Top 10 Bad Things Billy C's Done For the Corn

1. Scheduling practices on Sundays. You know, as in the day after game day. I'm sure this schedule change was met excitedly from players especially following night games. Could you imagine having to come back home after the USC game at something like 10pm West Coast time, get home around 3am CST, and then have to practice the next day??? This was widely thought of as Billy C not being able to let go of the NFL mentality of working on Sundays. Nevertheless, Sundays were often film days for the coaches, and players could voluntarily show up to look at film. But all out practices on Sundays, and giving MONDAYS off??
2. The debacle of the Texas Tech game, perhaps the worst moment in NU Football history. The 70-10 loss led to the infamous "We saw some good things out there" comment from Billy C. He must not have recalled backup quarterback Beau Davis coming in later in the game and turning the ball over five times in barely a quarter's worth of action.
3. The unforgivable loss to Colorado -- at HOME -- in November, 2004. The loss officially stopped the Corn's record bowl game streak at 34 and put an ugly stamp on a season that showed a record of 5-6, the first losing season since the Beatles stopped touring. Callahan, after the game, said "It was one game today, one season." Yep, that pretty much summed it all up. But Billy C had a trick up his sleeve, needing just a few months to make Husker Nation forget 2004 ever happened...
4. Recruiting Day, February, 2005. Billy C proudly faces the media and announces a group of 5-star recruits who've committed to Nebraska, feeling a lot like Lorne Michaels when he brought in Chevy Chase, John Belushi and crew to his first season of Saturday Night Live. The only problem is, his self-anointed savior, Harrison Beck, flamed out in a big way. After the Omaha World Herald ran a FULL TWO PAGE spread on all of the big recruits, including artists renderings of each player and bio's that looked like they belonged on Cooperstown plaques, Husker Nation was ready to forgive. Then last November, Billy C used up Savior Beck in a game he thought he HAD to win against Kansas State, therefore losing his redshirt. Come fall practice, Beck was as low as 4th on the depth chart, Mama Beck called Billy C out, and the next thing you know, our "savior" was transferring to North Carolina State.
5. The end of "Debbie Does Dallas": OK, so Osborne never took the team to see any sort of porn flicks, but Friday nights before game day was one of those great Corn traditions that brought the team together. They'd all spend their Friday nights together, taking over a movie theater and relaxing and enjoying a flick. The Friday night movie night was one of TO's great traditions, helping create team unity in a way. Watching "Remember the Titans" was a great way to get the team motivated before a big game, for example. Callahan immediately killed this idea. "I'm not really a movie guy," Billy C said. "I'm more of a preparation guy." These kids can multi-task, they can play Madden while texting buddies across the country -- hell we ALL can. Why not give them a much needed break after having to go over a 500 pound playbook all week long?
6. Pretending the infamous "throat slash" incident against Oklahoma never happened. The video replays were shown over and over on every local media outlet, it was all over the internet, ESPN even got into the act. There was no denying it happened. So here's how the first Tuesday press conference went following the OU loss and "Throat Gate":
   "Coach, would you like to comment on the gesture?"
   "What gesture? What are you talking about? Nothing happened."
7. Not finding the right place for Turner Gill on his coaching staff. The thinking is that Callahan was giving the University's blessing to "clean house" and let all of the old Solich coaches hit the road while Billy C could bring in all of his own guys, but that Stevie P and the University folks (and Husker Nation for that part) had to be very delicate regarding the Gill situation. Turner Gill was one of the greatest and most popular Husker players in the program's rich and storied history. Telling him to not let the screen door hit his ass on the way out would not have exactly endured the new boss to the Husker Faithful. So Billy C decides the best thing to do with Nebraska Quarterbacks coach Turner Gill....is to make him the RECEIVERS coach??? In retrospect, Gill couldn't have been classier about how everything played out, saying about how much he learned and would take with him as head coach of Buffalo. Billy C got through this one relatively unscathed, but let's just say he wasn't exactly, shall we say SAD when Gill got a new gig.
8. The fun way where Billy C would just stand up at press conferences and just lip-synch from tapes played from old press conferences. OK, this doesn't really happen (or at least we think it doesn't), but have you ever noticed how much this guy just says the same thing over and over EVERY week? The best was one time when a local radio station played an old clip from Media Day before the Tampa Bay/Oakland Super Bowl, and pretended that it was a clip from Callahan's most recent Husker press conference. And the audience BOUGHT it! Classic radio. Be nice to hear a "fuckin' hillbillies" drop once in a while at a presser, and see that Billy C isn't the A Rod of Coaches Press Conferences.
9. Losing 40-15 at Kansas in 2005. This was the last of the "streaks" left really for the Husker program (and granted, a lot of these were broken under Solich's watch). But this was the easiest one to keep going, and the fact that he had to lose to a coach who looked like the biggest thing on his mind was whether or not to eat that third sandwich just made the loss harder to take.
10. No more RUDY: The trimming back of the sacred walk on program. This was one of Billy C's first moves here, and at first the thinking was that he wanted to do away with the idea of walk-on's altogether. There's a part of me that likes the idea of Billy C just going out and bringing in the biggest studs he can find from wherever. There's another part that wants to see the occasional Nebraska kid TRY to make the team.