Reliable, Trustworthy Reporting, Capturing The Heartbeat Of Our Community
Reliable, Trustworthy Reporting, Capturing The Heartbeat Of Our Community
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Tell me the landscape of college football is changing without telling me the landscape of college football is changing. Take example No. 1. Last week, Marshall officials announced that its team will not play in the Independence Bowl, due to “player unavailability due to activity in the transfer portal.” Since Dec. 8, 29 players have entered the transfer portal after coach Charles Huff left the Thundering Herd to become head coach at Southern Miss. How about example No. 2? The House v. NCAA antit...
Unpopular opinion: Sportsmanship is best shown during competition, not during a five-second sound bite or video during a coin toss. That’s why I agree with the take by Nebraska sports writer Mitch Sherman from Friday’s Huskers versus Iowa game. “The Athletic” journalist asserts that the 60-minute football contest showed true sportsmanship. The pregame antics were pure hype. “They didn’t head hunt. They didn’t try to start fights or commit personal fouls. Common in rivalry games, those actions...
It may seem cliché but one of the funniest Halloween costumes is the blind referee. If you’re a sports fan, the referee scenario undoubtedly has run through your mind. I’m not into conspiracy theories but ... At least six calls were missed during Saturday’s Nebraska-Ohio State football game, calls that could have given Nebraska a signature road win or handed Ohio State an even bigger margin of victory. Two of the most notable: the spot on Emmet Johnson’s first-down run that turned into a third...
Was driving home from a fishing trip the other day when I heard the news – Pete Rose, probably the best hitter in the history of baseball, had died. When I played in high school, I used a "Pete Rose" Louisville Slugger bat. It was as thick as a telephone pole, and almost as heavy. But I was like a lot of people – we loved the way Rose played the game. All-out. Sliding head-first into the bases. Knocking down catchers in plays at home plate. And best of all, slamming hit after hit, and spr...
Pricking his finger with a small needle, Anthony Warrior squeezed a drop of blood onto the test strip. As he saw the number illuminate, the then-40-year-old Absentee Shawnee citizen and Muskogee descendant knew his days of bad eating had caught up with him. With his weight nearing 500 pounds and his blood sugar dangerously high, Warrior was facing a future of possible blindness, kidney failure and limb amputation – all complications of unchecked diabetes. If he didn't address his eating h...
Summer is usually a relaxing time in Lincoln. College students have left, state lawmakers have gone home, the weather gets hot, the backyard tomatoes get ripe, and the biggest debate around town is whether this is the year the Huskers become relevant again in football. Optimism always abounds in the pre-season, before the first kickoff. But not sure the same optimism accompanies the special session Gov. Jim Pillen has convened to address the state's traditionally high property taxes. Every...
One of the great, unsolved mysteries in the state has been why the beloved Trev Alberts left his alma mater to become athletic director at Texas A&M. Alberts was an All-American football player at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, then eventually became athletic director at the school after a successful stint at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. Seemed like a match made in heaven, and a job Alberts would hold for many years. But then, suddenly, it was over, and Alberts was trading Husker...
Funeral services for Alice J. Rittscher, 80 of Clearwater, will be 10 a.m., Saturday, March 30, at Snider Memorial Funeral Home in Clearwater, with Rev. Peter Jark-Swain officiating. Burial will be in Laurel Hill Cemetery in Neligh. Visitation will be 5 to 7 p.m., Friday, March 29, at Snider Memorial Funeral Home. Alice died Monday, March 25, 2024, at Battle Creek Community Pride Care Center. Snider Memorial Funeral Home is handling the arrangements. Condolences may be directed to the family at...
TAYLOR – Bailley Leibert walks into civics class and plops her sunflower-print backpack onto an empty table. The 15-year-old rummages for her notebook and colored pens. Around her are enough chairs to seat 10 students. But today, and every day, there are nine empty seats. It's just the ninth-grader and social studies teacher Ken Wright – an unintentional private lesson for the only freshman in this school. At Loup County High School, Bailley is the sole member of the class of 2027. The cla...
Since we're writers, we, at SAM love lists. Trust us, we keep and use them every single day. But, how does one determine which articles should be at the top of the yearly list? In the past, we've based it by reader count from our website. This year, we're still relying on reader count, featuring the top-read article by month. We wrote nearly 2,000 articles in 2023 and, while some of our favorites don't appear on the list, we're sure these are a newsworthy representation of the Summerland region....
There has been no formal request, but speculation runs high that the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Athletic Department may ask for funds to help with the planned $450 million renovation of Memorial Stadium. Earlier this year the Legislature directed $30 million in state funds to Creighton University in Omaha, including millions to help the private school build new baseball and softball stadiums to accommodate needs for the annual College World Series. School officials said the baseball stadium...
Every day, Ellen Rudd ventures down to the basement of the Nebraska Wesleyan's theater building, Elder Theatre Center. She enters a whole new world – or rather, an infinite amount of worlds. Rudd doesn't have a typical job and this isn't a typical basement. Rudd is manager of the costume library, which holds an inventory of an estimated 60,000 costumes, props and shoes. Established in 1980, the costume library acts as a significant resource for theater departments in and outside of Nebraska. I...
