"Then Osborne Said to Rozier. . .": The Best Nebraska Cornhuskers Stories Ever Told
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"Then Osborne Said to Rozier. . .": The Best Nebraska Cornhuskers Stories Ever Told
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Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781617492006 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Triumph Books |
| Publication date: | 07/01/2008 |
| Series: | Best Sports Stories Ever Told |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 224 |
| Sales rank: | 1,040,121 |
| File size: | 4 MB |
About the Author
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"Then Osborne Said to Rozier ..."
The Best Nebraska Cornhuskers Stories Ever Told
By Steve Richardson
Triumph Books
Copyright © 2008 Steve RichardsonAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-61749-200-6
CHAPTER 1
Bob Devaney: The Beginning of Nebraska's Dynasty
Before the 1962 season, the Nebraska coaching job went to the wispy, charismatic Irishman named Bob Devaney, who had no links to the Cornhuskers state. But Devaney had an attractive résumé because he had made a winner of a downtrodden Wyoming football program in the western frontier of America after spending his early years in Michigan.
Bob Devaney was a Midwesterner through and through, but not a Nebraskan. He was a football end at Alma College in Michigan in the 1930s, graduating in 1939. During the next decade he was a Michigan high school football coach at such places as Big Beaver, Keego Harbor, and Saginaw before a seven-year stint at Alpena High School (52–9) earned him a spot as an assistant on Biggie Munn's staff at Michigan State.
"Devaney played college football, but he was probably a better baseball player and boxer than he was a football player," said Adrian Fiala, who played at Nebraska from 1967 to 1969. "Being a boxer, that's where his toughness came in. ... Bob wasn't very big. But he was a kind of a stocky guy. There are some guys you can just kind of look at and say, you don't want to fool with them."
In 1957 Devaney could have wound up as the Missouri head coach. He had been considered for the Missouri post when Don Faurot retired from coaching following the 1956 season and slipped into the Missouri athletics director's chair exclusively.
"At the time, Bob Devaney was going to Wyoming [from Michigan State] and Frank Broyles was an assistant at Georgia Tech under Bobby Dodd," said Dick Tamburo, who was an assistant football coach in those days and later the Missouri athletics director. "Bob called me and asked, 'If I get the Missouri job, will you come as line coach?' Shortly after that, Frank Broyles was named Missouri's head coach."
By the time Devaney took the Nebraska head coaching job, Missouri already was a national power under Dan Devine.
In 1957 Devaney's first Wyoming team was 4–3–3. But in 1958 Devaney took Wyoming to the Sun Bowl, where his Cowboys beat Hardin-Simmons 14–6. His 1959 Wyoming team (9–1) would have gone to the Gator Bowl if it hadn't been on probation for a recruiting violation.
"That Wyoming team was one of his favorites," said Jim Walden, who was Devaney's quarterback then at Wyoming and later an assistant coach at Nebraska. "It was a catalyst team. It was his first big winning team. They loved him at Wyoming. Bob, keep in mind, spent 14 years in high school football and had been an assistant at Michigan State. He was not some wide-eyed graduate assistant type. He was in his forties when he took the Wyoming job. It was a different environment [in Wyoming].
"The media was, like, the play-by-play guy on the radio, the sports editor of the Cheyenne paper," Walden continued. "The Laramie Daily Boomerang had one guy. There was no TV to speak of. A press conference at Laramie was him and a couple of guys going down to the bar and having a beer. Everything was looser and everything more fun. He enjoyed it immensely. And he transferred it to us. He took chances on guys from Wyoming. He had a great staff. I was amazed how much he demanded of you. He wasn't Bear [Bryant] and tried to kill you. But he demanded a lot from you. We maybe were not as good as the players Nebraska had. But we were going to be as good as we could be."
Walden, playing in the Canadian Football League, visited his former coach in 1961 at Wyoming before Devaney took the Nebraska job following that football season.
