Water is being let out of the Harlan County Lake!

The elevation hit 1948.32 today. Normal pool level is 1946. They are letting a good amount of water out of the lake. This hasn't happened in a while.

Harlan County Dam rises even more!

Michael Boehler takes in some swimming at the Harlan County Lake last Sunday!!!!


The Harlan County Lake had an elevation of 1947.61 early today. That is up almost eight inches in one day. A year ago the lake was at 1936.84. On 1/2/07, the elevation was 1926.44. So in 16 months the lake is up almost 20 feet. Rain is expected tonight. The inflow is still heavy from the Republican River but it definitely peaked on Monday. Tourism traffic near Orleans to see the high Republican River was amazing over the weekend and on Memorial Day.

Oral Robert is in the regional in Lincoln this weekend. They have three pitchers at 32-4. After Eastern Illinois, the Lincoln regional is as tough as anywhere in the country except for in Miami, Fla. where they are joined by Missouri and Mississippi.

Roburt Sallie is gone from NU basketball. This writer wonders how all the enrollment issues caused problems. Did somebody not know the rules. It would have never happened if Sallie would have had his grades up to start with. Bad news for the Huskers.

Look to Kyle Busch to continue his pursuit of the Cup. He is the closest thing to Dale Sr. I have seen. Most fans won't like that comment but JJ Yeley drove the 18 car last year and look how he did. Casey Mears is driving the 5 car this year, the car Kyle Busch drove last year, and look at the dismal season he is having. There is no driver better. Look for Carl Edwards to give Kyle B. a run for the money this week.

Dan Jennings is starting for NU this Friday. A great choice,but not this writer's choice. He was Eric Bid. Anderson knows what he is doing though and it will be great for the Huskers to be home and start with Eastern Illinois. Look for a 10-4 vistory on Friday and then a pitcher's duel against UC-Irvine on Saturday.

Eric Bird should start against Eastern llinois!

Nebraska starts its regional this Friday. This writer's pick to start game one is Eric Bird. Bird is NU's fifth starter but in reality is number two or three. Why start Bird?
1. Bird has been pitching well and is well rested.
2. Eastern Illinois is a 500 team and will be somewhat intimidated by the crowd.
3. Weber needs extra rest.
4. If we don't win with Bird on Friday, we are in deep trouble anyway.
5. Johnny Dorn is one of the best pitchers in the nation and we need him against Oral Roberts or UC-Irvine who will be using their #2 pitcher.
6. Left-handed Jennings will be available for Saturday or Sunday. He might be our best bet to start Sunday if the starters in the first two games can go quality innings.
7. That will leave us with Pribanic or Weber for Monday. We have a good chance of playing on Monday.

Why Dorn might start on Friday. Nebraska has a history of always starting the #1 pitcher? Quinten Robertson started a couple of years ago ahead of Marsden but normally NU goes with number one in the first game.

Eastern Illinois is not very good and to get to the CWS in Omaha we have to go with Bird Friday!! If it doesn't work, then we probably weren't going to make it anyway.

Thank goodness this writer is not the manager, but it is fun to pretend. What is your prediction?

The Harlan County Lake hit an elevation of 1946.74. Normal pool is 1946. Just crazy!! The lake is up over ten feet from this time a year ago.

Also Robert Sallie is NOT coming to Nebraska to play basketball. The Big 12 voted not to allow him to join any team in the Big 12. Academics? So now we have two scholarships available. Sallie was looked to as a player who could change NU's future. Bad news for basketball fans!

Harlan County Lake

The Harlan County Lake now has an elevation of 1945.62. It will hit normal pool of 1946 tomorrow. HOWEVER, Bryce Boehler reported from Orleans that the Republican River is starting to drop. HOWEVER, it is now starting to rain again. Stay tuned for more HOWEVERS.

Michael Boehler caught five catfish on Saturday in the river. Bryce Boehler caught one today. This writer fished for seven hours both days without a bite except for some disease carrying mosquitoes. Scott Boehler says they aren't biting because there is too much to eat. He thinks that the flooding has carried all kinds of food into the river. My thought is if there are stale chips in the buffet, I still go for the prime rib! That's what I say anyway.

That's our current fishing report direct from Orleans today.

Sport Shorts

The Gretna golf team won the Class B golf championship this week. Scott Boehler, the Gretna coach, said that his team worked hard this year. He also said he had a great bunch of kids. He was especially proud of his senior's leadership.

It was announced this afternoon that Nebraska will host a regional next weekend in Lincoln. Teams will be announced tomorrow. Nebraska hopes to rebound and this writer believes they will win their regional.

Texas beat Kansas State 15-7 today to win the Big 12 baseball championship. Texas has been hot but to see K-State in the final is a mystery.

