Conference Big Eight Conference | 1917 record 5–2 (2–0 MVIAA) | |
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Head coach E. J. Stewart (2nd year) | ||
The 1917 Nebraska Cornhuskers football team was the representative of the University of Nebraska in the 1917 college football season. The team was coached by E. J. Stewart and played their home games at Nebraska Field in Lincoln, Nebraska.
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Before the season
Coach Stewart's second Cornhusker team was coming off of a down year that anywhere else would have been considered very successful. The two losses of 1916, although ending the four-season unbeaten streak, still did not prevent Nebraska from notching a seventh consecutive league title. Stewart greatly expanded his roster to 22 players, an increase of almost 30% from the 17 players on the squad in 1916. Coach Stewart set up this year's schedule as an ambitious test, as powerhouses Michigan, Notre Dame and Syracuse all had dates with the Cornhuskers on the slate.
After the season
Coach Stewart ended his second season much like his first, with two bitter nonconference losses but with another conference championship. Nebraska had so far strung together an implausible eight straight conference titles, spanning all of coach Stewart's career as well as the entire career of his predecessor, Ewald O. Stiehm. Coach Stewart's Nebraska career record fell slightly to 11-4-0 (.733), and the two season losses nudged the program's overall record down to 164-51-11 (.750), though the conference record improved to 24-3-2 (.862).
Coach Stewart departed the football program after this year in order to assist in the war effort, as the United States moved closer to involvement in World War I. He would spend time at the YMCA helping young men train in preparation for joining the armed forces, but would eventually return to Nebraska to run the basketball program.