The return of the OU-Nebraska rivalry
Huskers are down, but renewal of rivalry has Sooners fired up
NORMAN — The big news came on Nov. 29, 2012.
The Big Red news, that is.
That was the day it was announced Oklahoma and Nebraska would be renewing their football rivalry. A homeand-home series would be played in 2021 and 2022, which at the time seemed long afield and far away. Some of us wondered if we’d still be around to see the Sooners and the Cornhuskers together again on a football field.
And after the difficulty of this past year or so, we might’ve wondered even more.
But we have made it. OU-Nebraska week is here.
“It’s so cool they brought it back,” Sooner coach Lincoln Riley said Saturday night after his team’s 76-0 demolition of Western Carolina. “It’s important. It’s been an important game in our game’s history.
“I think you have to appreciate especially ones like these that you don’t get every year.”
Every college football fan of a certain age will for sure appreciate the renewal of this rivalry, even if the competitiveness of this year’s game is in doubt. OU stands as a College Football Playoff candidate and a national title contender. Nebraska, well, doesn’t.
And yet, even as the Sooners and the Catamounts cleared the field Saturday night, it was easy to start thinking about the teams that will next occupy Owen Field.
Sooner crimson on one sideline. Husker red on the other.
“It’s exciting,” Sooner defensive terror Perrion Winfrey said. “It’s exciting times. I just can’t wait to be part of this tradition.”
The tradition is being renewed, of course, in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the “Game of the Century.” The OU-Nebraska game in 1971 had as much pregame hype as the pre-internet, pre-ESPN days could muster, but then the two teams produced a classic worthy of the intense buildup. Nebraska won 35-31.
But really, that was just one of many great and important games in the rivalry. There were so many close calls, so many memorable moments, so many
consequential outcomes with the programs often in the mix for Big Eight supremacy and national championship claims.
Of course, the rivalry has been on hiatus since Nebraska left the Big 12 and went to the Big Ten after the 2010 season.
Here’s guessing OU athletic director Joe Castiglione started working soon after that to get Nebraska on the schedule.
“Classic rivalries like Oklahoma-Nebraska are part of college football’s historic fabric,” he said in a statement back in 2012 when the renewal of the series was announced. “The ability to rekindle a fabled series between two traditionrich programs and two extremely loyal and passionate fan bases was very important to both universities.”
Riley intends to spend some time this week educating his players about that importance. Most of the current Sooners were in elementary school the last time the Sooners and Huskers played, so their appreciation of what happened in decades past may be limited.
But they know enough to know this game holds extra gravity than most nonconference matchups do.
“I know it’s a big rivalry, was back in the day,” Sooner quarterback Spencer Rattler said. “It’s gonna be a big, fun atmosphere, especially being at home.”
Granted, the nostalgia may be lost a bit on the players. Maybe it has to be.
“Honestly, week to week, we don’t even look at the opponent,” Winfrey said. “We just focus on us.”
Rattler said, “We’ve gotta go in and prepare this week and see what they do on the defensive side and practice it to perfection and then come out Saturday and play our best for four quarters.
“It sounds boring and bland, but that’s how it is.”
But for many, it won’t be boring or bland to see the Sooners and the Huskers back on the same football field again.
Riley marveled at the notion he gets to be the OU head coach for the renewal of this rivalry. He was but a twinkle in OU’s eye when the series was announced nine years ago. He was still at East Carolina then.
“Yeah, and when I was at ECU, I wasn’t thinking too much about that,” he said. “I wasn’t thinking I would maybe be coaching here, be the head coach in that game.
“Kind of wild, honestly, to think about still.”
But Saturday, nine years after the renewal of the series was announced, Riley will be on the Sooner sideline, Scott Frost and his Huskers will be on the visitor’s sideline, and a new era of the OUNebraska will begin.
After this home-and-home series, the Sooners and Huskers are scheduled to play again in 2029 and 2030. Who knows what the programs will look like then, but here’s hoping there will always be something special about Sooner crimson and Husker red on the same field.