THE DAILY NEBRASKAN OCTOBER
29, 2015
DailyNebraskan.com
Vol 115, Issue 01
Now what? After Nebraska’s 14-13 loss to Illinois on Saturday, the Huskers find themselves 2-3 on the year, the worst start since 1959. Where do Mike Riley and his staff go from here?
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LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Editor’s note: The following is a letter to the editor from Hank Bounds, seventh president of the University of Nebraska, in regards to college affordability.
As I travel the state and talk with Nebraskans, one of the questions I’m asked most frequently is: “What is the University of Nebraska doing to keep college affordable for students and families?” Citizens across our state — young people and their parents, policymakers, leaders in business and agriculture, taxpayers — want to know their university is working to keep costs down so students can stay in school, graduate on time and enter the workforce with minimal debt. Fortunately, in Nebraska, we have a great story to tell. That’s something we should all take pride in, especially considering that more than 70 percent of jobs in our state will soon require higher education. Our conversations about college affordability are both timely and important. Our story starts with the fact that the value of an investment in higher education has never been greater. For an individual, that investment means the opportunity to discover a new passion or career path, to learn from faculty who are experts in their fields, to earn $1 million more over a lifetime than a high school graduate. For the state, the investment means a broader tax base, a more engaged citizenry, greater economic growth and greater quality of life as a result of university activities. Affordable, quality higher education is a partnership between the university and state. In Nebraska, our partnership is
long-standing and successful. There are two sources of revenue that support the university’s day-to-day activities: state appropriations and tuition. These are the funds that allow us to maintain our classrooms and facilities, pay our talented faculty and staff and cover other basic operating costs. To be successful in what I believe is the most competitive higher education marketplace in our lifetimes, it’s critical that we continue to invest in these priorities. Nebraska policymakers understand well the importance of maintaining both affordability and quality at the state’s only public university. We are fortunate that they have provided a stable level of state support that, while not keeping pace with inflation or our enrollment growth, has allowed us to keep tuition rates at least 25 percent below the peer averages. Yes, tuition increases have been a reality almost every year in recent memory, but students I talk to understand that they have a stake in their education and that moderate and predictable increases in tuition allow us to make investments that are critical to their success. While our sticker price alone makes us a great value, our commitment to affordability extends further. We invest more in need-based financial aid than ever, and today, more than half of Nebraska undergraduates receive grant aid. We also have leveraged partnerships with the private sector to expand affordability. Private funds serve as a tremendous supplement to state support in helping our students afford a college edu-
cation. Last week, in fact, we announced a new initiative to raise $200 million in direct support for students in the form of scholarships, support services and student-centered capital projects. Even with our investments in financial aid, we know unmet need remains, with the majority of our students applying for needbased aid. The new fundraising initiative, “Our Students, Our Future,” will build on our momentum in access and affordability, putting us in a position to attract even more students in support of our goals to grow enrollment beyond the current 22-year-high and produce more graduates to meet Nebraska’s workforce needs. The final component to maintaining affordability is a commitment to cost effectiveness on our part. Like any Nebraska family or business, we must make tough choices about how we use our dollars. We have made $84 million in budget cuts since 2000. While the cuts haven’t been easy and have required us to eliminate programs and services, they have allowed us to invest in our priorities and keep tuition increases moderate and predictable for students and families. We will continue to look for efficiencies to make sure we are responsible stewards of the resources Nebraskans entrust
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to us. Nebraskans can be proud that the university, education leaders, policymakers, private supporters and others share a commitment to affordable, excellent higher education. We have an opportunity to build on our good work to support even more students who want to change their lives through education. That’s my fundamental goal as president of the University of Nebraska, and I am fortunate to be in a place where citizens across the state are working together to achieve it.
Sincerely, Hank Bounds
Seventh president of the University of Ne-
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ON THE WEB
ARTS & Lincoln Calling ENTERTAINMENT Recaps from shows
on October 2 and 3 in downtown Lincoln
Dear not-boyfriend
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OPINION TURNER
Decommissioned DADT soldiers deserve more
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Coach Mike Riley reacts to a call at the game on Saturday at Illinois. Nebraska blew a 13-point lead in the fourth quarter to lose their third game of the year.
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22-year Natural History Museum vet retires Beloved State Museum director reflects on more than two decades of work, looks forward to more time with her cats LUKAS ZIEMBA DN For the past 12 years, any University of Nebraska-Lincoln student or faculty member could find Priscilla Grew, director at the State Museum of Natural History, giggling with excitement in her office after contacting new donors or observing children perusing the many exhibits the museum has to offer. But her time spent working for the museum came to a close on Oct. 1 as she retired after 22 years of employment at the university. Grew has a passion for science and bettering her knowledge. When she began her undergraduate degree, she didn’t know her future major even existed. “I didn’t know you could major in geology at all,” she said. “I was going to major in physics because I heard of it on TV.” She ended up hating her freshman physics course and discovered the summer of her freshman year that she could major in geology. “I went back to the ranch that my parents took me to when I was growing up, and I found these people majoring in geology,” she said, a slow smile spreading across her face. “I didn’t know you could do it for work.” She looked into geology courses at Bryn Mawr, a women’s liberal arts college outside of Philadelphia, and discovered the school was one of the top for women entering the field. She earned her bachelor’s of geology in 1962. It wasn’t until she went to the University of California, Berkeley, where she received her PhD of Geology in 1967, that she realized it was unusual to be a woman in this field. “I didn’t know I was a pioneer,” she said. “I just was really interested in it.”
