The ISU football team is hoping to pull off a huge upset against Nebraska Saturday at Jack Trice Stadium. History proves that the series between the border schools has been more than unkind to ISU Football Coach Dan McCarney.

McCarney is 0-5 against the Huskers in his Cyclone coaching career, with the average score of the games being 58-13 in the Huskers’ favor. The two largest Husker victories were 73-14 in 1995 and 77-14 in 1997, both national championship seasons for the Huskers.

“Embarrassing is an understatement,” McCarney said. “We’ve let it get out of control, out of hand, and been completely dominated when we’ve played Nebraska. We’re not the only team that it has happened to, but it sure has happened to us, and it hasn’t been a lot of fun.”

The game will be televised by ABC and is the first time in over 30 years that both teams enter the showdown undefeated. Both teams are 4-0 with the Huskers being top-ranked in the USA Today coaches poll and No. 2 in the Associated Press poll.

“It’s been 35 years since these two schools have played each other while undefeated, and I also understand that we’re 0-49 against teams ranked sixth or higher, so history hasn’t been kind to Iowa State in games like this,” McCarney said.

“Nebraska usually is undefeated and we hardly ever are, so it’s great to be in this matchup with one of the top programs in the nation. We want to try and turn this game into a good matchup instead of a complete matchup which it has been since I’ve been here.”

ISU quarterback Sage Rosenfels was a redshirt freshman in 1997 and doesn’t have fond memories of the blowout in Lincoln. However, Rosenfels also points out that things have changed since that game.

“That 77-14 game was possibly my most embarrassing moment of my life at Iowa State. To be part of that game and beaten that bad was tough,” Rosenfels said.

“We’ve changed so much since then, if you look at that team and then watch this Cyclone team, it’s a completely different team. We’ve upgraded talent so much that it’s a different level of football right now. It’s been embarrassing and we want to get that corrected.”

McCarney agrees that the Cyclone program has been on the rise and those previous blowout losses are history.

“We’re not playing the past, we’re not playing their tradition,” McCarney said. “We’re not the Iowa State of old. This is a better football team than we’ve had in the past and Saturday, we’ll see if we can play Nebraska better than we have in the past.”

In most of the recent meetings between the two teams, the Huskers have gotten off to fast starts and had big leads by halftime. Rosenfels knows that a tremendous effort through all four quarters will give the Cyclones a chance.

“From my perspective, if you look at the teams that have beat Nebraska, you don’t beat them in the first half,” Rosenfels said. “You either lose by a lot or take them down to the wire and beat them at the end. Hopefully I’ll be in the position to make a play and I think I can make that play and I think a lot of guys on this team can make a play.”

Last season, Husker running back Dan Alexander ran for 135 yards on only 10 carries to lead the Huskers to a 49-14 win in Lincoln.

The Huskers have struggled through four games this season and Alexander knows that his team must improve its play Saturday.

“This is the toughest game on our schedule to date,” Alexander said,”If we continue to make the mistakes we’ve been making lately, it’s going to be hard to come out of there with a W against a real good Iowa state team.”

At Tuesday’s press conference, Rosenfels pointed out that Arizona State was whipped by the Huskers in 1995 and came back the next year to pull a huge upset.

“Coach McCarney gave us some examples the other night of teams that got beat by 40 or more points then came back the next year and beat the other team,” Rosenfels said.

“For example, Arizona State got beat like 60-10 with Jake Plummer in his junior year and came back the next year and beat Nebraska at home. We got beat in Lincoln last year and with how much we’ve improved, we feel that we can beat them at home if we play our game.”