It was the fans’ turn to take the field on Saturday, Aug. 8.

Fan Day 2009 gave way to thousands of Big Red fans with posters, programs, jerseys, helmets and T-shirts, trying to get autographs from Husker players and coaches. The fans were from all over Nebraska and beyond. The lines were already meandering well into the university’s campus an hour before the event started. Once the gates opened and the fans got inside the stadium, they plotted out which lines to wait in and which to pass. It was crowded, and they had to hurry to get the most out the afternoon.

One common reaction, from both the young kids playing catch with the footballs they just got signed and the adults who have been coming to fan day year after year, was to take a knee and rub their hand back on forth on field turf, leaving a brief impression of their hand on the turf that owns the state’s attention during football season.

Here's the second of Fan Day Dispatches...we'll run them throughout the next week!

Darrin Frey teaches math at Cedarville University in Ohio, but he hasn’t been able to teach his two sons Jacob, 12, and Nathan, 10, to love the Huskers like he does. But the family was in Nebraska visiting and Darrin brought his sons with him to fan day all the same.

Jacob is actually an LSU fan and wanted to meet their former defensive coordinator.

Darrin has had some luck at teaching his sons some Husker history.

“I know the year I was born they shared the national championship with Michigan,” Jacob said.

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Once believed a liability of Nebraska’s team, the defensive line has unquestionably been a strength.

Just how well has it held up during the season?

All four of its current starters rank among the Big 12’s top eight in tackles made by defensive linemen. Junior nose tackle Ndamukong Suh is first with 34. Senior tackle Ty Steinkuhler is tied for second with 33. Sophomore end Pierre Allen is fourth with 31 and senior end Zach Potter is tied for eighth with with 25. Only Iowa State has more than one player in the top eight.

When asked if he was surprised at such a number, Bo Pelini deadpanned: “You forget I just coached Glenn Dorsey.” In his senior season last year, Dorsey had 69 tackles, ahead of any of the Huskers’ individual pace.

Still, to have four players with high numbers, Pelini said, is “pretty rare.”

“Our defensive line has pretty well,” he said. “They’ve gotten better…going into the year nobody really thought that would be a strength of our team, but it has been the strength of our defense.

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