Man, woman and child, this has been a fun week to sit in the film room of our memories. Oklahoma vs. Nebraska, in black, white and living color. The only way for the Huskers to bid adieu to the Big 12, right?
It's very fitting, in more ways than one.
Some Nebraska fans will be carrying extra baggage down to Arlington, Texas, this week. All that angst toward Texas. Dan Beebe. The Big 12, in general.
But what about the school in crimson on the opposing sideline?
This week is a sentimental journey for a generation 35 and older. Those Nebraskans miss playing Oklahoma. They miss their best friend. They blame the Big 12, and even Texas, for ending the series that was like family. But that anger has been misdirected.
The fact is, it was Oklahoma that ended the series. Oklahoma that walked away from dear old friend Nebraska.
It says here that if Oklahoma and Nebraska had continued their series on an annual basis, NU would not be leaving for the Big Ten.
Go back to 1995. Conference realignment was on the fast track. The Big Eight and Southwest Conference weren't likely to secure large TV contracts in their existing state. So Oklahoma Athletic Director Donnie Duncan and Texas Athletic Director DeLoss Dodds got together and assembled the Big 12 — the Big Eight plus four SWC schools.
Where was NU Athletic Director Bill Byrne in this scenario? That may have been the first sign of things to come.
As divisions and schedule rotations were set up, Duncan made a decision that would change history. With OU and NU in separate divisions, he decided that Oklahoma would no longer play the Huskers annually.
Duncan told this story last May while he attended the historic Big 12 meetings on Kansas City's Plaza. I asked him why he chose to end a meaningful rivalry like NU and OU. His reply: "Oklahoma already had a rival in Texas. There was no need to play both Nebraska and Texas every year.''
I don't think Duncan acted alone here. You don't end something like Nebraska-Oklahoma without permission from the president, regents, governor and the fans. As I recall, there was little uproar in Oklahoma about this. Most of the noise was coming from north of the Kansas border.
How could OU do this? The Sooners already had blood rivals in Oklahoma State and Texas, which would be annual games. And, as Duncan said, why should OU have to play Texas and Nebraska every year when nobody else in the Big 12 South would have to do that?
It's a lame excuse. Play Texas and NU in the same year? In the Southeastern Conference, they call that October. Look at NU's inaugural road through the Big Ten next year: Ohio State, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Penn State and Michigan State.
Go back to 1995 again. Nebraska had Tommie Frazier. OU had Howard Schnellenberger. Maybe that was part of the incentive. Texas wasn't a threat then. Neither was Oklahoma State. Did Duncan dump Nebraska while the getting was good?
The bottom line is, Oklahoma pulled the plug because it never cared as much about this "rivalry'' as Nebraska. And, in hindsight, now we know: NU-OU was more of a classic series than a rivalry. True rivalries aren't allowed to end, no matter the conference structure. See Ohio State-Michigan.
What if OU had kept Nebraska as an annual game? History would be different. That move immediately soured Nebraska fans on the idea of the Big 12. The Sooners essentially chose Texas over Nebraska as their running buddy. Things went downhill from there.
Yes, there would be other reasons for NU to feel uncomfortable in the Big 12. But with OU-NU still intact, Nebraska would have been able to stomach Big 12 heartburn. There would have been something meaningful for NU to hold on to.
I don't think that Nebraska, especially with Tom Osborne at the helm, could have walked away from the Big 12 if it meant turning its back on the Oklahoma game. Without it, there was nothing historical or emotional to tie NU to the league.
"That's interesting,'' said OU Athletic Director Joe Castiglione on Wednesday. "I've never thought about that.''
It has crossed the mind of Osborne, Nebraska's athletic director. I asked Osborne, via e-mail on Tuesday, if Nebraska would have had a hard time leaving if the Sooners were still an annual staple on the schedule. And I asked if dropping the game got NU off on the wrong foot with the league.
"I would say that had Nebraska and Oklahoma played each other every year, it would have made it more difficult to leave the Big 12 Conference,'' Osborne wrote in a reply. "One thing the Big Ten made sure of in its realignment was to preserve the traditional rivalries, and I think those games tend to bind a conference together.
"I don't know that we had a sour mood going into the Big 12 because of the loss of the annual game with Oklahoma, but it did put a different complexion on things.''
Too bad Joe C. wasn't in charge of the Sooners when the Big 12 was formed. History might be different.
Castiglione, a Maryland graduate and the A.D. at Missouri before he went to Oklahoma in 1998, is a big fan of the Oklahoma-Nebraska game. A generation of married couples fell in love to Frank Sinatra songs. A generation of fans fell in love with college football because of Oklahoma vs. Nebraska, Osborne vs. Barry Switzer, Thanksgiving weekend.
Castiglione was among them. Two years ago, he came up with the idea to invite the 1971 "Game of the Century'' participants — from both schools — to a reception and dinner at OU before the 2008 Nebraska-Oklahoma game. It was classy. It was so well done Osborne returned the favor last year in Lincoln.
Last summer, just after Nebraska announced it was going to the Big Ten, Castiglione called up Osborne to propose a two-game nonconference series beginning in 2021 — the 50th anniversary of the Game of the Century. Castiglione also tried in past years with Byrne and Steve Pederson to make Nebraska-OU a nonconference game. But both schools had trouble fitting the game into already busy schedules.
If Castiglione had been A.D. in 1995, NU-OU could have been scheduled as a nonconference game the two years that it wasn't on the Big 12 schedule. But Castiglione wouldn't go there.
"It's hard to say what would have happened,'' he said. "I clearly understand the thought process at the time for Oklahoma. You would create a disproportionate schedule for one school against the others (in Big 12 South).
"I do think that series meant a lot to Oklahoma. But Oklahoma has a different set of challenges to deal with to make it all work.''
If it had gone on, the series wouldn't have necessarily created classics. Osborne vs. John Blake was a mismatch. So was Bob Stoops vs. Bill Callahan. The 2000 and 2001 games offered a glimpse into the past. Now, with Stoops and Bo Pelini in charge, OU and NU would be more like family than ever. It would be harder than ever to break them up.
But we'll never know. We'll just have one long, last look at our childhoods this Saturday.
"A lot of people are saying how this is a fitting way to end it,'' Castiglione said. "I have some emotions about it, but we all have to move on. There's a level of disappointment in this. There are a lot of people who didn't think it had to end like this.''
But it will end, and how ironic that Nebraska's dear old friend Oklahoma may have been the one to pull the plug.
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