Through these gates pass the greatest fans in college foot-ball. The audacity. The bias.
The nerve. Rarely will you find me defending the merit of religion, but I'm as contrarian as Jesus was devout. Also, I was drunk at midnight following yet another Husker loss.
In the basement bar, behind a stack of camouflage Busch Light cans my buddy slurred his point of view, "I can't get behind the idea that just because who your parents are, and where you grew up, that a person can spend so much time in church believing their God is better than others" he said. I lifted my Makers Mark in the air, like a pastor raising his hand to their congregation, and replied to my buddy, "And yet you are a loyal Nebraska football fan." Thankfully the basement crowd was sober enough to recognize the irony and thus the joke.
We laughed, including my friend, and went back to watching a meaningless Pac-12 football game we'd bet on before betting became cool, legal and rogue. People are also reading..
. The following Friday I dropped my 3-year-old daughter off at Little Kingdom off Old Cheney Road; I was reminded of that drunken conversation. The turtle room for toddlers was its own version of a Sea of Red.
Little girls in cheerleading outfits, scarlet bows and white pom-poms; little boys sporting Burkhead and Armstrong jerseys with eye black and white Adidas socks pulled high. Red shirts engulfed every unassuming toddler's tiny body. Each of them too young to know about the game of the century, the fumblerooski, the option, the 2-point try, wide left, unfinished business and Sapp sucking air, Touchdown Tommie's run, the retirement, the firing, 9-3, and eventually the downfall.
Not one of them old enough to understand how badly their parents and grandparents were clinging to the hope that the prodigal son, Scott Frost, would return their team to significance. Turns out he wasn't the chosen one. These youngsters, whose red burns brighter than other kids of course, because of who their parents are and where they were born, will spend a lot of time in front of TV sets, at tailgates and inside Memorial Stadium worshiping their team more than others.
They will grow up believing Hail Varsity is better than any dotting of the I in Ohio, that the tunnel walk means more than "Enter Sandman" in Virginia, that the light show and rumblings of "Thunderstruck" at the end of the third quarter are superior to Jump Around in Wisconsin. As I walk through Gate 14 this weekend with my 12-year-old son Jackson, I hope I've taught him well. To believe in any deity he chooses so long as they be named Devaney, Osborne or hopefully Rhule.
And to respect everyone else's right to choose their deity whether it be Saban, Bowden, Switzer or whatever God they believe in. To understand that as hard as it might be to admit, if he had been born 300 miles to the east he just might believe in that so-called religion known as Iowa football. I hope I've taught him to buy into the macro concepts that are woven into all religions, which can be found in the Nebraska prayer: To get better each day, to cheer others in victory and defeat, to win by a code of doing things the right way, to be fair, and to enjoy the battle of life knowing that it's about the journey not the outcome on any given Saturday.
I hope I've taught him to believe in faith, hope and love with the greatest of these being love. And if loving your team unconditionally, so much so that you fill that beautiful church on One Memorial Stadium Drive 400 times in a row, is the definition of being the greatest. Well then, go ahead Husker fans.
Be audacious, show your bias, have the nerve. You might just be the greatest fans in all of college football. Willie Kloefkorn lives in Lincoln and is a lifelong husker fan.
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