The Harlan County Lake is at 1944.97 today. Normal pool elevation is 1946. It should hit that by Tuesday or Wednesday as the Republican River is out of it banks. Lake activity was brisk in the Alma area. South of Orleans there was a steady stream of cars viewing the flooding of the river.

James Dickey

James Dickey was in Lincoln today talking to Doc Sadler. Sadler and Dickey are old friends and hopefully Doc can talk him into being an assistant coach at Nebraska. Dickey was a head coach for Texas Tech for 11 years. Read more about Dickey on the Oklahoma State info page.

okstate

Harlan County Lake continues to rise!!

The Harlan County Lake is up to 1944.18 which is less than two feet below normal pool level. If you have a fishing report for the lake or the Republican River, leave a comment.

The Nebraska games will take on a few changes this fall. The doors that are shut during the tunnel walk will come down. The players will no longer have to stand for a period of time while waiting for the doors to open. The national guard usually had two of their guards open the door. I am sure we will find another way to honor the military. Also we will go back to the song during the tunnel walk that we had when Solich was coach. It will be a nice change.

The Oklahoma Sooners football stadium is getting a new scoreboard. Read more about the Sooners....

NewsOK

Jimmie Fallon is taking over for Conan O'Brien when O'Brien takes over for Jay Leno. Read more about it.

edubtv.blogspot.com

Bengals:A Great Spot for Mo

Big Red Report

Tuesday Bullets from the NBA

truehoop

Jason Whitlock talks about K-State's success in athletics.

Jason Whitlock

Here's a Kansas City Royals blog. Interesting.

royalsreview.com

No Domo Arigato Mr. Jo Votto

Yesterday when the Reds played my Cubs, the Reds hit 7 home runs! Joey Votto (pronounced Va-toe) pictured left, had 3 home runs himself. The Reds really laid the beat down to the Cubs. The Cubs are slumping right now. They are 3-7 in their last 10 games but only 2.5 games out of first. They have been on the road a lot lately but return to Wrigley tomorrow night to start a 3 game series with the Arizona Diamondbacks. Should be a great test for the Cubs.

In other baseball news, the Twins center fielder, Carlos Gomez hit for the cycle last night. His was the first player to do so since Kirby Puckett.

After getting demoted to the bullpen after starting 0-6, Giants pitcher Barry Zito returned to the starting lineup after making zero appearances in relieve. He didn't look too bad but he received no run support and took the lose which drops him to 0-7.

I hope you got to see the two outfield assists from Rick Ankiel, of the St. Louis Cardinals, on Tuesday night. He threw out two people from deep and deeper center field who were trying to tag from second base on a fly ball. He originally was a pitcher who couldn't hit the strike zone from 60 feet 6 inches but now can throw a strike from 200 feet away. The throws were incredible!

The top college baseball series in May is this weekend!

Texas A & M is ranked sixth in the nation. They are 40-8 and they play eighth ranked Nebraska in Lincoln this weekend. Nebraska needs to sweep the series to take the lead in the Big 12. Here is how the teams have done against common opponents.

Team...................Texas A & M......Nebraska..
Northern Colorado.......2-2..............6-0...
Arkansas................1-0..............1-1...
Texas Tech..............2-1..............3-0...
Oklahoma St.............1-2..............1-2...
Kansas..................3-0..............2-1...
Kansas St...............3-0..............3-0...
Oklahoma................3-0..............2-0-1.
Baylor..................3-0..............2-1...
TOTAL..................18-5.............20-5-1.

The game is in Lincoln. This writer takes NU winning two out of three. What is your guess and why?

What do you think of PETA getting involved with Eight Belles going down in the Kentucky Derby? Sounds like they want to end horse racing. What do you think?

Chiefplanets.com

We made into Chiefplanets.com, which is a site for Kansas City Chief fans.

Chiefplanets.com

Jason Whitlock discusses the Kansas City Chiefs' draft.

Jason Whitlock

The Big Red Report has the statistics and a story on attendance for the football spring games. See how Nebraska placed.......

Big Red Report

Danny Woodhead goes to the Jets!

The Lincoln Journal Star has reported that Danny Woodhead is going to the New York Jets as a free agent! He'll be coached by the "Running Game" coach of the Jets, Bill Callahan.

Steve Octavian will go to the Kansas City Chiefs as a free agent. The Chiefs had a good draft with Glen Dorsey of LSU and Jamal Charles of Texas.

No news on Sam Keller or Maurice Purify yet.

Zach Bowman and Carl Nicks were drafted in the fifth round. Bowman was drafted by the Bears. Nicks was drafted by the New Orleans Saints. Bo Ruud was drafted in the sixth round. Ruud goes to New England.

