Being raised by a single father you could say I was influenced by him a lot. We spent our time hunting, fishing, jamming out to AC/DC, and every fall Saturday we watched Nebraska football. I was a National Championship baby, conceived in 1994 and born in 1995 when we were under the reign of the all-mighty Tom Osborne. Growing up, everyone in our family was a Husker fan, so it was only a matter of time before I considered myself one too. It was like our own religion. The only problem with this was that living in Iowa and being a Husker fan was basically a sin.
Cyclone and Hawkeye fans hate each other, but not as much as their combined hatred for Nebraska. There isn’t an age limit to the harassment. I was picked on by as young as 4th grade for not conforming to the expectation that being born in Iowa meant I had to pick between the two major universities within our state. And for the love of God if you choose one that's not in Iowa don’t choose Nebraska. Even my ex-boyfriend gave me grief for it. I felt like being a fan was something I had to hang my head for, but all of the fans in this Cy-Hawk state were wrong.
I’ve heard it all: “they are obnoxious”, “they suck”, “they think they are better than everyone else”. With 5 national championships, 46 conference titles, and 881 total wins under their belt you can't tell me they haven't earned their way. Not one person could give me a good enough reason as to why being a Nebraska fan was such a bad thing. Every team has fans that aren’t the nicest or thinks their team is better than everyone else.Those fans simply hate the team and those associated just to hate them.
The football team itself is not only made up of young men who play their hearts out every week but are role models in their community. They volunteer for charity events, visit sick kids in the hospital, and are student athletes that work just as hard in the classroom as on the field. It makes it a lot easier to put my support behind a team that is making a difference in the lives of others when it's by choice and not required.
There is no other experience like Memorial Stadium on game day with the sea of red roaring after every touchdown, the student section holding their shoes high above their heads, and the entire stadium singing along to the National Anthem. The amount of people that come together to rally behind this team is almost overwhelming. Hell I’ve even considered moving to Lincoln just for that reason. Standing there as just another face in the crowd taking it all in, I realized Nebraska football wasn’t a leper or something to be ashamed of it was a way of life. I may have been born in the Cy-Hawk state, but I couldn’t be more proud to be raised a Husker.