After finishing her education, Grew had a long career of teaching and participating in California’s state government, working for Jerry Brown, now governor of California. Later, she worked as the director of Minnesota Geological Survey at the University of Minnesota, and in 1993, Grew was hired at UNL as vice chancellor for research. After a few years, she returned to teaching introductory physical geology and environmental geology in the department of geosciences. She became the director at the State Museum at the UNL branch in 2003. Geology certainly has it’s ups and downs in turns of employment, she said. Grew thinks it is important for students to pursue what they are interested in, not what their parents want them to. “Where are you going to be at two in the morning?” she said. “What’s going to be driving you?” Grew said she is happy to go to work each day knowing that her work is also her hobby. “(I loved) being able to come to work everyday with the enormous range of things in this museum,” she said. “We just wanted to make science fun.” Grew said she thinks she was able to communicate that everyday with her own passion for science at the museum. Grew takes pride in her work, but she also enjoys getting away. Whenever she and her husband are on vacation, they end up finding themselves at a museum, Grew said. Some of their favorites to visit are the Smithsonian in Washington D.C., the American Museum in New York and the Natural History Museum in London. At the State Museum, Grew said her favorite exhibit is the minerals. She said enjoys the exhibit because she and her husband are mineralogists and because it was produced by UNL’s own Matt Joeckel, from the School of Natural Resources. “It has this background story that this exhibit was produced by a volunteer from our faculty,” she said. Grew said that it will be difficult for her to give the new museum director, Susan Weller, space after working at the museum for this long, but she knows she can do it.
PHOTO BY ANDREW BARRY | DN Priscilla Grew, director of the State Museum of Natural History, stepped down on Oct. 1 after 22 years at the helm. A lot has changed about the university during her time here, she said. The overall expansion of the university is a major change that she accounts. UNL’s associate vice chancellor for research Mike Zeleny said it will be hard to adjust without Grew. “She’s a delightful person, loves the university and is respected nationally,” he said. “Her dedication to the university, the State Museum and the academic pursuit will be missed. She’s been a real leader for the museum. It’s been a gift for the state.” After retirement, Grew plans to stay in Lincoln and enjoy life. “In Lincoln, you can put together remark-
able coalitions of people in a hurry,” she said. Grew said she plans to travel to England and see her husband who is currently in Maine. Grew was all smiles when thinking about all the time she’ll have to spend with her cats or sit down with a thick Agatha Christie novel. Grew plans to volunteer at the museum and hopes to help bring the fourth-floor renovation of the museum to life. According to Grew, she isn’t quite ready to say goodbye to UNL. “I don’t want to say a farewell,” she said. “I want to stay involved.”
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RSO sells jewelry to support Sri Lankan women HANA MUSLIC DN Women empowering women. This is the goal of The Salvage Project, a University of Nebraska-Lincoln organization at-
tempting to make a difference in the lives of Sri Lankan women who have been victims of abuse or are suffering from HIV/AIDS. The student-run nonprofit partnered with another nonprofit organization in Sri Lanka called Community Concern Society. The Sri Lankan women make handmade jewelry by
following the designs, which are created by international designers. The jewelry is all made from recycled materials that is donated by international companies. That same day, they earn a fair wage for their work; this income is how many of the women can afford things such as medical expenses and sending their kids to
school. Then, The Salvage Project sells the jewelry back in Nebraska, and 100 percent of the profit goes to the partners in Sri Lanka. Bringing the project to Nebraska was the brainchild of UNL advertising professor Sriyani Tidball, whose daughter runs a creative boutique agency in Sri Lanka where the designers
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DAILYNEBRASKAN.COM do their work. Her role is to bring the final products to The Salvage Project, where members of UNL’s Enactus – an entrepreneurship program based out of the College of Business Administration – sell them. “It was a neat opportunity that was more than just a job for these women,” Tidball said. “It brings a really cool connection to Nebraska.” The women can come and go as they please into the agency and spend as long as they would like at work. Most are self-motivated and stay for a while, as they are paid by the amount of products they make. Tidball said the affected women are not usually given a second chance. “No one really wants to help them. That’s why this project is a really awesome thing. It makes people realize that at every level there is someone worse off than you.” The materials used to make the products are also being given a new life; companies from around the world donate their leftover resources to the project. The tea industry, for example, has recently donated the silky packaging its products come in and that has been turned into The Salvage Project’s latest line of “Cleopatra necklaces.” This gives the project the added bonus of being bio-efficient and environmentally friendly.
