Easy, just mention Tom Osborne. How do you drive them to delusional cravings for a 2008 National Championship and an immediate return to the mid-90’s? Just hire Tom Osborne as interim athletic director when you dump a program wrecker like Steve Pederson.
Get ready football land, because if you think my Texas Longhorns can have inflated expectations just wait and see what you get coming out of Lincoln in the next several weeks. I feel certain that no matter how well the Huskers do the remainder of the college football season current coach Bill Callahan will get the axe. The names being thrown around early on are Bo Pelini and Turner Gill. Bo Pelini would surprise me as a selection for two reasons: he was snubbed when Nebraska fired Frank Solich and should have gotten the job then. Would he come back to take over. The other is that he is not a “Osborne” guy and the thought process is that Nebraska will want to bring in one of their own to turn the tide.
That leads us to Turner Gill who was a Heisman candidate as a quarterback for the Huskers in the early 80’s. He coached quarterbacks and wide receivers at Nebraska and is currently the head coach at the University of Buffalo where he has a 5-16 record. I think this would be a nightmare selection for the Huskers because he just lacks the track record of a guy built to take over a big time program in need of a serious turn around.
Many interesting things could come out of the next few weeks with Osborne running the athletic department. First off, there will be a new energy following the football team that has been lacking since the week of the Southern Cal game. Fans have been disgruntled, leaving games early, and even the occasional “boo’s” coming from the stands. That should be a thing of the past at this weekends “Buyout Bowl” against Texas A&M as Memorial Stadium will be filled with an optimism that has been lacking the past few weeks.
In less that one full day on the job the “team” made the decision to get rid of all Blackshirts in practive this week. Let me guess how that “team” decision was made. It likely went like this:
T.O. – Hi, Coach Callahan.
B.C. – Hello, Dr. Osborne.
T.O. – That is Coach Osborne to you and what business do you have letting that so-called defense wear black jerseys in practice?
B.C. – Yes, sir. We’ll have a team meeting shortly.
There will be some interesting days in the coming months for the Husker Nation, but I still think the best thing for them would be to drop a couple of games along the way to ensure that there will be a new coach in Lincoln in early January. Though I feel that it is a certainty that it will happen, winning out could make it tough. When the decision is made for a new coach I would sure hope that Paul Johnson would get serious consideration. Paul Johnson is currently the coach at the United States Naval Academy and has been successful everywhere he has been. I would hate to see him leave the Academy, but he would be a great fit in Nebraska. He could take Nebraska back to a run oriented offensive attack, but throw the ball enough to keep teams honest. He is a coach who instills discipline and patience in a potent offensive attack.
Either way, I think that it is good for college football to have Nebraska as a power and I hope that they are able to achieve that with the moves they are about to make. I just hope they do not make a move that forever moves them to that lower rung of football hierarchy.
