95 football/volleyball

[Eric the Red]

It would be hard to equal NU's 1995-96 success

 

Sunday, Jun 25, 2006 - 12:01:15 am CDT

 

Nebraska earned national titles in football and volleyball.

 

BY TODD HENRICHS / Lincoln Journal Star

 

As holiday seasons go, 1995 was a festive time for Big Red fans.

 

Nebraska’s first national championship in volleyball — the first won by a so-called “northern” school — was just the beginning of a storied season in NU athletics. The Huskers defeated future rival Texas in a victory marked by coach Terry Pettit’s celebratory fling of his familiar clipboard.

 

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Weeks later, quarterback Tommie Frazier left an indelible mark with his tackle-breaking 75-yard run as Nebraska won its second straight national title on the football field.

 

For as celebrated as Nebraska’s 62-24 flogging of Florida in the 1996 Fiesta Bowl remains, even years later, the accomplishment of NU winning national championships in two high-profile sports remains a benchmark for Husker teams now and in the future.

 

Said athletic director Steve Pederson last week: “We want to win the national championship in football and volleyball again in the same year.”

 

But much has changed since 1995-96, the least of which concerns the retirements of Pettit and three-time national champion Tom Osborne.

 

Their teams’ 1995 championship seasons were the last in the storied Big Eight Conference. That academic year, 1995-96, Nebraska won Big Eight titles in eight sports and the Huskers were eighth in the national all-sports standings. Only once have the Huskers finished higher.

 

This past year, Nebraska won only one Big 12 title and the Huskers appear destined to finish 19th in the Directors’ Cup, their sixth consecutive finish outside of the top 10.

 

“For a lot of the years in the Big Eight, we were able to fund our programs unlike other people could,” said Pederson, who was in charge of football operations at Nebraska from 1994 through 1996. “It was pretty much Oklahoma and Nebraska being able to ratchet up their other programs, and the other people just weren’t in a financial position to do it.

 

“We’re in a much tougher environment than we were 10 years ago.”

 

Reach Todd Henrichs at 473-7439 or thenrichs@journalstar.com