Sport Shorts

The Harlan County Lake is up to 1943.86 compared to 1934.9 a year ago. The Republican River is down about a foot from its flow two or three weeks ago. Catfishing is not good at this time in the river and this writer is unaware of mushrooms appearing yet.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. will win the Nascar race at Talledaga this week. Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon, and Tony Stewart will be other possible winners. Yesterdays, Nationwide race was filled with some bad wrecks and there weren't many cars left on the track that didn't have damage.

Nebraska baseball swept the doubleheader with Baylor yesterday. In the second game Thad Weber pitched seven innings with no earned runs. NU won 14-1. In the first game they had to go extra innings to win 6-4. Good news is that Jake Mort and DJ Belfonte are hitting ball well now. Jake Opitz, Mitch Albeita, and Nick Sullivan continue to hit well. NU continues to play well with a record of 32-7-1. In early loss to Stanford now isn't such a big deal as they were ranked sixth last week.

How did you like last week's Red-White game? Did you like the new format with the draft? Leave your comments!!

Nebraska Spring Game!

There were 80,500 fans at the Nebraska Annual Red-White Game. There were 150 high school recruits at the game. There were 200 ex-players at the game, mostly on the sidelines. What an atmosphere for a practice game!!

This writer has three plays that were his favorites!

1. Early in the game, Lance Thorell hit Todd Peterson as he received a pass on a down and out. Thorell jarred the ball loose as he made a jarring hit!! The crowd went crazy and, after that, the defense set the tone for the game on both teams.

2. Tyler Wortman's hits. He was all over the field. He looked like he was an All-American, if we didn't already know better. He looks like he should be on the field a lot this fall. Totally impressive. A great hitter with great passion.

3. Joe Ganz to Curenski Gilleylen for a 77 yard TD pass. Curenski outran the defense and Ganz laid in a perfect ball.

Anybody that comes away from the game and says whether NU will be good or not is beyond me. Nebraska played Nebraska. It looked like there wasn't any part of the team that looked like we have deficits in any area. It also looked like there wasn't any part of the team that did great except for the kickers and punters. This is good, this writer thinks.

Some disappointment with the backup quarterbacks. It seemed like a lot of passes got batted down or were off the mark by quite a ways. The offensive line did not dominate the defensive line as we would have guessed before the game. In fact, the defensive line may of outplayed the offensive line. Quentin Castille may be our best back, but he fumbles too much. Kody Spano was very impressive for a kid that should still be in high school. Receivers dropped too many balls. The defense got four turnovers. Matt Donahue may have improved his status with a nice catch from Beau Davis.

It was fun to watch and fans should be excited for this fall.

Husker Hoops

Please make the trip to Holdrege on April 27th at 3p.m. to attend the 2008 Husker Hoops basketball game. Husker football players will be playing basketball against local athletes from Loomis, Betrand and Holdrege, to raise money for Team Mates, a mentoring program at Holdrege Middle School. $5 for adults and $2 for students, pre-K is free. There will be contests to win shirts and a raffle to win some great prizes. Some prizes include a UNL football autographed by the current coaching staff and players, UNL helmet display signed by Johnny Rodgers, Mike Rozier and Eric Crouch, coolers, cookbooks, HHS baskets, huskers sweatshirts and caps and camp chairs. Come and enjoy the fun and festivities. Hope to see you there.

NFL Mock Draft

The Houston Chronicle and the Z Report has a mock NFL draft for the first round. Are there any Nebraska players taken? Read on.

Houston Chronicle

Ways to avoid a cold!!

Kansas Coach Mangino has a bad cold this week. Must be going around cause I have one too.

There are different things you can do to avoid a cold. Here are a few.

Wash your hands constantly. Or when you can. Especially after you have been out in public or before a meal.. Eat a healthy diet. Lots of fruits, vegetables, and wheat. If it is cold dress warmly. try not to be around someone that is sick too much. One other thing that might be good is to spray disinfectant spray on stuff that you touch a lot like doorknobs.

Please don't pick your nose and wipe it on somebody as illustrated above.

Harlan County Lake elevation

The Harlan County Lake elevation is at 1943.55. Normal pool level is 1946. The lake continues to rise at a good rate.

Jay-R Strowbridge is transferring

It was announced today that Sophmore Jay-R Strowbridge has decided to leave the Nebraska basketball team. He averaged 4.8 ppg and 1.6 rebounds in 32 games last year. This should open up another scholarship to recruit a big man for this fall.

Cody Glenn will be a starting linebacker!

Word is Cody Glenn is practicing well, very well. In the last four practices, he has three turnovers. Now this is a guy who is still learning the position. He is good!!! Now to go a little further, look to Cody Glenn to be a team captain. This comes after seeing the other players rally around him last week. He is popular and respected. With his development, the defense will be that much more talented. They are young, but aggressive and talented.