“It’s a win-win situation for all,” Tidball said. Junior Thea Phillips is the project manager. She oversees everything from logging inventory, to booking space for a pop-up sale, to coming up with a marketing plan. “I’m passionate about (The Salvage Project) because I find it so fulfilling to empower other people,” Phillips said. “I’m motivated to continue this project, even with every challenge, because every effort I make impacts the women in Sri Lanka.” Her plans for the future of the project include making an online Etsy store a major source of revenue. The Salvage Project also sells jewelry at the Sheldon Museum of Art. Phillips said she’d love to branch out and partner with other businesses in Lincoln. “Above everything else, my team and I are working on Salvage becoming a recognizable brand,” she said. “I want people to know the work we do, so they can gain a better understanding for the need in Sri Lanka, and why we find it so important to help.”
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NEWS@ DAILYNEBRASKAN.COM PHOTO BY ANDREW BARRY | DN
The Salvage Project attempts to make a difference in the lives of Sri Lankan women who have been victims of abuse or are suffering from HIV/AIDS.
Social media can have negative effect on mental health increasingly isolated and have disengaged from their academic responsibilities. People have (come) to CAPS as a result of cyberbullying, but also have reported some negative impacts on Chelsea Musfeldt came to the University of self-esteem by virtue of comparing themselves Nebraska-Lincoln at a healthy weight of 150 unfavorably to others.” Social media usage has become a staple of pounds. She had come a long way, physically the American college experience. According and mentally, from the days when she couldn’t step on a scale to “face how fat (she) was.” Since to the consumer insight service Experian SimMusfeldt had started seeing a therapist in her mons, more than 98 percent of college-age stusenior year of high school about her anorexia, dents use social media, and a nationwide survey depression and anxiety, she’d made it back to conducted by researchers at the University of a healthy weight and mindset. Nevertheless, California, Los Angeles found that 27.2 percent of students spent more than six hours on social Musfeldt hoped to avoid the “Freshman 15” as media per week in 2014. much as any girl her age, but for once, she was However, a small but growing body of rehappy with her weight right where it was. search suggests that this popularity and freHowever, by fall break, Musfeldt had gained almost 30 pounds. For a girl who just a quency of social media use among college students could have negative consequences for year ago had to be “taught” the “idea” of eating their mental health. In 2014 alone, three sepawhen she was hungry, the extra weight should rate studies conducted by researchers at UCLA, have been a sign of continued progress. But the University of Missouri and the University scrolling through her Instagram feed, Musfeldt didn’t always feel that way. Looking at images of Innsbruck in Austria each linked social media use to negative mental of girls’ flat abs or their health outcomes, ranging paltry meals triggered from worsened moods We have seen the those haunting thoughts and envy to more serious she had worked so hard whole gamut of problems such as depresto bury. sion and anxiety. You’re not good enough. impacts (of social media “Social media is a If only you didn’t eat. You use) upon students.” wonderful tool,” Portnoy could look like them again. said. “Like anything, howMusfeldt’s experiROBERT PORTNOY ever, when taken to excess, ence with Instagram trigcaps director it is harmful.” gering her anorexia highFor the researchers at lights a growing point of the University of Missouri, concern in the mental health community: Social media is having negative effects on college stu- the connection between envy and what they called “surveillance use” – defined as the use dents’ mental health. social media sites to make comparisons between “We have seen the whole gamut of impacts (of social media use) upon students,” said Rob- one’s life and the lives of other users – was the key to understanding why heavy social media ert Portnoy, director of Counseling and Psychouse can lead to depression and other more serilogical Services at UNL. “Students have become ous mental issues. According to the study, Face-
MATT HANSON DN
book use was positively linked to depression when it triggered feelings of envy in users but was actually negatively related to depression when the researchers controlled for those envious sentiments. Portnoy echoed the study’s conductors, and said he has observed connections among social media use, envy and graver mental health problems. “People tend to have a fear of missing out on all the fun that they imagine others are having, which causes them to monitor social media even more closely,” Portnoy said. “This then becomes a never-ending cycle of striving to have the elusive and highly unrealistic ‘perfect life,’ which, it is believed, can only happen if one stays abreast of what everyone else is doing. Not surprisingly, this can lead to increasing levels of anxiety and depression.” Portnoy’s colleague and fellow CAPS counselor Charlie Foster said that she agreed that the comparisons students make when they’re on Facebook and related sites are a major source of anxiety and depression but added that the problem is exacerbated by the sites’ quantification of approval in the form of likes, favorites, friends and more. “Students very much want to be seen in a positive light, and that gets to be problem-
atic when (they) don’t get the likes that (they) want,” Foster said. Now a junior, Musfeldt has learned to channel her struggles with mental health into helping others with theirs. She’s majoring in psychology, frequently speaks out about mental health on her Facebook page and is currently in charge of the social media for UNL’s chapter of Active Minds - a national organization dedicated to fostering discussion about mental health on college campuses. But while she’s doing better than she was earlier in college, Musfeldt admitted that she can still get triggered by what she sees on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, a fact which she attributes to the culture of those sites. “(On social media) everyone seems so outgoing, and they have so many friends, and they’re always doing something,” Musfeldt said. “It (makes) me sad. All these people go to parties, or they have all these friends they’ve met. When I was in high school everyone said, ‘You’ll meet your best friend in college,’ and I don’t have too many college friends... which sounds really messed up.” Musfeldt said she believes that this “lookat-what-I’m-doing” culture on social media sites pressures students to put on their happy faces when they’re online, even when their offline
