Back to the Future

The past few days have been strange ones for Nebraska football fans.

First, the Huskers suffered their worst loss at home in nearly 50 years. On Monday, Athletic Director Steve Pederson was fired. Tuesday, former coach Tom Osborne was brought back to be the interim athletic director.

So what does that have to do with the YD household? Well, Dad spent two years chasing the Husker football team here and there in 1995 and 1996 as the managing editor of Nebraska Sports America magazine. (Dad wrote the book shown at right.) Previous to that, he covered Nebraska football for the Grand Island Independent newspaper from 1987 through to his TV news producing days. His second day on the job at KPTM, Dec. 10, 1998, Osborne announced his retirement. Dad served as executive producer of KMTV's Husker coverage from 1999 to 2003.

So watching the events in Lincoln unfold from afar have been a little bit surreal for Dad. After ignoring the team for the start of the season (he had a bike racing team to follow, after all), he's actually listened to the last few games on the radio. This week's game is also on the radio (you don't play on TV unless you're winning), so he'll probably be doing that again on Saturday.