Nebraska Football's practice

This writer watched the Nebraska football practice on Friday. The players were in half pads but they got after each other pretty good at times. What was the difference between this year's practice vs. practices under Bill Callahan?

One thing that was noticed was that Friday's practice was spirited for the whole practice. Most of the time players were yelling encouragement to each other. Cody Glenn, for example, got a lot of attention from coaches and the players. It has been reported that Joe Ganz is the best liked player on the team. Sports Nightly has talked about this at times. Friday the man was Cody Glen. You could tell that the team wants him to do well. He is learning the drills and doing a pretty job of it, but he has a ways to go. But he is getting a lot of attention from Coach Ekeler. When Glenn intercepted a pass and ran down the field with a pile at the end of the play, the players went nuts. They congratulated Glenn for his good play. There was a lot of screaming and yelling!! Fun to watch.

Another thing is that in the past years, the practices were very businesslike and kept on schedule. They did a lot of things in a short amount of time. Coaches were coaching but they seemed to keep going at a rapid pace. This year's practice was very scheduled also but there seemed to be more time spent on coaching the players. Less efficiency as far as the number of plays run but more development of the players.

It could be just the practice schedule this writer saw on a particular day but it seemed that practice was split more with offensive and defense. It seemed in the past that the practices emphasized offense. More players participated in the practices also this year. In the past there was more reps with the top units.

When players dropped the ball, ran the wrong coverages, or did other miscues, they had to run. Some were doing pushups

One thing missing from the practice of this year compared to the practice from the previous coaching staff was the Oklahoma drill. This is when the players get in a circle and and an offensive and defensive player goes against each other. They were matched up by position and this drill really got things going. Coaches were yelling and the players went crazy. It was a fun drill to watch.

The above is just observations of the practice Friday. They aren't meant to say one coaching staff did things better than the other but the players were more into the practice with more yelling of encouragement, etc. this year which is a good sign.

Joe Ganz looks like the best QB so far. Actually Ganz looked as good as any QB we have had in the past five years this writer has watched a practice. Lee and Witt look like they can contribute also. We have a good group of QB's with good arms. You have to give Beau Davis credit. He has a great arm but his chances of playing in games aren't that good. he is a team player.

The offensive line is the best we have had in the past five years. It looks like we have recruited some real good offensive linemen over the past several years. We have to be better on offense this fall just because of this. Lots of depth. Lydon Murtha needs to hide his holding as he was going against Zach Potter and held him some of the time.

Same story at running back. Lucky has proven himself. Castille looks like he can run and catch the football. We might want to use him like Missouri used Rucker and Coffman last year. He is big and fast. Roy Helu looks like an all Big 12 back. Again lots of depth.

We don't have a Maurice Purify this year, but with Swift, Peterson, Holt, Gilleylen, Paul, Henry, Brooks, and others, we should be in fine shape. We'll see Chris Brooks on the field quite a bit this year if he can hang on to the ball.

At tight end Dreu Young looks real good. Mike McNeil looks fast but is hurt right now. We should be in good shape at tight end if McNeil stays healthy.

All in all, the offense, will be powerful!!!!!

On defense, it is harder to tell how good they are. Right now the offense is ahead of the defense. The offense has more experience coming back. The Red White game could be a higher scoring game because of the defense adjusting to the new system and the offense having a veteran crew coming back.

The defensive line doesn't have Suh as he is recovering from surgery. Steinkuhler, Dixon, and Barfield are playing a lot on the top unit. At defensive end, Barry Turner looks in good shape. He didn't practice last spring because of surgery. He could shine this year. Potter is back at the other end. Looks slimmer and quicker.

The linebackers are young except for Philip Dillard. He should have a great year. He looks and plays like the veteran. Latravis Washington is also playing linebacker on the starting unit. He looks like a great athlete but is learning the part. Blake Lawrence also plays on the first unit as long as they aren't in the nickel package. It will be interesting to see where Cody Glenn fits in. He has a huge learning curve. He is making the effort and the team is behind him. He could be a pleasant surprise.

With the number of spread offenses NU will face, we will probably see Dillard and Washington as the two linebackers and Murillo, West, and Prince Amukamara as cornerbacks in the nickel package a lot. Anthony Blue will be a big part of this in the fall also.

The safeties include Asante, Thenarse, Culbert, and O'Hanlon. Thenarse is hurt a little so O'Hanlon was running with the top unit. Hard to tell how good O'Hanlon is but he must of impressed the coaches so far. Thenarse is a hitter. Sounds like he is still learning the coverages but most of the players are.

Should be an exciting year. Players are developing so there will be a few changes before we play our first game. Can't wait til the first game. Heck this writer can't wait until the Red White game.