Nebraska

After a glowing college football career at Nebraska, former Burlington City standout Charles Fryar assumed that his future would be determined during the recent NFL draft. Fryar, a cousin of former Nebraska all-American and current New England Patriots receiver Irving Fryar, had been a three-year starter at cornerback for one of the nation's highest-profile football programs. Last season, the 5-foot-10, 175-pounder was named first-team all-Big 8. He grabbed five interceptions for the Big 8 champions, including two in his final game, a 23-3 loss to Miami in the Orange Bowl.

Colorado's Darian Hagan watched with one eye open and one eye closed. There were six seconds left in the football game of his life, and he wasn't sure what to do. Watch or not watch. But curiosity got the best of Hagan, and as Nebraska quarterback Gerry Gdowski set up to throw, Hagan opened his other eye. As Cornhuskers split end Jon Bostick streaked 42 yards into the end zone, Hagan's eyes widened. When Gdowski's pass arced down toward Bostick's arms, Hagan's eyes almost popped out of his head.

Quarterback Steve Taylor sneaked 1 yard for a touchdown, capping an 80-yard march with the opening kickoff, and Nebraska ended four years of frustration by defeating Oklahoma, 7-3, yesterday in Norman, Okla., for the Big 8 championship and a berth in the Orange Bowl. The Cornhuskers (No. 7 AP and UPI) won their first outright crown since 1983 by shutting down Oklahoma's vaunted wishbone and holding the Sooners (No. 8 AP, No. 9 UPI) to 137 total yards and only 98 on the ground. Oklahoma came in as the nation's fourth-best rushing team, averaging 367.9 yards a game.

A WOMAN HAS sued Nebraska coach Bo Pelini's foundation and offensive coordinator Tim Beck, alleging she suffered a traumatic brain injury while participating in a drill at a football clinic put on by the foundation 2 years ago. Beverly Morgan, 66, of Lincoln said in the lawsuit filed Tuesday in Lancaster County Court that she fell and hit the back of her head during a drill in which a gauntlet of women struck her with blocking pads. The fall caused her cap and earrings to fly off, according to the lawsuit.

Sam Crawford, who leads the nation in assists, turned the Carrier Dome into his personal playground last night, dishing out 16 assists, knocking down deep three-pointers, smiling as he watched his New Mexico State Aggies teammates dunk all over Nebraska (20-11) during a 93-79 first-round East Regional victory. This game was strictly about entertainment. There was little serious defense. And Crawford aside, no real superstars, either. Nebraska's top scorer, Ed Piatkowski, from Rapid City, S.D., can't even claim to be the star of his own family.

The Big Eight Conference has been the Big Dud in college football so far this year. The winner of today's game between No. 9 Nebraska and No. 15 Colorado will have a pretty good shot at an Orange Bowl trip. And outside of Boulder, Colo., and Lincoln, Neb., nobody seems to care. Nebraska (6-1 overall, 3-0 conference) has been clobbered this season, at home no less, by Washington. Colorado (5-2, 3-0) also was handed an embarrassing home loss, by Baylor. No Big Eight team is going to be in the national-title picture, and that reduces the Orange Bowl to second-class status this season.

CHICAGO - Forget, for once, the annual regular season-ending blood feud between Ohio State and Michigan. The Buckeyes and Wolverines go at it on Nov. 26 in Michigan Stadium, with first-year coaches at the helm for the first time since 1929. But the bowl-ineligible Buckeyes are in the NCAA doghouse and the Wolverines are coming off the nightmare of the 3-year Rich Rodriguez coaching experiment, during which the winningest program in the history of college football went 15-24, including 6-18 in the Big Ten. No, the Big Ten game of the year in 2011 figures to be the Oct. 1 scrum in Camp Randall Stadium between two red-clad heavyweights that, in certain ways, are mirror images of one another.

Joe Dailey became the first Nebraska quarterback to throw for more than 300 yards and tied a school record with five touchdown passes, and the Cornhuskers bounced back from the worst loss in their history to beat Baylor, 59-27, yesterday in Lincoln, Neb. Dailey completed 13 of 20 passes for 342 yards, breaking the record of 297 yards set by Dave Humm against Wisconsin in 1973. Dailey threw touchdowns of 27 and 45 yards to Isaiah Fluellen in the last 1 minute, 21 seconds of the first half to give the Huskers a 31-3 lead.

Nebraska kept its national championship hopes alive - barely. Ahman Green rushed for 202 yards and two touchdowns, and the second-ranked Cornhuskers survived a fourth-quarter scare to beat Colorado, 27-24, yesterday. Scott Frost passed for 92 yards and ran for 76 yards and a score as the Huskers (11-0, 8-0 Big 12) extended their conference winning streak to 39 games. Colorado (5-6, 3-5) completed its first losing season since 1984. If Nebraska beats Texas A&M in the Big 12 championship game next Saturday, the Huskers will play in the Orange Bowl with a shot at their third national title in four years.

Camden Catholic righthander Jonathan George, considered among the best major-league-baseball prospects in the region, has accepted a baseball scholarship at Nebraska. The 6-foot-4, 210-pound senior made an oral commitment last night. George is expected to have another decision in June during the major-league draft. With a fastball that has been consistently clocked above 90 m.p.h., he is considered a potential choice in the top five rounds. For now, he's happy to have his college decision made.

