Mike Babcock is in his 47th season covering Nebraska football. Babcock also covered most other Husker sports at some point in his journalism career. Mike earned his undergraduate degree in English from Cal State-Chico and Masters in English (teacher preparation) from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Babcock spent seven years teaching English and Introductory Literature at Parkland Community College. Mike wrote sports part-time at the Champaign-Urbana Courier as well as for Lincoln Journal and Star for 17 years for the sports department covering Nebraska as a sports columnist. Babcock then wrote for Huskers Illustrated before Hail Varsity and Hurrdat Sports.
Defense was the difference for fourth-ranked Nebraska. “I thought the defense played awfully well,” Tom Osborne said following the Huskers’ 17-12 victory against Colorado in the final regular-season game at Memorial Stadium, the day after Thanksgiving 1996. Consider...
It was a showdown of sorts for the Nebraska football defense at Iowa State’s Cyclone Stadium/Jack Trice Field on a rain-soaked, 50-degree afternoon in mid-November 1996. The Husker defense was matched against Iowa State running back Troy Davis. The Blackshirts ranked...
Maybe it was the “butterfly effect," where a small change in the past can alter major events. After all, a butterfly did flutter just outside a press box window a couple of hours before kickoff for the Nebraska-Michigan game at Memorial Stadium Saturday afternoon....
For many outside the Nebraska football program, Saturday’s game at Memorial Stadium against 21st-ranked Michigan will be something of a defining moment. Are you among them? A Husker victory would reinforce the belief Matt Rhule definitely has things moving in the...
Another offensive onslaught, right? Fifth-ranked Nebraska football defeated Missouri 51-7 at Memorial Stadium on Nov. 9, 1996. The victory was the Huskers’ seventh in a row. But the score could be misleading on how it was achieved. Special teams accounted for nine...
Archie Wilson, Nebraska’s much-publicized punter from Australia, made his first appearance at Memorial Stadium against Houston Christian Saturday. But he didn’t punt. Wilson came in with time running out as the deep man in victory formation for the final kneel-down....
Former Husker Mickey Joseph, now the head football coach at Grambling State, included in his comments before his team’s game at Ohio State last Saturday the fact that among reasons for scheduling the game was the money Grambling State, an FCS program, would receive....
Neither team scored in the first quarter when fifth-ranked Nebraska football played Oklahoma in Norman Nov. 2, 1996. The Huskers managed one first down, minus-7 yards rushing and 7 total yards. The Sooners out-yarded Nebraska with 19 yards, 15 of them rushing. “When...
It seemed like old times, old, old times, like Nebraska football’s “Scoring Explosion” team in 1983, almost. The Huskers defeated Akron 68-0 at Memorial Stadium Saturday night — again, 68-0. The last time they scored more was in 2012, a 73-7 victory against Idaho...