At Wyoming, Devaney compiled a 35–10–5 record in five seasons and had won or tied for four Skyline Conference titles. His 1960 Wyoming team led the country in total defense (149.6 yards allowed a game). And in 1961 Wyoming finished ranked 17th in the final United Press International Poll.
Devaney had requested and received a new five-year contract. So when he made the decision to leave, he created quite a stir and drew resentment in Wyoming.
"I was sorry to see him leave Wyoming," Walden said. "But I was happy for him. I wasn't sure it was such a great move, looking at Nebraska's record. And he was leaving a good football team. ... I wished him well and thanked him for him what he had done.
"I could only surmise that any player at Nebraska, brace up, because he will coach you to the bone," Walden continued. "His assistants at Wyoming — John Melton, Carl Selmer, Mike Corgan, and Jim Ross — they understood him and they were a nice team together. If it was any way possible to be good at Nebraska, help was on the way. Coach Devaney was such a good communicator. He would nudge you or pull your aside and said you were not doing enough, and say, 'You can do better.'"
Devaney's First Season
In the early 1960s Nebraska's program was in a state of disrepair and in a 20-year drought. Devaney's predecessor at Nebraska, Bill Jennings, had a 15–34–1 record from 1957 to 1961. He was the seventh straight NU head coach to have an overall losing record at Nebraska since Biff Jones had a winning mark of 28–14–4 from 1937 to 1941.
When Jennings was fired at Nebraska, he made the statement: "There is an intense desire to do something good in this state, like elect a president or gain prominence in politics. But we can't feed the ego of the state of Nebraska with the football team."
Jennings was about as adept at knowing what ultimately would feed Nebraskans' egos as he was at coaching football. Devaney, hand-picked by Nebraska athletics director Tippy Dye, put together a football program that would rise to national prominence, even beyond what he had done in Laramie.
Nebraska hadn't won more than two league games since the 1956 season, but Devaney won five in his first season, and the Cornhuskers, third-place finishers in the Big Eight, became a bowl team in 1962.
Nebraska's only two losses in 1962 were to powerhouse Oklahoma and to Missouri. Guard Bob Brown, Devaney's first All-American at Nebraska, was a star on that team. Warren Powers, later a Nebraska assistant coach (1969 to 1976) and Missouri head coach (1978 to 1984), was a senior defensive back for these Cornhuskers before playing six years for the Oakland Raiders.
Nebraska hadn't even scored on Missouri in the previous four seasons, all under Bill Jennings, losing 10–0, 28–0, 9–0, and 31–0. In 1962 the Cornhuskers at least broke that streak in scoring a touchdown in a 16–7 loss to the Bluebonnet Bowl–bound Tigers. A 34–6 loss to Bud Wilkinson and Oklahoma in the season finale was the one time when Devaney was outfoxed by Wilkinson, who surprisingly unleashed quarterback Monte Deere as a passer. He had three passing touchdowns against Nebraska in Norman.
Immediately, however, Devaney's personality took over the Nebraska program, which had been languishing in a league dominated by Oklahoma in the late 1940s and 1950s under Bud Wilkinson. Oklahoma won 12 straight outright league titles from 1948 to 1959 before Missouri broke the string in 1960. But Nebraska was about to become the next dynasty of the Midlands.
"Devaney was a funny, funny man," said Wayne Duke, who was the commissioner of the Big Eight during much of Devaney's tenure at Nebraska. "He was a carbon copy of Duffy Daugherty. He was on the same staff with Duffy at Michigan State [who was an assistant and then became head coach]. Bob was a humorous guy. He had a lot of jokes. ... Bob was a lot smarter than he looked. He was always a step ahead, except for Bud, of course. He did not have any sideline comments about Bud. But Bud wasn't there too long while Devaney was coach at Nebraska."
Devaney was not only a tremendous organizer and communicator with his staff and players, he was a great recruiter. And this was obvious from the very beginning. His first recruited class included running back Frank Solich, who later became a Nebraska assistant and then head coach.
