Capitalizing on opportunity

It’s safe to say freshman tight end Nate Boerkircher will never forget his first catch as a Nebraska Cornhusker.
There’s just no way that’s ever going to happen.
Midway through the opening quarter Saturday afternoon against Buffalo with temperatures approaching 135 degrees on the turf, the former Husky, filling in for an injured Austin Allen two plays earlier, caught the ball from Adrian Martinez on a little seven-yard drag route, then literally going head-over-heels after senior linebacker Kadofi Wright went low for the tackle.
Nate flipped onto his head, tumbling and securing the football, getting up like nothing had happened.
Welcome to big time football.
The Huskers would go on to claim a 28-3 win over the visitors on a day in which nothing came easy.
It was also a day that marked the 20th anniversary of the horror of 9/11, the crowd introduced to some of the crew of the submarine “Nebraska,” as well as the pilots of the jets and bomber in the pre-game flyover.
It also provided a powerful video tunnel walk message, Husker Damian Jackson, a former Navy SEAL, saluting a military veteran wearing the all white alterate uniforms, in general also saluting first responders.
Powerful stuff.
Nate said following the game that it was such a good feeling to secure his first college catch.
“It felt great. It was an amazing opportunity,” he noted. “It was a good play and I took a pretty good fall, and I made it out just fine.”
He said things happened so fast after he secured the football.
“I lined up on the right side, blocked for a little bit and released and came to the left. Before I could see, he hit me in the legs and then all of a sudden I was falling through the air.”
The Huskers would go on to miss a field goal on that drive, and actually didn’t score their first points until running back Gabe Ervin scored on a 2-yard run with just 6:56 remaining before halftime.
A 68-yard touchdown pass from Martinez to Montana transfer Samori Toure right before the break made it 14-0, Nebraska’s Blackshirts having a bend-but-don’t-break mentality, holding the Bulls to less than 400 yards for the seventh game in a row.
In fact, the three points allowed were the fewest given since the Blackshirts allowed only a field goal to Michigan State 10 years ago.
Austin played only one half of one series before laying on the ground injured after catching a pass for an eight-yard gain out to the NU 49 in what looked like a possible concussion.
“It’s unfortunate Oz went down,” Nate pointed out about his fellow Husky, who was featured on the cover of the game program. “He’s a great mentor and a great leader for me, and he got me prepared for situations like this.”
Buffalo’s defense made things difficult on the Husker running game, committing to stopping it by filling the gaps and generally making life rough for running backs.
Still, Big Red ran for 220 yards with Martinez getting just over half of that (112) on his many scrambles. In fact, after the game the junior quarterback became just the fifth player in Big Ten history to have passed for over 6,000 yards and rushed for over 2,000 yards (joining NU’s Taylor Martinez and three others).
“We had a lot of guys at that point not in the game,” noted Husker coach Scott Frost afterwards about the lack of available receivers, including Austin, Zavier Betts and Oliver Martin.
“We should have scored more in the first half. We got bailed out by a couple of big plays that Adrian and Somari made in the first half.”
“Their defense was quick and athletic,” Nate mentioned. “They made plays and played pretty good in the first half. We had a good game plan going in. We were trying to get the run game going, and as that was happening, we got the pass game going pretty well, too.”
The Huskers in fact had two pass play touchdowns called back because of penalties, but on this 20th anniversary of 9/11, when our country was going through difficult times, maybe that just wasn’t meant to be.
“I was a week old,” Nate added about the events on Sept. 11. “I was just born. It’s something that is super unfortunate. I know a lot about it, watching a lot of things and learning. It was a horrible thing to happen to our country, but I think it helped unite us.
“Every Sept. 11, every year, we unite pretty well again. It was great to wear these jerseys to honor them.”
DAVE BRADLEY can be reached at advertising@hamilton.net.