GRAND ISLAND, Neb. - Opponents of a massive Canada-to-Texas oil pipeline converged on a snowy Nebraska town Thursday for a critical hearing on the project, but they already were preparing for acts of civil disobedience should President Obama approve it. Despite a storm that brought sleet and snow to Nebraska, the U.S. State Department hearing in Grand Island drew more than 1,000 supporters and opponents from around the state, as well as outside activists...

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - An early spring snowstorm forced the cancellation of more than 100 flights at Denver International Airport and closed several roads Saturday as it moved eastward, dumping more than a foot of snow in some places. The snow started falling around midnight in northeast Colorado and then moved into northwest Kansas and southwest Nebraska. Ten to 15 inches had fallen by Saturday afternoon north of Interstate 70 in northwest Kansas and northeast Colorado, with an additional inch or two expected in the area, said Ryan Husted, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Goodland, Kan., where 15 inches of snow had fallen.

WASHINGTON - Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said "the political knives" came out when Chuck Hagel faced fellow Republicans on the Senate Armed Services Committee during his confirmation hearing to be Pentagon chief. Panetta said he was disappointed that Thursday's eight-hour hearing focused so much on what Hagel, a former Republican senator from Nebraska, had said in the past about Iran, Israel, and other matters instead of what he thinks about today's issues, including the war in Afghanistan, the fight against terrorism, and looming automatic budget cuts and their impact on military readiness.

LINCOLN, Neb. - Nebraska Lt. Gov. Rick Sheehy resigned abruptly Saturday in a scandal involving thousands of calls to four women on his state-issued cellphone, including one woman who said she had a romantic relationship with the politician. Gov. Dave Heineman announced Sheehy's resignation in a hastily called news conference Saturday morning. Sheehy, a Republican, had been considered the front-runner in the 2014 gubernatorial race. "As public officials, we are rightly held to a higher standard," Heineman said.

ORLANDO, Fla. - Aaron Murray wanted nothing more this week than to send Georgia's senior class out with a game to remember. The junior quarterback provided a record-setting performance to make it a reality. Murray threw five touchdown passes to set a Georgia bowl record, including two in the fourth quarter, as the sixth-ranked Bulldogs beat No. 23 Nebraska, 45-31, in the Capital One Bowl on Tuesday. Murray shook off a pair of first-half interceptions, including one returned for a touchdown, and passed for 427 yards - also a Bulldogs bowl record - against the nation's top-ranked passing defense.

She Loves Me Not New and Selected Stories By Ron Hansen Scribner. 238 pp. $25   Books marketed as "New and Selected Stories" are the literary cousins of those greatest-hits CDs that come with a few brand-new songs tacked on as a bonus. Such compilations, textual or aural, seem to target both casual fans, who don't know quite where in an artist's body of work to start, and die-hard devotees, who devour every word written or note played. Typically, the writers who receive the new-and-selected treatment have published numerous acclaimed collections over the years (e.g., Steven Millhauser's We Others and Charles Baxter's Gryphon , both of which came out last year)

TIME TO LET your mind wander for a moment. Let's say Oregon, Kansas State and Notre Dame all lose before the season's over. And the winner of the SEC title game (presumably Alabama or Georgia) loses in the BCS final. And let's say Urban Meyer's Buckeyes win out. What then? And if you don't think there's at least a possibility that each of those things could fall into place, you haven't been paying attention. In this BCS era, late insanity has been no stranger to the equation.

LINCOLN, Neb. - A strong southerly wind that gusted to 35 m.p.h. made for some interesting football Saturday at Memorial Stadium. Penn State scored 16 of its 23 points, including all three of Sam Ficken's field goals, with the wind at its back. Nebraska, however, kicked a field goal and scored two touchdowns into the wind, and had the breeze at its back in the fourth quarter when it posted the final 12 points in a 32-23 victory. "At the end of the day I believe our kids handled it pretty well," Penn State coach Bill O'Brien said.

A BLOWN CALL on a Matt Lehman touchdown will be the lasting image of Penn State's 32-23 loss to No. 16 Nebraska on Saturday in Memorial Stadium. The tight end reached the ball across the plane of the goal line and then lost control of it in the fourth quarter, but officials ruled the play a fumble. Replays showed the ball broke the plane of the goal line in Lehman's possession before he fumbled, but the call was not overturned. Nebraska recovered for a touchback, Penn State fans erupted in anger on Twitter, and the Cornhuskers didn't look back.

The predominant memory of Penn State's first Big Ten game at Nebraska will be the disputed fumble by tight end Matt Lehman at the goal line, which replays showed may indeed have been a touchdown that could have spurred the Nittany Lions to victory. But conspiracy theories or perceived biases aside, the Lions made too many mistakes and again came out sluggish after halftime, a combination that led to a 32-23 defeat by the 16th-ranked Cornhuskers on Saturday at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln, Neb. Counting the controversial call against Lehman, the Nittany Lions (6-4 overall, 4-2 Big Ten)