6 | MONDAY, OCTOBER 5, 2015 lives are far from happy. “Seeing all these people going to parties with their friends, you kind of feel obligated to be like, ‘This is what I’m doing, too,’” she said. As social media coordinator for Active Minds, Musfeldt she hopes to help make the culture of social media sites more friendly to people like her who struggle with mental illnesses. In honor of National Suicide Awareness Month this September, she posted several links and statuses related to sui-
DAILYNEBRASKAN.COM cide prevention, and she said she hopes to continue to leverage her Facebook to promote discussion about mental health issues. “I think people are afraid of the stigma (surrounding mental health),” Musfeldt said. “Like if I share something about the suicide hotline, someone is gonna be like, ‘If it’s you, you’re just being selfish. If it’s a friend, they can just get over it.’ (People) just don’t want to be associated with the disease.” Like Musfeldt, Portnoy also said that he be-
lieves social media can be used more positively by students. He stressed the importance of engaging in the social media world more consciously, sparingly and purposefully. “When used responsibly and in moderation, social media can serve to connect people in ways that were both impossible and unimaginable a generation ago,” he said. “However, when used as the sole means of communicating and relating, it can become a crutch that further enables avoidance of
real-world contact.” Musfeldt has her own way of looking at the perils and possibilities of the online world. “Social media is like a knife,” she said. “You can slice butter with it, or you can stab someone in the chest.”
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Student brings family nonprofit to UNL Parents of UNL junior continue their work of helping impoverished families in India and Africa KELSEY CONNELLY DN It all started in India. “I remember being on a train and watching a mom get water for her kids to drink out of a dirty puddle, and I thought ‘I want to love and help these people, but I haven’t been prepared to do that,’” Cynci Petersen said. After returning home, Petersen, along with her husband and trusted friends from India, began to brainstorm service projects. “If we could work with the right people to get the right things to the right place, we knew we could make a difference,” she said. Brainstorming projects turned into brainstorming what it would take to turn the service projects into something of their own, a nonprofit organization. In 2009, the Petersens started Hope Venture, a nonprofit organization that brings help and hope to some of the most impoverished people in India and Africa through compassion projects. “We have about a dozen different projects related to education, food and clothing,” Petersen said. Hope Venture operates out of Lincoln, with the help of a small staff and volunteers. “We only have three part-time staff members, but we’ve impacted a good 20,000 lives in the past few years,” she said. One of Hope Venture’s biggest compassion projects is its backpack project. For every $10-donation, Hope Venture sends a backpack with a year’s worth of school supplies to a child in India. “People don’t realize they could skip getting that mocha twice a month and make a difference in a child’s life for an entire year,” Petersen said. Along with the backpack project in India, Hope Venture runs schools in the slums of India, sponsors children in Africa and offers vocational training for women. “They decided they weren’t going to be an organization that raised money and then just dumped it somewhere,” Hope Venture intern Thea Phillips said. “They wanted to actually go in and be active and involved and make an impact in these countries.” While most of Hope Venture’s projects are in India and Africa, almost all of their fundraising
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is done in Nebraska, including a Run For Hope to benefit its backpack project every spring. Hope Venture’s growth and success spread mainly by word of mouth, Petersen said. Volunteers from more than 35 states, including Nebraska, have helped Hope Venture, and now, University of Nebraska-Lincoln students can, too. Hope Venture became a registered student organization on UNL’s campus this year, allowing students to help lives find hope with them.
As Hope Venture continues to grow throughout UNL and Nebraska, Petersen said she hopes as an organization they can continue to encourage people to get involved and change lives. “The need is overwhelming in some of these countries, and we feel like there’s just so much more we want to do,” she said. Petersen said that while some people may feel discouraged by distance or the amount of need, anyone could get involved and help im-
prove the lives of the people living in impoverished countries. “You might think that it’s kind of hard to make a difference in Nebraska,” she said. “But once you find a project you trust, you can change the world right from where you are,”
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SPORTS
Week six match up score predictions
Josh Kelly, Senior Sports Editor Wisconsin 30, Nebraska 20 What some were initially calling the Big Ten West Championship game is now more of an elimination game for the division. With new coaches on each side in Mike Riley and Paul Chryst, Nebraska and Wisconsin are still trying to discover their identity. Both teams are coming off of losses you wouldn’t expect at the beginning of the season, with undefeated Iowa defeating Wisconsin and a subpar Illinois team beating Nebraska at home. One thing is for certain, and that is the fact that these two teams won’t be doing anything special this season. There’s always bragging rights, though. It’s supposed to be sunny with a little bit of wind on Saturday at Memorial Stadium, so passing the ball will be a lot easier for Tommy Armstrong Jr. But what Nebraska needs to do is give Devine Ozigbo more carries, as he averaged 10 yards per carry against Illinois. While Nebraska has been able to score at home, Wisconsin’s defense is averaging 9.6 points allowed per game. On the other side of the ball, Joel Stave will be able to get a few big passes to put the Badgers ahead early. The Huskers play catch up but fall short.
