Friday, February 23, 2007

Preparing for the Blizzard

A few thoughts as we await the arrival of a blizzard tomorrow night:

Much of HuskerNation is abuzz over former Husker offensive lineman David Kolowski's book "Diary of a Husker", who played during Frank Solich's first five years as head coach. Not sure what to make of this book, which I first heard about over a year ago and wondered what happened with it. It seems that Kolowski was unable to find a publisher and is self-publishing it himself for now. The Omaha World-Herald describes the book as"Kolowski's evolution from wide-eyed freshman to disgruntled upperclassman." It apparantly provides plenty of dirt about the team - players smoking pot, drinking on the team bus after a pasting at Kansas State, and plenty of criticism of Solich.

So what does this book mean? Hard to say. Players being unhappy about not playing isn't particularly noteworthy. Unhappy players complaining and criticizing the coaches isn't exactly new either. Is there any value to it? Perhaps. I might see about checking out of the library at some point down the line, just to judge for myself. But deep down, I'm not sure rehashing the firing of Frank Solich does any good in 2007. We need to move past it.

Longtime Husker football trainer Doak Ostergard was dismissed last week by Bill Callahan, and Ostergard isn't sure why. In fact, Ostergard feels he helped bring Callahan to Lincoln. On one hand, Callahan has the right to choose his staff. On the other hand, you hate to see yet another contributor to the program depart, especially so unhappily. It's a sad trend... Jordan Congdon, Shane Siegel, Andy Birkel, Joe Dailey, Jack Stark...

As I post this, UNO is leading Alaska-Fairbanks 4-3 in the 3rd period in the Great White North where it is currently -29 degrees. UNO's Scott Parse is getting more consideration again this season for the Hobey Baker award. After all, he's 3rd in the nation in scoring this season. Sad to think that next weekend will be his last games in Omaha wearing a Mavs sweater.

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