Big 12 crowd humming ‘Boomer Sooner' after Nebraska's behavior

OU plays Nebraska on Saturday night in Jerry Jones' Arlington spaceship, and fans from Waterloo, Iowa, to Alpine, Texas, will take crimson over scarlet. Will pull for the Big Red South over the Big Red North.

And Big 12 administrators, who outwardly will display all the proper decorum, will be humming Boomer Sooner under their breath.

Such is the fractured relationship of Nebraska and its soon-to-be ex-league, you couldn't blame Big 12 commissioner Dan Beebe for telling the Cornhuskers, don't leave, just leave mad.

Corn Country is outraged that Beebe — nor anyone from the Big 12 office — showed up in Lincoln for the Nebraska-Colorado game Friday.

Beebe was honest about why he didn't go to Nebraska. He feared for his safety.

I talked to Beebe in the Boone Pickens press box Saturday night, and he said he had received enough threats from Nebraska fans — over the 2009 title game controversy, over his suspension of NU's Eric Martin for a helmet-to-helmet hit against Oklahoma State, over the officiating in the Nebraska-Texas A&M game two weeks ago — that he was advised to steer clear of Lincoln.

Now the Huskers consider it an affront that no one bothered to conduct a trophy presentation for the Big 12's North division title.

Never mind that Nebraska only tied for the North title, with Missouri. Never mind that most of us out here in reality land didn't even know they hand out divisional football trophies. OU's now been to eight Big 12 title games, and I don't remember ever seeing or hearing about a single division title ceremony.

Turns out there is a trophy, and sometimes even a presentation, but nobody in a precinct like Norman or Austin, or you would think Lincoln, gets excited about such pomp.

I don't think Nebraska's football standards have fallen so low that the Huskers prize a We-Beat-Mizzou piece of hardware. I just think a once-solid fan base has lost its collective mind.