Brett Nierengarten, Online Sports Editor Wisconsin 31, Nebraska 10 How did we get here? Just six weeks ago this game looked like it would be for control of the Big Ten West. Now, it’s between a 3-2 Wisconsin team and a 2-3 Nebraska team. I think in this one, knowing how to win crucial games prevails, and yes, this game is crucial for both teams because the loser could find itself below .500 this season. Wisconsin’s defense allowed only 10 points against Iowa and, outside of the Alabama game in week one, that unit has been very good. Its struggling offense should be able to score enough points against a Nebraska defense, which has been well below average this year. Joel Stave is completing 63.6 percent of his passes and is averaging more than 200 yards through the air per game. Stave, who is having the best season of his college career, should be able to take advantage of Nebraska’s secondary and put up a lot more points than he did against Iowa.
Nick Wilkinson, Print Sports Editor - Wisconsin 24, Nebraska 17 Nebraska fans are tired of the roller coaster feeling of the 2015 season, and so is Mike Riley. After an embarrassing defeat in Champaign, Illinois, to the Fighting Illini, 14-13, the seats are hot in the Nebraska coaching staff offices. Riley and company made a mistake late in the game, which led to an Illinois touchdown. Things need to change if the Huskers plan on receiving a bowl game invitation. Things need to change now. Wisconsin, aside from obvious wins against Troy, Hawaii and Miami (OH), has been walking on nails in the lead-up to the game this Saturday. Just like Nebraska. With high expectations for quarterback Joel Stave and running back Corey Clement, their season started off sour with a 35-17 spanking from Alabama. Yes, it’s Alabama. But what happened last Saturday against the Hawkeyes? For premier programs like Wisconsin and Nebraska, holding your opponent to two touchdowns or fewer should result in a victory. There is a scoring drought occurring right now for the two teams, as their first year coaches can’t seem to gel with their new homes. Wisconsin doesn’t have Melvin Gordon anymore, but they always seem to shine against Nebraska. Both teams need a big win against a big team. This weekend is the prime opportunity to get one. Wisconsin always seems to have the upper hand, and things in Huskerland will only get worse before they get better. Wisconsin will maintain the Freedom trophy for another year, as they leave Lincoln with a 24-17 victory.
Vanessa Daves, Football Beat Writer Wisconsin 17, Nebraska 14 Everything about this season is up in the air. Everyone expected a win against Illinois — a close win but a win nonetheless. A blowout was expected against Southern Mississippi, but in the second half, things really started falling apart for the Huskers. It’s been a mediocre season, and a loss against Wisconsin is inevitable. The Badgers are 3-2, but the way they’ve played shows more consistency than the Huskers. They lost their season opener against Alabama, and they lost to Iowa 10-6. The other teams Wisconsin has played are kind of, uh, random — Miami (OH) Redhawks, Troy Trojans and Hawaii Rainbod Warriors — but they’ve blown them all out of the water. Nebraska hasn’t done that to a single opponent yet. There are still some questions up in the air about Nebraska: What’s the offense going to look like? Will Langsdorf and Riley pick a key running back? Will the secondary be ready to handle those deep passes? Is quarterback Tommy Armstrong going to be able to make decisions under pressure? Adjustments need to be made, but even then, Nebraska has an uphill battle for the rest of the season. That starts with Wisconsin.
Michael Dixon, Football Beat Writer - Wisconsin 28, Nebraska 17 If 2-3 sounds bad, how about 2-4? That’s the unfortunate reality for the Huskers because this year won’t get any easier. Now, Wisconsin comes to town. And even if the Badgers only lost a 10-6 barn burner at home against Iowa, they’re still a very difficult draw. Mistake-prone Joel Stave has as much of an ability as anyone to torch the Nebraska defense, and if the Huskers can’t make adjustments, it might be a long afternoon at Memorial Stadium. On the flip side, this game could be exactly what Nebraska needs to turn 2015 around. A win against pesky Wisconsin could do wonders for a team that’s still very much in the hunt for the Big Ten West. If the Huskers can figure out what to do at running back, and Tommy Armstrong recovers from an abysmal afternoon in Champaign, they’ve got a shot to win. But it’ll be tough, and Wisconsin should be favored comfortably. Unless the Huskers can magically turn the corner, they’ll have a rough go on Saturday. Look for Wisconsin to take an early lead, and though Nebraska will keep it fairly close, it will be two games under .500 heading to Minneapolis.
