A Touch of Sadness with Alberts? High HonorA Touch of Sadness with Alberts? High Honor
Football

A Touch of Sadness with Alberts? High Honor

Randy York’s N-Sider

Alberts Joins 2015 Hall of Fame Class

Video: Trev Alberts Husker Highlights

For Trev Alberts, Friday was a whirlwind day. Nebraska’s 1993 All-America linebacker was formally announced as the 17th Husker player who will be enshrined in the College Football Hall of Fame next December in New York. Now Vice Chancellor for Athletics at the University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO), Alberts was simultaneously humbled, surprised and ultra-appreciative to become the Huskers’ fifth Hall-of-Fame selection in the last nine years, joining the legendary Mike Rozier (inducted in 2006), Grant Wistrom (2009), Will Shields (2011), and Tommie Frazier (2013).  

Ironically, what should have gone down as one of Alberts’ biggest celebratory days was business as usual on Friday.  Not only did he present UNO’s athletic strategic plan to 200 in a campus-wide forum Friday morning, Alberts also finished his work day Friday night watching the 12th-ranked Mavericks cap a furious third-period rally to overcome a 3-0 deficit and beat 10th-ranked Denver, 5-4, at the CenturyLink Center before 6,478 fans. Nebraska Educational Television broadcasted the event live statewide. NET interviewed Alberts, who is proud to say that hockey, with more than $2 million in annual ticket revenues, and men’s basketball are UNO’s primary revenue generators.

Alberts enjoyed receiving 100+ messages in his email box Friday, plus congratulatory calls from family, friends, former teammates and coaches, including Tom Osborne, who recruited and welcomed the Cedar Falls, Iowa, native, into the same Hall of Fame that honors him. “Trev was one of the greatest pass rushers I’ve ever seen,” Osborne said. “He had a tremendous first step, was explosive off the ball, played with high intensity and was a very intelligent football player.”

Trev’s Most Poignant Moment: Remembering His Mom

With a heavy dose of professional responsibilities mixed with the historic news of college football's pinnacle achievement, I asked Alberts late Friday afternoon what his most poignant moment was during such a special, commemorative day. After a brief pause, Alberts answered my question, coupling a choked-up voice with a celebratory chuckle. “It was a little emotional moment for me, and I wasn’t really ready for it until it happened,” he told me. “I was really happy today, but I was also really, really sad. I lost my mom last year, and that means she won’t be in New York to celebrate this honor with the family next December.”

Sometimes, the sound of silence is best. Alberts enjoys a therapeutic laugh to elevate both of us. “Outside of the coaching staff who recruited and helped me, my mother (above left) probably had as much impact on my success as anybody,” he said. “She was almost obnoxious in her pride. As she walked around Cedar Falls, Iowa, she’d tell everybody that she was my mom. Just thinking about how proud and excited she would be with this honor, I’m just disappointed she won’t be with us to share it. That was the most emotional part of the day for me.”

Fortunately, the introspective moment inspired Alberts to address the campus-wide Friday morning forum, to give his level best at an afternoon press conference and to focus on a late-night hockey celebration. Truly it was a day that Trev Alberts will never forget. When I mention that Friday also shined a light on the UNL and UNO campuses simultaneously, Alberts did not dispute the thought. “I really love the whole state of Nebraska,” he said. “At the end of the day, we’re part of the same university system. We have all kinds of people who received their undergraduate degree at one school and their master’s degree at another (including Kearney). It’s just a fun experience and a reflection of the entire University of Nebraska system.”

At Nebraska, Individual Honors Are Team Honors

Alberts (in white above with son Chase, now 17, and former defensive coordinator Charlie McBride) played on a team that lost the 1993 national championship, 18-16, to Florida State in the 1994 Orange Bowl. “That team played at a high enough level to win a national championship and certainly could have won it,” Osborne said. “I felt bad that Trev wasn’t on one of those national championship teams (’93, ’94 and ’97). He was one of the guys that was instrumental in putting us in position to win national championships.” In Alberts' final regular-season collegiate game, he dislocated his elbow, but returned to play in the Orange Bowl, where three of his six tackles were sacks that resulted in 29 yards of losses. He also had three quarterback hurries and earned defensive MVP honors in that razor-thin loss to FSU.

Being recruited by, playing for and still having Osborne as a mentor covers the bases for Alberts. “I’m the one who gets to go into the Hall of Fame,” Alberts said, "but the reality is there are a lot of players who had similar numbers. When you get in the Hall of Fame, especially when you played in the 1990s at Nebraska, in large part, you are really an expression of the national respect for what our teams did during that time. Eric Crouch will be in the Hall of Fame soon. When you think about Tommie (Frazier, 1993-94) Will (Shields, 1989-92) and Grant (Wistrom, 1994-97), they were all representatives of great teams in Nebraska during those time frames.”

