After a one-week hiatus from the No. 2 ranking in college football, the Nebraska Cornhuskers regained their familiar spot at the top. On Saturday afternoon, Cyclone fans got a first-hand look at what is quite possibly the best college football program ever.

Being a Cyclone fan I am biased towards Iowa State, and harbor a lot of resentment towards a program such as Nebraska. It has great fan support, a loyal media, and attract the best athletes in the country to come and play football; they have everything you like to see in a college football program, and has everything that you wish your school had.

I wanted more than anything for our beloved Cyclones to pull out the upset, however, after Mike McKnight’s PAT miss in the third quarter, all my beliefs about Iowa State still being a second-rate program came to realization.

Nothing against McKnight (as we didn’t lose by one point or on that play), our coaches or our administration (we have come a long way), Nebraska is just clearly in a league of its own when it comes down to lining up and battling on a Saturday afternoon.

Programs such as Nebraska, Florida or Florida State don’t have letdowns. Those programs don’t commit mental errors or penalties and are bigger, stronger and faster than all of their competition.

When trailing 14-13 at halftime, Nebraska Head Coach Frank Solich and his staff didn’t make many adjustments, didn’t pull out any trick plays and more importantly didn’t panic. Solich and his staff have all the confidence in the world in their players, as they should.

Solich stuck with his game plan, his players executed, and Nebraska won convincingly. It’s just that easy for them.

Thirty-eight consecutive winning seasons, 31 consecutive bowl bids, 315 consecutive weeks ranked in the Associated Press poll, and 236 consecutive home sell-outs are just some of the numbers that set the Nebraska football program apart from the rest.

The only reason that Jack Trice Stadium was sold out on Saturday was because of the faithful fans from Lincoln.

After the game, ISU players and coaches praised Nebraska for its sportsmanship and class. Nebraska players could be seen knocking down an ISU player and then helping them up off the ground, patting them on the butt for a good effort, or slapping their helmets after a good hit; all signs of the caliber of the high class with which Nebraska football competes and carries itself.

Saturday was my first time seeing Nebraska in person and what it means to college football is way more than any Iowan will ever know. Nebraskans could be easily spotted in their red (or scarlet as they like to call it) apparel and their shouts easily heard over that of their counterpart ISU fans.

That is what tradition and pride in your school is supposed to be like. Not merely reciting the fight song when your team scores but screaming from the top of your lungs. Nebraska football is an institution in the state of Nebraska. It is as one of my friends from Nebraska put it, “When the Huskers are playing, everything else stops.”

That statement may sound pathetic to non-sports fanatics, but to college football fans its about being able to say “my team is better than yours.” The Nebraska Cornhuskers are by far the best team that will visit Ames this year and are definitely the nation’s premier football program. They are in a class all by themselves and are truly a program to be respected and emulated, not imitated, by all.