There's a poll on the front page about the worst NU loss to officials making terrible calls. The two games listed are 1982 Penn State and 1993 Florida State (94 Orange Bowl). Both are pretty gregarious examples, but there are definitely more out there.
For me, it's 2011 Texas A&M. Yes, the game where would-be TSA Agent and TAMU lineman Tony Jerod-Eddie sexually assaulted Ben Cotton. That game was a chippy 6-9, all field goal affair and was tied 3-3 until the fourth quarter. An absolute offensive yawner or a 2-way defensive beatdown depending on your perspective. What gets me though, is that Nebraska was penalized 16 times for 145 yards, including a penalty on Ben Cotton for kicking Jerod-Eddie after he grabbed Cotton's nutsack on national television. TAMU walked away with no call on that play and notched only 2 penalties for 10 yards. Those slugfest kind of games generally tend to see charity yards racked up on both sides, but I swear that the Big XII refs were giving us a goodbye present. There were a lot of bad calls in our swan song season, but this was an entire game full of them. When things are getting salty in the trenches, you usually see both teams racking up the personal fouls, false starts and offsides calls pretty evenly.
Remember that Ben Cotton got docked twice for personal fouls. On the same play. After getting fondled. Apparently, the Big XII refs decided to give NU a 30 yard punishment for the audacity of letting one of our players be assaulted. And Eric Martin got docked twice for Personal Fouls, as did DJ Jones. That's 75 yards off fairly discretionary calls. Nobody was throwing punches.
And lest anyone say A&M simply outplayed us, just look at the stat line. Almost every single category was practically tied, from first downs to total offense to time of possession. The only difference was that A&M picked off two INTs (we had zero) but neither INT was returned for any yardage. One of the INTs was caught on the A&M 10 yard line (robbing NU in the redzone) and resulted in an eventual FG for A&M. That drive was probably the game determiner, since it took a practically guaranteed 3pts off Nebraska's total and gave A&M a field goal of their own. That series was "helped" along by two questionable pass interference calls that came late in third quarter and gave the Aggies a freebie boost of 30 yards. It's worth noting that the entire rest of the game saw zero PI calls against immaculate DBs like Amukamara and Dennard.
No, the stakes of this game weren't anywhere as high as 1982 Penn State or 1993 FSU, but I've never seen a bigger smear job - in ANY game, not just NU games - than the refs did that night in College Station.
For me, it's 2011 Texas A&M. Yes, the game where would-be TSA Agent and TAMU lineman Tony Jerod-Eddie sexually assaulted Ben Cotton. That game was a chippy 6-9, all field goal affair and was tied 3-3 until the fourth quarter. An absolute offensive yawner or a 2-way defensive beatdown depending on your perspective. What gets me though, is that Nebraska was penalized 16 times for 145 yards, including a penalty on Ben Cotton for kicking Jerod-Eddie after he grabbed Cotton's nutsack on national television. TAMU walked away with no call on that play and notched only 2 penalties for 10 yards. Those slugfest kind of games generally tend to see charity yards racked up on both sides, but I swear that the Big XII refs were giving us a goodbye present. There were a lot of bad calls in our swan song season, but this was an entire game full of them. When things are getting salty in the trenches, you usually see both teams racking up the personal fouls, false starts and offsides calls pretty evenly.
Remember that Ben Cotton got docked twice for personal fouls. On the same play. After getting fondled. Apparently, the Big XII refs decided to give NU a 30 yard punishment for the audacity of letting one of our players be assaulted. And Eric Martin got docked twice for Personal Fouls, as did DJ Jones. That's 75 yards off fairly discretionary calls. Nobody was throwing punches.
And lest anyone say A&M simply outplayed us, just look at the stat line. Almost every single category was practically tied, from first downs to total offense to time of possession. The only difference was that A&M picked off two INTs (we had zero) but neither INT was returned for any yardage. One of the INTs was caught on the A&M 10 yard line (robbing NU in the redzone) and resulted in an eventual FG for A&M. That drive was probably the game determiner, since it took a practically guaranteed 3pts off Nebraska's total and gave A&M a field goal of their own. That series was "helped" along by two questionable pass interference calls that came late in third quarter and gave the Aggies a freebie boost of 30 yards. It's worth noting that the entire rest of the game saw zero PI calls against immaculate DBs like Amukamara and Dennard.
No, the stakes of this game weren't anywhere as high as 1982 Penn State or 1993 FSU, but I've never seen a bigger smear job - in ANY game, not just NU games - than the refs did that night in College Station.
