#21: The Big12 (And It's Officials) Can Go To Hell

From the second Nebraska announced it's intentions to depart the Big12 and move to the Big10 we, as fans, knew that trouble would await us from the conference, likely in the form of officials taking some liberties in, to put it gently, fucking us in the ass.

To our surprise though the issue with biased officiating seemed to keep it's ugly head away from games involving our beloved Cornhuskers.  That is, until we took our boys down to College Station, TX for a game with the Aggies of Texas A&M.  Nebraska was good this year, real good.  Strait up, no stripes involved, NU would beat A&M 90% of the time, no question in my mind.

But A&M did have the officials on their side, to the tune of 16-2 in the penalty department.  The NU defense was playing good football against one of the better offenses in the Big12.  On the game winning drive, on third and long, NU pressured the A&M quarterback to throw the ball out of bounds. NU would now get the ball to drive for a game winning possession.  Or not.  Watch the following if you have a strong stomach:

The penalty gave A&M a first down a subsequent game winning field goal.

Bullshit.

So, as the rabid fan I am, I decided to give the Big12 a nice backhanded complaint.  I quickly went to Facebook and created the "Wear Red, Be Loud, Wave Yellow" campaign.  We were to make penalty flags and wave them at the next game after every call against Nebraska as a form of appreciation to those in stripes.  The group grew quickly and although a few haters tried to stop people from doing it saying it wasn't the "Nebraska Way" the overall consensus was that this was going to be great.

I made my way to the fabric store a few days before the game and got to work:

The next day I made my way downtown, shocked at how many students I saw with their flags already.  The pregame radio shows were talking up the idea, it was going to work damnit.

When I took my seat at the game I was greeted with more than a handful of students carrying garbage sacks full of flags and handing them out to those around them.  Handshakes were shared and friends were made.

Lucky for us right after the game started Rex Burkhead was hit after calling a fair catch.  The flags went crazy, they were EVERYWHERE.  I felt like a new father, I was beaming.

Unfortunately for us, the penalties that game weren't all that bad, but it still looked great, and even ESPN got into it with the post game report:

The Nebraska student section played off Pelini's complaints about penalties in the A&M game, showing up with yellow flags that they waved en masse whenever it looked like a penalty was or wasn't warranted.

It was fun, I made an impact, and most importantly, Nebraska won the game. Is this the most exciting story I have or will share? Not by any means, but it was fun as hell for me.

Still waiting on some more stories from you guys to share on here...