OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla. — Nebraska men’s basketball is headed to the Sweet 16.
Luke Combs sings a song called “Days Like These.” In the chorus, Combs sings: “If I got you and you got me, we got everything we need.”
That is the best way to describe Nebrasketball during the 2025-26 season.
The chorus continues, “Even if it grew on trees, money can’t buy days like these.”
Mr. Combs is right, although Husker fans spent many of their hard-earned dollars in Oklahoma City, and plenty of happiness followed. Money certainly well spent.
“They don’t come around as much as they ought to.” Yep, right again.
Nebraska waited 85 years for an NCAA Tournament win. They got that Thursday in a dismantling of Troy.
This program’s fan base waited lifetimes, generations for an experience like the one the team has taken it on this season, particularly the last four days in Oklahoma City.
Tommie Frazier has “the run.” Braden Frager will have “the shot.”
Combs sings: “When the sky is blue and the grass is green, How much better can it be?”
Well, Mr. Combs, Frager, a redshirt freshman from Lincoln, made a game-winner with 2.2 seconds left to send the team he grew up rooting for to the Sweet 16 with a 74-72 win over Vanderbilt Saturday night. That’s about as good as it gets.
“We stuck together when we got down late there,” Frager said, “I think that’s what we’ve been doing all year, sticking together, and that’s what makes us so special.”
After the Troy win on Thursday, I asked Fred Hoiberg what this team’s superpower was at his availability on Friday. His answer: “This team has been very connected.”
The team is very connected on the court; just look at the communication on the defensive end of the floor. Hoiberg and the team have said all season long about how special this group of players is. They play for each other because they do things together off the court. In the day and age of Name, Image and Likeness, that’s harder to find.
They are connected enough to trust that when almost everyone in the building and watching on television just knew that Pryce Sandfort with the ball in his hands was going to take the last shot, he made the right play, a pass to Frager who split the defense for the game winner.
There is another connection that makes this team special: the one with its fans.
Saturday night, after the television and interviews at midcourt were over, the Huskers didn’t just head straight to the locker room. Every one of them high-fived their fans, not just on their way to the tunnel but around the entire lower bowl of the Paycom Center, which looked and sounded like Pinnacle Bank Arena South on Saturday night.
Nebraska is good enough to win games against really good teams; they proved that with road wins at Illinois and against Michigan State. The Illinois win was much tougher; it was on the road without the fan base.
Without the fans in Oklahoma City on Saturday night, the magical weekend and season might have ended in a heartbreaking fashion.
When Nebraska needed them most, trailing 67-62 with 5:34 seconds left, the fans stepped up and cheered against the opponent, not the three wearing stripes.
The connection between the fans and Nebraska athletics has been there for decades. In Oklahoma City on a magical weekend, the college basketball world finally saw what Husker nation is capable of.
It surprised many in the national media, but it’s no surprise if you’ve been to Pinnacle Bank Arena in the last decade.
After all, these days don’t come around as much as they ought to, and Combs is right, you should soak them up when they do.
See you in Houston, Husker nation. You deserve it.