SPORTS@ DAILYNEBRASKAN.COM
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PHOTO BY ANDREW BARRY | DN
In his year as head coach of the Nebraska football team, Mike Riley has led his team to a 2-3 record thus far, Nebraska’s worst record since 1959.
DIXON: Huskers can’t find clear direction MICHAEL DIXON DN What’s next? Following Nebraska’s baffling 14-13 loss against Illinois in Champaign, Illinois, on Saturday evening, one can’t help but wonder. In a game labeled a ‘gimme,’ the Huskers found yet another way to look ordinary, mediocre and uninspired. They did it against BYU. They did it against Miami. And heck, they even did it against Southern Mississippi. And on Saturday, after play-calling blunders and clock management errors, Nebraska watched Illinois go 72 yards in 41 seconds to overcome a 13-point fourth-quarter deficit, scoring the final
touchdown with just 10 seconds to go. Another gut punch, and another loss. Why? Quite simply because the Huskers are nothing more than ordinary -- and they’re starting to slip toward oblivion as a program, too. This time, the outlook’s different. Non-conference games for teams that won’t contend for a national title are somewhat trivial. Of course, they’ll affect where you go to play a bowl game, but they don’t have much of an impact on what happens within the conference. So the Huskers had an opportunity to reset, and they couldn’t do it. They couldn’t erase the demons from the last-second loss against BYU and the comeback-cut-short in Miami. Instead, they
played (and managed) themselves to another disastrous loss. Nebraska had the ball on 3rd-and-7 at the Illini 27-yard line, with just one minute to go and no timeouts left for Illinois. Instead of running the clock down to a handful of seconds, quarterback Tommy Armstrong rolled right and threw an incompletion to running back Devine Ozigbo, stopping the clock with 55 seconds to go. You might as well have just given the Illini one of your timeouts. And on a night when the rain and wind played as much a factor as anything, Nebraska threw the ball 31 times and ran it only 34 -- even with NU averaging over five yards a carry. Now, where’s the sense in all of that?
“Well I thought earlier in the game our throwing was going good. The first pass of the game was a good throw,” coach Mike Riley said. All right. It worked on the first play of the game, so let’s try it again. “Ultimately we were trying to make plays,” Riley continued. “And we were doing so, for a while.” That’s a fair assessment, until you look at the stat sheet and see quarterback Tommy Armstrong finished 10-for-31 with 105 yards and an interception. So who was making these plays -- and what plays were they making?
DIXON: SEE PAGE 16
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Kelly Hunter takes over leading role for Husker volleyball SETH OLSON DN
think it’s a really good blend for our team, how she helps keep everybody else loose.” All of her life, Hunter has “kept it loose” when Sitting behind leader and star setter Mary Pollmiller all of last season, sophomore Kelly Hunt- it comes to volleyball. At Papillion La-Vista South High School, where Hunter starred alongside curer soaked it all in — every game, every practice and every meeting. Nebraska’s current setter didn’t rent teammates Amber and Kadie Rolfzen, Hunter just observe Pollmiller during her redshirt season. said it took a while for her coach — because of her intense nature — to understand the type of player Hunter focused on the broader spectrum: the team Hunter really was. as a whole. “By my senior year, she understood who I am, After a full year of taking a view from the backseat, Hunter was ready to take the reins to and that’s what I do,” Hunter said. “When you have a coach and other players that are on you, on help steer Nebraska volleyball toward Omaha, the you, on you it gets really stressful. And that’s when home of the 2015 Final Four. you play nervous and tentative. I’m just trying to “Redshirting in general is a really good opportunity,” Hunter said. “This is my third year now make them feel good about themselves.” Hunter referred to setters as players who love with the team, so I’ve had a lot of time to watch how we are and get to know what we need to do to cheer and get really loud. As a result, Hunter said because she is out on the court throughout the to succeed.” match, she is in charge of team energy and keeping Hunter has been instrumental in the Huskers’ the team upright. success this season, as No. 4 Nebraska is off to a hot “As a setter, I feel like you have to hype up your 12-2 start and fresh off a victory against top-ranked hitters,” Hunter said. Penn State, which had won 33 straight matches be“We are out there all the time, so we need to fore Friday. In Friday’s five-set comeback, Hunter bring the energy and be the mediators.” tallied 52 assists. While the team energy on the court needs to be Even when it looks bleak, Nebraska coach John Cook says Hunter and junior libero Justine Wong- controlled, so does the offensive pace, which is also controlled by Hunter. Orantes are the two players on the court who keep “We are still trying to go faster offensively,” the team thermostat at a good temperature. What Cook said. “It’s a process living on the edge. We are helps Hunter regulate the temperature is her comgetting glimpses of it from time to time, but