A number of the many Nebraskans that I have met during the past few weeks have told me about their loyalty to the Big Red football team. During the past couple of days I have seen and heard that loyalty expressed in different forms.
Everyone who walks into Memorial Stadium passes beneath a sign that displays a statement that helps to explain why the country’s longest consecutive sell-out streak is now at 343 and counting. During the 53 years since that streak started, Nebraska fans have only witnessed two losing seasons while the Huskers have won 5 national championships and numerous conference championships. The fans have certainly been rewarded for their loyalty by the team’s results over the years and have filled the stadium even on those cold November days when the icy wind blows into town on a non-stop journey from the Arctic via Canada. On such days it must be tempting to stay at home by the warm TV to watch the game, but the sell-out has continued unabated.
Then I heard a story about an individual fan’s act of loyalty last week in Beatrice. The 89-year-old lady, obviously a long-time Big Red fan, had heard that the game against Southern Miss would be telecast on the ESPN News channel. During the days leading up to the game she was most perturbed to find that her cable TV provider did not carry this particular station. To not watch the game was of course unthinkable, but exactly how to solve her problem was the question. Perhaps spend the afternoon watching the game with a friend? Or go to the Senior Center? Either of these solutions would have been fine, but the lady in question took a much more direct approach. She simply switched to a different cable company. After all, what was the good of continuing to pay monthly fees to that fool company that didn’t have enough sense to make sure that the Huskers game was always available to its customers?
(By the way for those who are wondering, Beatrice High won their Friday night game in Omaha 55-13 which brings their record to 4-1)
But given how the first few games have played out, I can’t help but worry about the senior Big Red fans watching the game. A last-second Hail Mary pass to lose the first game, followed a couple of weeks later by a 23-point comeback in the last 8 minutes to tie the third game, and then this last week Nebraska blows a 22-point lead and in the last minute almost loses. We’ll probably see a lot more commercials for cardiologists popping up during the breaks in the game as the season goes on.
For that reason I was much reassured to see this vehicle parked near the stadium throughout last week's game. However as I walked by later in the day, I realized that it served a slightly different purpose than what I had first thought when I saw it from a distance. It was indeed being used to dispense some form of over-the-counter medication to the fans in its immediate vicinity, and that exotic medication must have been rather volatile because it had to be kept on ice before delivery to the patient. In other words, I was mistaken in thinking that patients were being treated for heart attacks caused by the fluctuating football fortunes of the Big Red – instead they were being treated pre-emptively to avoid the possible effects of dehydration on a warm day in Lincoln. Those wonderful Nebraska fans: they’re just as loyal to one another as they are to their team!