THE NEBRASKA 100

Jeff Kinney came to the University of Nebraska in 1968 as a quarterback. Had he arrived a couple of decades later, Kinney might have run options for Tom Osborne in the mold of a Scott Frost.

"I threw the ball better than Scott Frost or any of those guys did," Kinney says with a chuckle.

But he didn't throw it better than Jerry Tagge and Van Brownson, two other quarterbacks who joined the Huskers in 1968. Kinney moved to flanker in 1969 spring practice. But preseason injuries to Joe Orduna and Frank Vactor made Kinney the No. 1 I-back.

That's where he stayed. He ran for 2,244 yards in three seasons, helping the Huskers win two national championships. He bulled through Oklahoma for 171 yards and four touchdowns in 31 carries in the 1971 "Game of the Century." He gained 151 yards after halftime.

"You just bite your lip and say, 'They're not going to stop me,'" Kinney says. "I don't know that we were a whole lot better than they were. But we were awfully determined not to lose that football game."

Kinney went on to play five years in the NFL -- four with the Kansas City Chiefs and one as blocking back for O.J. Simpson with the Buffalo Bills.

He's lost some lift from his days as a three-sport standout at McCook High School. The 6-foot-2 Kinney could dunk a basketball, took second in the state in the high jump and made all-state in football.

"I couldn't have ever dreamed things would work out the way they worked out," he says. "It was just being in the right place and getting an oppotunity."

— Doug Thomas