Kelly munication skills. “Everybody has their own style and we have to controls the tempo, so it’s what she feels comfortrun with whatever it is, but those girls play hard for able with and how fast she can go and still locate Kelly and she does a really good job,” Cook said. the ball.” When it comes to locating the ball and kicking “She has a way of talking to people. You can’t coach the offense into gear, Hunter focuses on the motto that stuff.” Part of the job description of an energy me- of “practice makes perfect” to set up her hitters for diator on the court is hounding the team when it’s the perfect kill. “I’m a perfectionist,” Hunter said. “I think I fostruggling, just like Friday night when Nebraska cus too much on putting up dropped the first two sets the perfect ball. Setters train before rallying to win three “She has a way of so much, with so many extra straight in State College, talking to people. You reps, so if you just trust and Pennsylvania. know that you have trained, “If everyone is down can’t coach that stuff.” you are going to do it right. and we aren’t doing very You don’t need to think well, it’s part of my role about setting as you’re do— especially as a captain ing it. You’ve done the reps JOHN COOK — to say, ‘Hey look guys, Volleyball head coach enough that you just know.” we need to get our stuff What Hunter does think together,’” Hunter said. “It about, however, is where she just kind of depends on the is going with the ball. And when Hunter can keep game, the mood and how we are playing.” Although Hunter occasionally has to chew the the defense guessing, it brings her great joy to see other players out when Nebraska is struggling, she the defense clueless and scrambling for the ball. “I really like to set the middles, throw it around is usually a free spirit. She helps keep the rest of the and get a lot of people involved,” Hunter said. “As team loose. “I’ve known Kelly since she was about eight a setter, it’s always fun to hear the other team’s middle blockers say ‘Oh, crap,’ because they don’t grade. I think that’s just her personality,” Cook said. know where the ball is going.” “She’s a great competitor, but she tends to have fun While Hunter knows she doesn’t always deby keeping it loose. And she can laugh at herself. I
PHOTO BY ANDREW BARRY | DN
The Nebraska volleyball team had a historic weekend as they defeated the No. 1 Penn State Nittany Lions in five sets.
liver the perfect set, she is happy that she has the talented middle and outside hitters to bail her out. All powerful, aggressive hitters, the Huskers’ attack force consists of the best players a setter could ask for. “Even if I don’t put up the best set, they are keeping it in play and still getting kills on balls that
a lot of girls wouldn’t get kills on,” Hunter said. “That’s the best thing as a setter. I really owe it to my teammates because they are really good at what they do.”
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New analytics department hopes to change the game ALLAN CHRISTENSEN DN Nebraska has a lot of experience with the pioneering spirit. One hundred and fifty years ago, the state was settled by those willing to put caution to the wind and blaze a new trail. Decades ago, the Nebraska athletics program was changed by a man
named Boyd Epley and two simple words: Husker Power. On July 1, 2015, Nebraska started another chapter of innovation with Tucker Zeleny and the advent of the Department of Sports Analytics and Data Analysis. Steve Waterfield, the executive associate athletic director of performance and strategic research, along with athletic director Shawn Eichorst took
Nebraska into the sports analytics world. Nebraska is believed to be the only university with a department solely dedicated to sports data analysis. While fairly prevalent in professional sports, especially baseball and football, colleges have been slow to pick up on the trend at a major level. Sports analytics have been exploding across the athletic world as athletes and coaches look to find
an advantage. Most people know the story of Moneyball, the story of the dismally poor Oakland Athletics adopting a new style of management using a system called sabermetrics and the team’s ensuing success. In the world of Nebraska athletics, Zeleny is the Paul DePodesta to Waterfield’s Billy Beane.
ZELENY: SEE PAGE 16
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Meetings Lincoln Foxhall AA group meets every Monday at 7:30pm at University Lutheran Chapel. 1510 Q Street. Open speaker meeting.
Crossword Across
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strengthened by squats 6 Shul attendees 10 Easy-to-spread cheese 14 Zac of “High School Musical” 15 “Don’t worry about me” 16 Course list 17 Coming on to a patient, perhaps? 19 Way off 20 Piltdown man, for one 21 Deny membership to skater Starbuck? 23 Agree to 26 Kedrova of “Zorba the Greek” 27 Genre that includes freestyling 28 Up time 29 Cyberspace ’zine
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Less-than sign’s keymate First name in scat “Make my ___!” Shiverer’s sound Dictator’s directive at a dance club? Seek pocket change, say Itinerary word Close to closed “Taras Bulba” author Marijuana, informally Seeker of illicit 48-Across Hollywood’s Gardner Cowardly Lion portrayer New York site of Mark Twain’s grave Bad-mouth designer Chanel? “Mon ___!”
ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE R A V I
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Edited by Will Shortz 1
1 Proof letters 2 Area 51 craft,
supposedly
3 Part of a curve 4 Dance to Tito
Puente, say 5 Buttinsky 6 Give bad luck 7 Rock subgenre 8 Hit the jackpot 9 Toast word 10 Key using all the black keys: Abbr. 11 Go straight 12 Facing big trouble 13 Moon of Jupiter 18 Suitable for most audiences 22 Decorative inlay material 23 First fratricide victim 24 Nat or Natalie 25 Gelding-to-be, maybe 26 Break between flights 30 Fannie ___ 32 Sunday hymn accompaniment
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puzzle by will nediger
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2002 sequel starring Wesley Snipes Mello ___ (soft drink) Budget chart shape City near Santa Barbara Teri of “Tootsie” Ocean predator
45 46 47 48 52 54
Traipsed (about) City of northern Spain Often-removed car part Amnesiac’s question Topmost points Hades’ river of forgetfulness
56
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57
Editorial strike-out
60
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61
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62
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63
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DIXON: FROM 12 While Big Ten teams around them progress, Nebraska continues to regress -- and nobody knows the final destination. Iowa won in Madison, Northwestern embarrassed Minnesota, and Indiana and Purdue gave the No. 1 and No. 2 teams in the country a legitimate scare. Even Michigan, the other nostalgic Big Ten power undergoing a coaching transition, is creeping its way up the polls. But Nebraska? Nope. The unranked Huskers quite literally
gave a crucial game away. A few decisions here and there, and NU escapes with a 3-2 record, and still in control of their fate in the West. Instead, the Huskers fly home with the program’s first 2-3 start since 1959 seared into their heads. The Huskers had three ‘gimmes’ in conference play: Illinois, Purdue and Rutgers. Win those three games, and you’re guaranteed five wins. Not quite enough to get to a bowl game, but close enough to make bowl eligibility much more feasible. If you can do that, just one win against Wiscon-
sin, Minnesota, Northwestern, Michigan State or Iowa would get you to 6-6. And really, coach Mike Riley avoids a first-year crisis. Now, things get tough. Really, really tough. Just to ensure they make a bowl game, the Huskers have to win two of those aforementioned games, assuming they beat Purdue and Rutgers on the road. That final record looks uglier and uglier with each passing week. It goes from 8-4 to 7-5. Then, it goes down to 6-6. Now, it’s looking like a 5-7 (or maybe even a
4-8). Yes, transitions are tough, but this is bordering on disaster. And crisis management probably wasn’t something Riley wanted to dip his feet into by the fifth week of his first season. But here he sits, with no clear image on where he’s ultimately heading.
and see what kind of conclusions we can draw.’” Zeleny received his bachelor’s degree from Nebraska in 2010, his Master’s in 2012 and started working on his doctorate in Lincoln when he was recruited by the former football coaching staff to do some statistical work. Zeleny, a lifelong Husker fan, jumped at the chance to combine his passions for numbers and sports. Zeleny’s work caught the eye of Eichorst and Waterfield. They decided to make a full-time position, and told Zeleny he should apply. So, immediately after receiving his doctorate from UNL, he took the position and now sits in his office in East Stadium, Level C, with the exciting and scary task of doing something that has never really been done. Zeleny is the pioneer, the astronaut, the man going where no man has gone before. “Where it kind of began was just looking all across the country. What sort of trends can we identify that typically lead to success?” Zeleny said.
It’s hard to hit the ground running when you’re paving the road at the same time. Zeleny had no framework, no predecessor’s work to guide him. “The big thing was, ‘Let’s get into a season,’” Zeleny said. “‘Let’s see how things go when we’re getting new data, what the coaches’ day-to-day schedules are like, what can we do to be the most useful.’” With a new regime in charge of coaching football, Zeleny said it was nice starting off with a clean slate, where the SADA could become a part of new habits of a new coaching staff. At the same time, football poses some challenges the other sports at Nebraska don’t. First of all, none of the other sports have 100-plus members on the teams. The sheer amount of data accrued from a GPS system SADA uses to track players during practice is staggering. Zeleny said he’s often on the lookout for trends that predict the likelihood of injury, but it’s hard
with a large team and many different sets of players (offense and defense, linemen and skill players), who often have extremely different practice routines. But the lessons learned on the football field will eventually help every varsity sport at Nebraska. “Football is going to be our biggest challenge,” Zeleny said. “I think if we can get a baseline established with football, that it will make working with the other sports easier.” But like a true trailblazer, there’s always doubt. “And maybe that’s not true, but that’s the sense I get,” Zeleny said. It’s hard to speak in certainties when you’re the first person to do something. When you’re breaking ground, it’s hard to be absolutely certain what’s underneath.
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ZELENY: FROM 14 Zeleny, now the director of sports analytics and data analysis, said he always gravitated toward numbers as a kid growing up in the small town of Carleton, Nebraska. After graduating from Thayer Central High School in Hebron, Zeleny accepted a full-ride scholarship to the University of NebraskaLincoln and pursued a degree in physics, but that didn’t last long. A couple of years into school, Zeleny said he started to realize he was enjoying the math classes more than the physics classes and promptly switched majors. Then, another academic choice may have changed his life. “My adviser at the time said, ‘Hey, why don’t you take a couple (statistics) classes? See how you like it,’ and I immediately latched onto that,” Zeleny said. “It was more applied. You get to the higher level math classes; it can be a lot of proving theorems and things like that, whereas the stats classes were, ‘Hey, let’s collect some real data, analyze it
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