When the school bell rang for the first time last week, six new educators experienced their first day of class at Summerland Public Schools. Kara Ahlers will teach fifth grade. She graduated college in December 2018, with a bachelor's degree in elementary education. She has an endorsement in reading and writing. "When I worked as a para years ago, the teachers who I worked with were amazing at encouraging and reassuring me I could be someone who could make a difference in the lives of our...
Maurice S. Schindler, 83, of League City, Texas, died Aug. 12, 2023, surrounded by family. He battled nearly a year from a failing heart. ~~~~~ Maurice was born on the family farm southwest of Ewing, on Jan. 26, 1940, to Joseph (Jack) and Marge (Marjorie Christiansen) Schindler. He was the eldest of their five children. Maurice was baptized at St John's Catholic Church. He received his early education at the country school located near the original Schindler homestead, and then went on to...
Wayne State College men's track and field coach Marlon Brink has announced the addition of four student-athletes to the 2023 signing class. The quartet of Trevor Thomson of Page, J'Dyn Bullion from Bellevue West, Ty Dingman of Omaha and Mason Weickum from Casper, Wyoming, join Jaxson Ninete of Elkhorn as members of the 2023 signing class for the Wildcat men. Thomson is a sprinter from Summerland High School where he was a three-sport standout in football, basketball and track and field. As a jun...
The state of the state on its 156th birthday. It's still a very red, heavily conservative and largely Republican mecca situated in one of those mostly square states out west that a lot of people couldn't find on an unmarked map. And we like it that way. Well, a lot of us seem to. Might that change? Could Nebraska be the place where high school and college graduates want to stay? Could it become a magnet for young people and innovation? Progress in that direction is slow but it could happen....
It happened on a late spring Saturday afternoon in Omaha. The cool mid-May breeze caused the fans ringing Westside High School’s modest football field to curl up under their blankets and jackets. They watched, peering through the late afternoon sun, as 16 high school lacrosse players made history. The NorthStar lacrosse team, a group of Black boys from North Omaha, faced off against the private Creighton Prep High School for the 2022 junior varsity Nebraska state title. Creighton Prep’s seasoned players warmed up along the sidelines, while sev...
Garrett Dwyer runs about 500 head of Hereford and Angus cattle on his Bartlett ranch on the east edge of the Sandhills. The land he's on today has been in his family since 1894, when his great-great grandfather homesteaded it. Dwyer, who grew up there, is now the fifth generation in his family to ranch this land. But Dwyer didn't take over the family ranch until he did something far from home. For five years, he served in the U.S. Marine Corps, including two combat tours in Iraq. Now he's...
As Justin Taubenheim combined soybeans in a Buffalo County field on an October afternoon, he thought about why he does it. "I'm not farming to get rich,” he said. “I'm farming to maintain a legacy, a way of life. Faith, family and farming, in that order. The farm is kinda like the icing on the cake." Taubenheim, 31, sports fewer gray hairs than your normal Nebraska farmer. The average age of a principal Nebraska farm or ranch operator: 56.4 years old, according to census figures. The rising worry: There won’t be a next generation to carry...
Welcome to 2023, a new year with a whole lotta new going on at the State Capitol. There’s a new governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, auditor and 14 new state senators assuming leadership roles in the Republican-dominated Nebraska government. There will be a new U.S. senator from Nebraska to be appointed by the new governor. There are 33 Republicans and 16 Democrats in the officially nonpartisan Legislature. So, what does this mean to you and me? A new year marks a great chance to move one year further away from the Covid pandemic l...
My turn to weigh on the new Husker hire. I’m no football guru, but I’ve been around the program long enough and have plenty of connections with former players (and we talk football a lot), so I feel I have a solid understanding of what it means to be all “N” and lead one of the most storied brands in college football. Initially, Saturday morning, as the news broke that Matt Rhule would be taking over the program, I wasn’t happy. I felt a sense of betrayal because deep down, I hoped interim c...
In the summer of 1978, Allen Wilke slammed the brakes. He did this often. A true plantsman, he observed everything but the road itself. He would spy a flowering prickly pear in the ditch, a wild grapevine. He would double back without warning, often sending his son and daughter – half asleep in his gutted cargo van's backseat – tumbling forward with their luggage. This time, the plantsman was alone. He was puttering through the Sandhills on Highway 91, a mile west of Taylor, when a tall, ski...
If you know me well, or if you’ve read this column for years, you know how much Husker football means to me. Always has, always will. Despite getting a breaking news alert during our grandson’s peewee football game that things were a little, um - frosty - in Lincoln Sunday morning. Despite a horrible coaching record for Frost during his tenure. Despite the oh-so-many close calls which left many fans feeling next week would be the turning point. I’m not sure I believe in the Solich curse, but I...
Are Nebraska diehards the worst fans in college football or do they live up to the perceived hype of being the greatest? After Saturday, I’m embarrassed by the actions of multiple so-called armchair quarterbacks who hide behind a keyboard and, on social channels, chastise an entire coaching staff and a team of 18-20-something-year-olds who play a game. Calling for the coaching staff to be fired immediately? Pointing out players’ mistakes on social media? Everyone has an opinion on how to coa...
Every fall, spring and summer, my office provides some outstanding college students with the opportunity to intern in Washington, D.C. or at one of our state offices. These internships give students the chance to learn more about public policy, our system of government and constituent service. This summer, I welcomed four interns to our D.C. team. These college students are all from Nebraska and, over the last eight weeks, they have done important work on behalf of the state. I am always...
