Tom Osborne, standing outside Memorial Stadium with bullhorn in hand, offered his condolences to a shocked Husker nation.
“I understand the pain you are feeling right now. I’m in shock too, my friends. I never thought this sort of wholesale destruction could occur on Memorial Stadium’s Astroturf. But we will recover.”
Fast forward 10 days to the present, Tuesday, Oct. 26, and fans are not feeling any lessening of emotion. Lori Bunn, a Lincoln native, says she’ll never forget what she was doing when she heard the news that Nebraska was about to lose to their hated rivals.
“I was standing in the kitchen making Toaster Strudels when my husband walked out of the living room. I could tell he was upset, but when I asked what was wrong I never thought it would be something like this.” She paused to wipe the gathering tears from her eyes. “It was awful. I didn’t believe him at first, but then I walked over to the TV and saw for myself – we were down two scores in the first quarter. I just stood there, staring at the live telecast, for who knows how long. I burned my Toaster Strudels.”
Osborne and head coach Bo Pelini were unavailable for immediate comment on game day as they comforted Nebraska fans at the scene of the tragedy. At a press conference later in the week, however, Osborne made it clear that his administration planned to tackle the growing sense that Nebraska deserved some of the blame for the defeat.
“We have to remember that we cannot fall into the trap of blaming ourselves for losing to Texas. It is very much an ‘if-then’ imaginary situation, one we cannot afford to have as the season progresses. ‘If’ Shawn Watson had bothered to call more than three different plays the offense might have been mildly effective. ‘If’ our receivers could catch anything we wouldn’t have had to rely on Alex Henery for our only scores for nine tenths of the game. ‘If’ will not solve the problem. There will be an investigation, but for now we are assuming the face of the matter to be true – that Texas caught us at our weakest and exploited that for their disgusting deed. They will be punished.”
A grainy video was released by Mac Brown’s coaching staff, believed to be hiding somewhere in Austin, Texas. In the three-minute clip Brown claims credit for beating Nebraska, and expresses no remorse for the deed.
“Yeah, we played a good game up there. We’ve been rivals for a long time, and it’s going to be a different league without Nebraska. Still, even though they’re a great team to play, and they have a great atmosphere up there, it’s nice to send them off with our series streak unbroken.”
Paratroopers from the Nebraska National Guard are expected to put boots on the ground in Austin by Wednesday. Coach Pelini explained the aggressive move at the same press conference.
“Whatever. Assholes.”