"His personality was very easygoing and he was a great recruiter," said Solich, who was from Cleveland, Ohio. "He cameinto our house. And to be very honest, my father did not want me to leave to go to school. But after Coach Devaney's first visit, they were ready to pack my bags. He just had that charm about him. He came across as a very good guy who you could trust and want to have your son go play for. As a coach, he had the ability get the most out of people."
Once a player was on his football team, he did not became just a number, either, often rare in big-time college football.
"Bob Devaney understood on an individual basis what every played needed as a person, as an individual," Fiala said. "That's pretty rare in a lot of programs where people come and go and they just kind of run them through. Bob knew how to motivate each of us individually. Some guys needed a pat on the back. Other guys needed a kick in the back. Some guys needed just a short discussion. Other guys needed to get chewed out. And Bob knew what each player needed."
It didn't take long for Devaney to register a landmark victory, either. It occurred in his second game when he took his Cornhuskers to Ann Arbor, Michigan, where they beat the Wolverines 25–13. Leading 19–13 in the fourth quarter, the Cornhuskers' pivotal play was a fourth-and-eight conversion inside the Michigan 30 when quarterback Dennis Claridge hit Dick Callahan for a first down to the 16. Bill Thornton's 16-yard touch-down clinched the game.
From the very beginning, Devaney had an even keel about him, mixed with a sense of humor
"A lot of people thought he might come in, in halftime and really lay it down," Fiala said. "Usually at halftime, you are so busy trying to adjust what you are doing offensively and defensively. We would break up into offense and defense right when we came in. With two about minutes left before we would go back on the field, Bob would, if we needed it, he just had a good old sense, an Irish way of how to motivate you. ... He wouldn't want to embarrass anybody.
"One of the great lines Bob had when Oklahoma was leading us, I was not on the team at the time. The only thing he did at halftime, he came in, and Jerry Tagge tells it pretty well because he was there. He didn't come in until about two minutes before and he poked his head in the door and looked around and said, "Okay, excuse me, ladies, I was looking for my football team.' That just fired everybody up."
Devaney's First Nebraska Postseason Trip: Gotham Bowl
One of the most exciting games played at Yankee Stadium was Nebraska's 36–34 victory over Miami in the 1962 Gotham Bowl. But only a crowd of 6,166 showed up at the game, in part because of a shaky promoter, frigid weather, and a newspaper strike in New York City. The bowl folded after the game.
"It was 14 degrees above, and by kickoff it was 9 degrees," said Don Bryant, who was sports editor of the Lincoln Star and later the University of Nebraska sports information director. "They played on frozen turf and had to wear tennis shoes. But it was one of the greatest games ever. In the fourth quarter I remember being on the sidelines, and there was a garbage can with a fire in it where the cheerleaders were trying to keep warm.
"Nobody thought there were that many people in the stands. I remember they shut the power off after the game. It was so cold in the press box, we went back to the hotel to file our stories."
The 1960 Gotham Bowl at Yankee Stadium was canceled when an opponent could not be found for Oregon State. Baylor beat Utah State 24–9 in the 1961 Gotham Bowl at the Polo Grounds before 15,123 fans. Finally, the 1962 Gotham Bowl was to be played at Yankee Stadium. But Bryant said the 1962 Gotham Bowl nearly failed to materialize.
"The promoter, Bob Curran, had guaranteed Nebraska a check for $35,000, but Nebraska officials were skeptical that he could pay it," Bryant recalled. "The Nebraska chancellor at the time had the team wait at the airport to take off back in Lincoln, while some Nebraska officials and some other sportswriters, already in New York City, took the check to the bank. It bounced. Curran said, 'Give me an hour.' He presented a check that cleared the bank, and the Nebraska team took off."
According to Bryant, Devaney said before the team went on the frozen field before 6,166 fans, "I am sorry I got you into this damn mess. It reminds me of those old back alley fights when I was back in Michigan. ... There's nobody here to watch, but the toughest son of a bitch will win."
