NU Cancelling Oklahoma Game?

I'm an 80 year old OU fan that was looking forward to the OU/NU series with the game on the anniversary year of one of the greatest games I personally have witnessed.  I walked out of Oklahoma Memorial Stadium with a big smile on my face.  It was typical of the OU and NU match ups back in that era of college football.  That game garnered OU and NU more publicity, ever.  The whole country watched the OU and NU yearly games.  It was a classic.

With this series, I was thinking it might lead to more OU Vs NU games.   I home this thought of Nebraska cancelling the game is just a joke or just plain ole rumor.  My wanting to see the home and home series because we OU fans cherished the old NU series just like all Husker fans did, as well.

I won't comment on the consequences of NU actually cancelling the 2021 game, except to say that it would be a shame to deny both sets of fans to see the home and home series.  We had so much great history and it is a shame not for our schools to meet every so often.

My guess is the reaction of Husker fans on the cancelling would be the same if we were to cancel such a game we would scream bloody hell over it.

Let the AD and the Administration how you all feel about cancelling the game.

 
The_Fan_Man said:
The only good explanation for this is that they're getting back-ups lined up in case the game is compromised by COVID. Of course, it shouldn't take the UNL media team two hours to respond if that was the case.
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I think this is the most likely answer, if this story has any legs at all. The AD lost a boatload of money this past year and I would imagine that having possible backup games lined up is now standard operating procedure if it wasn't already. 

 
The financial explanation doesn’t hold up: if you want extra revenue, how much “extra” do you really make? Home ticket sales and concessions? There’s no guarantee that we will have full stadiums by fall. Even if we do, you still have to pay the buyout to OU and pay the new team to come here. After those expenses, is what you have left REALLY worth losing all your integrity and respect over? Sadly, the damage is already done and it’s more permanent than we all realize. You can be labeled a lot of things in football and life....but scared is a label that’s impossible to come back from.

 
Just tossing this out there... is it possible that whoever is allegedly seeking to postpone the matchup is doing so because of stadium capacity questions? As in they want full houses for the games and don't want to have the big matchup played at 20-50% capacity? I'm in favor of playing the game regardless but I have to wonder why this now. I don't think we'd be looking to postpone out of fear of a loss... I believe Frost and Moos want us on the big stage more, not less.

 
RedSavage said:
If we play some patsy, I don't think there will be a whole lot of fan interest to begin with.  Then add in how pissed people are about this, I could see a lot of fans giving the university the finger and not showing up.  
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The average fan isn't on this forum and frankly doesn't follow the day to day stuff like most of us do.  The stadium will be full when attendance is allowed.  There will be some PR explanation offered if we do cancel with Oklahoma and most will accept it.  We are a pretty gullible society lately.

 
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Iowa's last 5 years of out of conference games. 

Miami (OH)
Iowa St 
NDSU (1AA) they beat Iowa
Wyoming
North Texas
Northern Illinois
UNI (1AA)
Middle Tennessee St
Kent St
Colorado St

 
Hilltop said:
The average fan isn't on this forum and frankly doesn't follow the day to day stuff like most of us do.  The stadium will be full when attendance is allowed.  There will some PR explanation offered if we do cancel with Oklahoma and most will accept it.  We are a pretty gullible society lately.
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I agree with the bolded.  This will be all over the news though.  Would be hard to miss and at least personally, I know a lot of people who don't follow the day to day and have seen this and this would be "the last straw" for them.  But maybe people will have moved on and forgotten by this fall, who knows. 

 
Even if this is to re-coop some of the money lost from last year, the PR of this is terrible and it shouldn't have even been considered. I can also see why our coaches think that going down to Norman to get our asses kicked by a top-five team is probably not what this program needs right now and that's a tough break, but trying to weasel out of a game is the weakest sauce possible. 

 
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KrakowIntellectuals said:
The financial explanation doesn’t hold up: if you want extra revenue, how much “extra” do you really make?
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The AD said in 2020 that each home game generates $5 million in revenue and about $12 million total when taking into account the local economy. Even if all the other optics and variables make this a bad idea, that type of cash flow is nothing to scoff at as an athletic department, particularly when UNL is one of a handful that actually generates profit each year.

I'm not saying pulling out against OU is the right call to make, but if revenue is an important KPI for you (which we know it is in the AD), then that may be why they looked into it.

 
Enhance said:
The AD said in 2020 that each home game generates $5 million in revenue and about $12 million total when taking into account the local economy. Even if all the other optics and variables make this a bad idea, that type of cash flow is nothing to scoff at as an athletic department, particularly when UNL is one of a handful that actually generates profit each year.

I'm not saying pulling out against OU is the right call to make, but if revenue is an important KPI for you (which we know it is in the AD), then that may be why they looked into it.
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Let's also keep in mind that this was likely leaked by an OU source to generate public pressure to keep it scheduled. So it very well might have been some preliminary kicking the tires on the revenue/seeing if we could possibly even get an opponent and now it's "nEbRAsKa'S tRyINg tO CaNCeL".

 
RedSavage said:
But maybe people will have moved on and forgotten by this fall, who knows. 
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With the amount of fan apathy in general, this is kind of where I'm at. I don't think people will care that much. Sure it'll be a fun punching bag on social media for the off season if it happens, but fans and sports are fickle. It's all 'what have you done for me lately.'

If by some miracle NU pulled out against OU but went on to win 9-10 games and a division title this year, I don't think the average fan would care about OU.

(FWIW... by the time I was born, most of the NU/OU glory days were done. OU was not very good in the 90's when I grew up watching Husker football. This is probably blasphemous to some of our older fans, but to me personally, I never viewed them much differently than any other team on Nebraska's schedule).

 
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