The conclusion is straightforward and sincere. “Even though I’m honored to go into the Hall of Fame, it really isn’t an individual thing. It’s a reflection of the team and all the success that we had,” Alberts told me. “In my case, it was just as much (linebacker) Troy Branch, (linebacker) Mike Anderson and (nose tackle) Terry Connealy as it was mine. We all benefitted from what Coach Osborne put together in strength and conditioning, academics, nutrition, and athletic medicine. I mean, every single area of support that everybody needed was instrumental both individually and team-wise. All of that is a reflection of our state, our football team, our university and everything good about Nebraska. I’m just humbled and honored to be a part of it.”

Alberts: Melton One of Best Recruiters He's Ever Seen

In my conversation with Alberts Friday, he made sure to acknowledge that John Melton (pictured above with Osborne), was the Husker coach who launched his recruitment. “I will never forget the first night Coach Melton rang the door bell and came into our house in bad weather and snow,” Alberts recalled. “He was one of the best recruiters I’ve ever seen. He's a guy who believes everything about the Huskers in his heart and in his soul. I just remember our family almost interrogating John because we could not believe that Nebraska was actually interested in me. In fact, my dad showed a document with my name among the players they were recruiting.

“We wondered if Nebraska had rearranged their rankings on not getting a couple of higher named players that they went after,” Alberts said. “I was equally as surprised that Coach Melton offered me a scholarship that night as I was when I learned I was named into the Hall of Fame, quite frankly,” Alberts said. The new Hall-of-Famer was wondering more about how the UNO hockey team was going to beat Denver Friday night with the Mavericks’ No. 1 goalie on the bench with a concussion. On Thursday, Alberts received a package from the National Football Foundation. It had a football with a painted Hall of Fame logo, plus a message that said congratulations and a request to please respect the process of the official announcement.

Football Arrived at Home; Basketball Coach Shares News

Friday morning, UNO Basketball Coach Derrin Hansen sent Alberts a tweet that included Brett McMurphy’s story that Alberts and Kansas State Coach Bill Snyder would be among those introduced as part of the 2015 College Football Hall of Fame class. The news from ESPN.com confirmed the news and triggered the private responses. Interestingly, Alberts was once a college football analyst on the same network as well as other networks. Injuries forced Alberts to the sidelines in the National Football League as a player, but his intelligence, savvy and work ethic paved the road to another career in athletic administration. Phone calls from Osborne, former Husker defensive coordinator Charlie McBride, former position coach Tony Samuel and All-America teammate Connealy followed. Stunned was the first word Alberts used to describe the experience. "Pretty amazing," he added.

Alberts' former coaches talked about Nebraska’s move to a 4-3 defense. “That really benefitted me,” said Alberts, the 1993 Big Eight Defensive MVP who tied the school's single-season record with 15 sacks for 88 yards in losses. Alberts finished his career with a school record 29.5 sacks, 284 career tackles, a retirement of his No. 34 jersey and the nation’s 1993 Butkus Award, another Nebraska first. Those numbers trump Alberts’ quip that Osborne "must have pulled some strings” to enable Trev’s Hall-of-Fame honor. For the record, Alberts was a first-team  All-American in every major publication or organization. He was the Big Eight Defensive Player of the Year and the Big Eight Male Athlete of the Year and The Football News' National Player of the Year. More importantly by Nebraska standards, Alberts earned the NCAA Top Six Award, the organization's highest overall individual honor. Alberts also earned postgrad scholarships from the National Football Foundation Hall of Fame, NACDA Disney, the NCAA and the Big Eight. A CoSIDA Academic All-American, Alberts graduated before his 1993 senior season.

It was almost uncanny that Alberts and Coach Snyder became a tandem journalistic lead in a joint national announcement from ESPN. “I have a tremendous amount for respect for Coach Snyder,” Alberts said. “He recruited me when he was the offensive coordinator at Iowa under Hayden Fry. To see what he’s done with the program he led is one of the most remarkable things I’ve seen in college football.” Somehow, it seems equally fitting that Alberts and Snyder will be honored in the same Hall-of-Fame class because of the friendship Snyder shares with Osborne, a role model for Alberts, who will be the sixth Husker in history to play for Osborne and qualify for the College Football Hall of Fame. Dave Rimington (inducted in 1997) and Mike Rozier (inducted in 2006) join Wistrom, Shields,  Frazier and Alberts as Hall-of-Famers who played for Osborne while he was Nebraska's head coach. 

Nebraska Players in the College Football Hall of Fame

Nebraska Coaches in the College Football Hall of Fame

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