNeill said. “Coach Bo really does preach that to us, and it's become part of our bloodstream.”
The Huskers insist that nothing's changed this week. They're business-like, emulating their head coach as best they can.
“After you take the emotion out of it, that initial situation, you look back at it and say, ‘OK, why did it happen?'” Pelini said. “You can't turn back the clock.”