It was a classic game shown tape-delayed on ABC's Wide World of Sports and resulted in Nebraska's first bowl victory in history. The Cornhuskers had lost their previous two bowl games to Stanford in the 1941 Rose Bowl and to Duke in the 1955 Orange Bowl. And they nearly dropped to 0–3 in bowl games.
The score was tied 20–20 at halftime, and each team scored two touchdowns in the second half of the game. The difference was Nebraska added two two-point conversions, one by Claridge and the other by running back/guard Bill "Thunder" Thornton while Miami kicked both extra points. The last two-point conversion gave Nebraska a 36–27 lead early in the fourth quarter.
But Miami was far from done. Led by quarterback George Mira, who passed for 321 yards, the Hurricanes sliced the lead to 36–34 with just under 10 minutes remaining. A last-minute interception by the Cornhuskers' Bob Brown of a Mira pass in the end zone saved the game for Nebraska.
Frank Solich was just a freshman and preparing back in Lincoln for the next season during the Gotham Bowl.
"I remember going to the weight room when the team was on the trip to the Gotham Bowl," said running back Solich. "I was trying to get bigger and put some weight on. We didn't have much of a weight room then. It was a pretty lonely deal. There weren't even a lot of guys who lifted weights in that era in 1962. That was over in the old fieldhouse. It was much smaller than the new one they opened up. And it really wasn't organized, not like you see today. It was not a year-round program."
The Growth of Memorial Stadium Under Devaney
Nebraska football was hardly a cash-register ringing affair after World War II and into the 1950s. And it didn't have any major permanent seating increases until shortly after Bob Devaney arrived more than 40 years after the stadium was built.
Memorial Stadium, with 31,000 seats, was opened in 1923 and dedicated in a scoreless 0–0 tie against Kansas.
Nebraska would play before overflow home crowds during the years, but the first actual addition wouldn't occur until 1964, Devaney's third season, when permanent seating was increased to 48,000 after south end zone seats were added to form a horseshoe. Nebraska had gone to the Orange Bowl in the 1963 season after winning its first Big Eight title since 1940 to spur fan interest.
And the 1963 title was also followed by Nebraska titles in 1964 and 1965, Nebraska's first conference three-peat since 1935 through 1937 in the old Big 6. The 1963 through 1965 Big 8 titles led to further increases and eventually the longest sellout streak in major-college football history.
In 1965 Memorial Stadium seating was increased to 53,000 when the center portion of the north end zone was added. And a year later, the completion of the north end zone with both sides brought the capacity to 65,000. It would stay at that capacity until Devaney's final season, 1972 (following back-to-back national championships in 1970 and 1971), when the south end zone was extended by 9,400 seats and the capacity went to nearly 74,000.
In 1962, Devaney's first home game against South Dakota, a 53–0 Nebraska win drew a crowd of 26,953, which would be the lowest home crowd of the Devaney era. In those days school kids could pay a nominal amount, lunch money really, and sit in the "knot hole" section in the end zone.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from "Then Osborne Said to Rozier ..." by Steve Richardson. Copyright © 2008 Steve Richardson. Excerpted by permission of Triumph Books.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Table of Contents
Contents
Acknowledgments,Prologue,
Introduction — The Early Years,
Chapter 1: Bob Devaney: The Beginning of Nebraska's Dynasty,
Chapter 2: Early Success,
Chapter 3: Down Years,
Chapter 4: Back-to-Back National Titles, Game of the Century,
Chapter 5: Transitioning to Tom Osborne,
Chapter 6: Oklahoma Series Heating Up,
Chapter 7: Missouri Series,
Chapter 8: Osborne's Legacy,
Chapter 9: Offensively Good, Then Great Triplets,
Chapter 10: National Champs Again,
Chapter 11: Walk-ons, Weight Lifting, Redshirting, Fan Adoration: The Culture of Nebraska,
Chapter 12: The Solich Years,
Chapter 13: Callahan Years Lead to Pelini,
Sources,