A State Dressed in Red

The opponent can be Middle Tennessee State or Oklahoma, the weather a heat wave in September or a snowstorm in November.

No matter what, every Nebraska home football game is a sellout.

Has been since Nov. 3, 1962.

The home opener today against UCLA will be the 196th consecutive full house in Lincoln, an NCAA record.

Memorial Stadium will become the third largest city in the state.

“Wait until you see it,” said Brenden Stai, the Cornhuskers’ All-American offensive guard from Yorba Linda. “It’s awesome, 76,000 people dressed in red and roaring.”

Of course, it is the only game in this capital city of 200,000, where the Frisbee was invented and Charles Lindbergh learned to fly.

It is also the only game in a state that does not have a major league professional sports franchise.

The same can be said about a number of other states represented by big-time college football teams, but few of them are afflicted with such a fever every fall.

Nebraska football sets attendance records because it is a winner.

A local radio station is conducting a contest that will award “an all-expenses-paid trip for two to Nebraska’s bowl game.”

Such confidence is justified by the fact that the Huskers--it’s Huskers, not Cornhuskers, around here--have been to 25 consecutive bowl games.

A record 26th is a cinch for a team ranked No. 1 in the USA Today/CNN poll and No. 2 in the the Associated Press poll.

So what if the Huskers have lost their last seven bowl games?

Coach Tom Osborne, in his 22nd season, has a record of 208-47-3 and ranks either just ahead of or behind Joe Paterno of Penn State in most of the important categories among active Division I-A coaches.

Osborne’s reputation is one of the reasons a school that doesn’t have the national following of Notre Dame or the in-state recruiting advantages of the Florida schools or Penn State is able to win so consistently.

Stai--who was recruited by UCLA and USC, among others--was asked why he chose Nebraska.

First, he gave the politically correct answer: academics.

Second, the football tradition.

Third, the weight room.

Fourth, the experience of living away from home.

The weight room was the most intriguing.

It isn’t really a weight room, it’s the Nebraska Strength Complex.

It occupies 30,000 square feet, the largest such facility on any American campus, and is located in a building attached to the south side of the stadium.

“The birthplace for strength and conditioning for collegiate athletes,” says the sign in the Strength Complex Museum.

In the lobby are pictures and stories of players selected to the Huskers’ all-time power team.

There is an offensive team and a defensive team, but, oddly enough, no kicking team.

The teams were selected by strength coach Boyd Epley.

He has six assistant strength coaches and a graduate assistant.

“I started lifting seriously when I was in the 11th grade at Esperanza High,” Stai said. “I won a competition there, but I’ve really been able to improve on my lifts here. This weight room is a diamond.”

As a freshman, the 6-foot-4 Stai weighed in at a scrawny 260 pounds.

Now he is a 305-pound senior considered by many NFL scouts to be the best pro prospect in the nation at his position.

Not long ago, he set a Nebraska record by bench pressing 505 pounds.

“The coaches had to kick me out today,” he said, grinning after a 45-minute weight session that followed practice on Wednesday. “Some of them think I overdo it, but I don’t.”

His teammates on the offensive line average 295, and it is no wonder the Huskers play what Stai describes as “smash-mouth football.”

They lead the nation with a 446-yard rushing average in their first two games.

The oddsmakers suspect that UCLA will be the latest in the long line of Husker opponents to get smashed in the mouth.

“This game means an awful lot to me,” Stai said. “A team from your hometown has to spark some extra excitement in you.”

Not that any is needed on a Saturday afternoon in Lincoln in front of 76,000 people dressed in red and roaring.