1943 record 2–6 (2–3 Big 6) | ||
Head coach Adolph J. Lewandowski (1st year) | ||
The 1943 Nebraska Cornhuskers football team was the representative of the University of Nebraska and member of the Big 6 Conference in the 1943 college football season. The team was coached by Adolph J. Lewandowski and played their home games at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln, Nebraska.
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Before the season
New Nebraska athletic director and head football coach Lewandowski assumed control of a Nebraska program in distress. World War II was dramatically impacting the way of life in the United States, which contributed at least in part to the change in fortunes for the Cornhuskers, although the Nebraska program was fortunate to still have a team on the field at all, as at least twenty major college programs suspended their football programs in 1943 due to the impacts of the war. Coming off the 3–7–0 1942 season, it would not take much to post an improvement if Nebraska could overcome the setbacks dealt over the past two seasons. Former Nebraska all-American star player and assistant coach Ed Weir also returned to the coaching staff this season after five years away, increasing hopes of a Cornhusker rebirth, though overall the coaching staff was reduced by more than half of its personnel from 1942.
After the season
At the end of the previous season, a disappointing 3–7–0 (.350) campaign, it did not seem as if things could get any worse. The Cornhuskers had suffered occasional off years in the past, but now there had been three straight losing seasons suffered by a program that had never even suffered two consecutive losing seasons in the history of the program, with the 1943 final record of 2–6–0 (.250) an even lower mark than before and the second-worst single-season record in Nebraska history. Nebraska's overall football record slipped to 303–116–31 (.708) as the conference record fell to 109–22–11 (.806). The Nebraska Cornhuskers football team was entering a dark time.