Nebraska’s next opponent was old rival Minnesota. The Huskers had played the Gophers more than any other team in the Big 10, in a series that began in 1900. It was a fierce rivalry during the early days of Nebraska football in which Minnesota held the edge before Nebraska hired Bob Devaney. Nebraska victories over Minnesota in 1913 and 1937 were regarded at the
time as some of the biggest wins in school history.
The Golden Gophers had one of the leading college football programs in the country between 1892 and 1960. Minnesota won three consecutive mythical national championships from 1934 to 1936. The Gophers reeled off two more national titles in 1940–41 and won another one in 1960. Minnesota has won six total national championships, compared to Nebraska’s five.
Minnesota football began a long decline in 1961. That coincided with the establishment of professional sports in the Minneapolis-Saint Paul metropolitan area. The Minnesota Vikings and the Minnesota Twins began play in 1961 and developed large and devoted followings. Gophers’ radio broadcaster Dave Mona said: “During the period of the ’30s, ’40s, and ’50s,
University of Minnesota football was the dominant sport in the region, had by far the most interest. A lot of people point to 1961. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that when this market began to embrace professional baseball and football in that year, one of the casualties of that was
Gopher football.”
The Minnesota team that Nebraska faced was a shadow of the former great teams in the program’s once proud history. The 1982 Gophers got off to a promising start by winning their first three games, but they lost their last eight games in a row to finish 3–8. Minnesota opened the 1983 season with an unimpressive 21–17 win over lowly Rice. Minnesota came into the
Nebraska game as thirty-three-point underdogs.
Minnesota truly believed that they were ready to take on top ranked Nebraska in the showdown in Minneapolis. Minnesota defensive coordinator Chuck Dickinson denied the Gophers would be intimidated and even talked some smack before the ballgame: “We’re going to try to intimidate Nebraska. I don’t know if we have enough talent to whip you, but we’ve got enough courage. We’re going to play a courageous game, if nothing else.”
Minnesota decided upon a gambling defense in which they stacked the line of scrimmage with six players and blitzed on virtually every play. It worked on the first series — Nebraska went three and out and was forced to punt. Minnesota linebacker Pete Narajan later said: “We kind of felt, wow as crazy as this is, this defense might work. But I knew it wasn’t long before the Nebraska coaches adjusted.”
But the dam burst on the next Nebraska series. Minnesota gambled and lost badly during the rest of the night. On Nebraska’s second time with the ball the Huskers had a three play, eighty-yard drive that culminated in a twenty-seven-yard run for a touchdown by fullback Mark Schellen.
During the first quarter, Gill completed touchdown passes of sixty-eight and seventy yards to Fryar. On the first touchdown pass, Osborne had called a running play. Gill noticed that nobody was covering Fryar and audibled into a passing play. Gill threw it to a wide-open Fryar
on the sideline who scored untouched on a sixty-eight-yard reception. “Minnesota decided they were going to come out and gamble early. They blitzed a lot. When you blitz you either stop a team for no gain or you give up a big play and that’s what happened. Sometimes routine passes
turned into big gains,” Osborne said in his post-game press conference.
The Huskers had a night of big plays, scoring twenty-one points in each quarter. Nebraska scored seven of its touchdowns on plays of twenty yards or longer and six of them were from forty-one yards or more. The Nebraska offense scored so quickly that the defense got very little rest. Linebacker Mark Daum said the defense felt the burden of having to go back on the field after another quick strike score. “We really had to suck it up,” Daum said.
Nebraska was only allowed to take sixty players on the road and Osborne played all sixty members of the team. If the game had been played in Lincoln, Osborne would have played many more than sixty players. Osborne did not want to run up the score and sent in his reserves once
the game was decided. Consequently, the second team played more than the first team against Minnesota. “We have some great second team players who are going to score a lot of points, too,” Osborne said. When the Huskers reserves were tired late in the third quarter, Rozier came back into the game and scored on seventy-one yard run to make the score 63–13.
Nebraska backup quarterback Craig Sundberg got extensive playing time in the fourth quarter in which he led the Huskers to three touchdowns. Sundberg threw a fifty-one yard touchdown pass to backup I-back Jeff Smith and followed that up with a forty-four yard touchdown run on a basic option play. “I cut it up inside and after four or five yards, there was
nobody there. I just kind of started jogging and nobody came after me…. It was a very strange night,” Sundberg said.
Mark Schellen played in the first series of the third quarter and did not return to the game. During the fourth quarter, some Husker fans in the stands threw the players sitting on the bench some hamburgers. “We had some people up there that got us some Wendy’s or something,” Schellen said. Schellen and his teammates ate their in-game snack without the permission or knowledge of the coaches.
Before the season began, the Nebraska Athletic Department sold a poster with the team schedule with pictures of the Triplets. The offense was called the “The Scoring Explosion” on what became a famous poster. That moniker was a good fit since the Huskers crushed the Gophers by the amazing score of 84–13. Nebraska rolled up its biggest score ever against an
NCAA Division I opponent and the most since a 100–0 win over Nebraska Wesleyan in 1917. Nebraska racked up seven hundred eighty total yards and five hundred eighty-five rushing yards.
Rozier ran for one hundred ninety-six yards in fifteen carries and three touchdowns. Fryar had two hundred fifty-three all-purpose yards, which included one hundred thirty-eight receiving yards, ninety-two rushing yards and twenty-three return yards.
Reporters asked Osborne after the game if he ran up the score. The Nebraska coach was respectful in his remarks: “I’m really sorry we scored that many points. I hope people don’t think we did it in a vindictive manner.” Osborne even said: “Those eighty-four points were bordering
on obscenity. I know that.” He tried to defend the big score: “I don’t feel embarrassed because we played our second team an awful lot.”
Nebraska’s players were less apologetic than their head coach. Rozier told the press that he did not feel any regret about the blowout win. “They were talking a lot of junk on and off the field. They were telling us we were no good and how we were not going to win the game. We just kept our mouths shut and went out and did our jobs,” Rozier said. Traynowicz said: “I loved
it. We didn’t come here to make friends. As far as I’m concerned, I’d like to score that many points in every game.”
Minnesota head coach Joe Salem was gracious in defeat. At the end of the game, Salem went out of his way to find Osborne. “He was very nice to even come over and say hello after something like that,” Osborne said. When Salem was asked about the final score, he said: “If they can beat us by that many points, we deserve it. We can’t be concerned about somebody
pouring it on. We knew they were going to show us they are one of the greatest offensive teams in college history and they did that tonight.”
