Lincoln, Neb. – The Nebraska/Illinois football game this past Friday may have drawn a large television audience, that doesn’t mean Husker Football Fridays are a welcome event for everyone. Nebraska AD Troy Dannen is one of those who feels it’s not in the best interests of the university. Dannen sent a letter to the Big Ten and commissioner Tony Petitti requesting Nebraska no longer host Friday night games. He made an exception for the traditional Black Friday matchup against rival Iowa.
The Huskers have hosted Friday night games the past two consecutive years, excluding Black Friday. This year, the university decided to cancel classes ahead of their September 20 game against Illinois. Dannen says that is a major motivating factor for his request to the Big Ten. “The university canceled in-person classes on Friday, and I sent a letter yesterday to the commissioner with the blessing of the president and the chancellor formally requesting not to host Friday games – outside Thanksgiving every other year, the game with Iowa,” Dannen said.
The decision to call off classes came after careful consideration of the issues that hosting a game at Memorial Stadium creates. The 90,000-capacity stadium causes a considerable amount of congestion on campus due to its location. Dannen recognizes how disruptive pregame preparations can be when it comes to students getting to their classes. “Because of the size of the stadium and your locale, I don’t think we want to be canceling classes, canceling in-person classes. I’m sure the students didn’t mind, but at the end of the day, the more we can avoid that, I think the better off everybody will be,” Dannen explained.
Nebraska is not the only school in the Big Ten to take such a stance. Dannen joins other conference athletic directors in expressing his thoughts on hosting Friday games. Michigan and Michigan State have both stated their concerns to the conference. Dannen followed Michigan State’s athletic director, Alan Haller, in saying he doesn’t feel it’s appropriate to “lay their foot down” and refuse to host Friday games, however, he felt the responsibility to at least say something about it. This does leave the door open to future Friday games at Memorial Stadium, but Dannen hopes the Big Ten will reconsider the novel scheduling option.
Nebraska has played games on Friday night the past three years starting at Rutgers in 2022. They hosted Illinois in 2023 in addition to this season.
