HUSKERS RECRUITING HYSTERIA - Dylan Raiola: Let’s Get Excited About a Tweet!!

Since you’re on this page, you might be aware the Huskers are unofficially hosting their most loaded recruiting weekend in years if ever.

When something like this happens, it’s our duty as Nebraska fans to have unreal hope/despair/both, overreact to and misread any and all tea leaves, and happily go utterly batshit.

I, of course, love to both fully engage in such behavior as well as egg it on.

So Friday night, someone caught this going on at the Husker baseball game:

A few observations then a conclusion:

• In case you don’t recognize him by now, the young man on the right leading the GOOO BIIIG REDDD chant is the consensus #1 recruit in the country, Dylan Raiola - Nebraska Cornhusker scion whose father Dominic was a Husker and All-American. There - we’re caught up.
• On Dylan’s immediate right, I believe (just a best guess - I wanted to throw his recruit stats up there) is Carter Nelson from Ainsworth, NE, the consensus #10 TE and #126 recruit overall in the country as well as some other recruits. His offer list includes Georgia, Alabama and Michigan among many, many others.
• They are joined by many other recruits for this game and the weekend, which totals 26 lads, 16 of whom are of the four and five-star variety as ranked by the various recruiting services.

So just what does a fun, harmless Go Big Red chant among top-ranked recruits mean? Well, quite a bit actually! Okay, just a couple things, but take them to the bank - this is science, wishful thinking and witchcraft all rolled into one.

1) Many of these recruits have signed a blood oath to follow Dylan Raiola straight into hell if it comes to that. And that hell just may be a program which is 38-57 since Bo Pelini was relieved of his duties with its last winning season being 2016.

2) With his uncle, Donovan Raiola, coaching the offensive line for NU as well as his father’s history with the program, Dylan is no stranger to Lincoln having visited multiple times and will be back at least for another official visit.

3) At the NU-Minnesota hoops game with his father and younger brother Dayton (a 2026 Nebraska QB offer) looking on, Dylan rolled the bones in response to being spotted by the Husker crowd chanting his name (see picture above).

4) See the tweet above again - he topped things off by leading a by-gawd GOOOO BIIIGGG REDDDDDD chant.

What can we learn from all this?

• No one likes their relatives this much. All these visits means the kid loves Lincoln.
• Rolling the bones is a big deal. It means he appreciates defense and details. Some of our older fans have no idea “rolling the bones” is. Also, 1) Georgia doesn’t have anything as cool as that for their Junkyard Dawgs and 2) Southern Cal doesn’t actually have a defense (see Rose Bowl - 2023).
• If one honors blood oaths, then one teaches his followers the chants of the hell to which he leads them. Dylan understands this and in Husker hell, we chant “GO BIG RED”.

UNDENIABLE CONCLUSION FROM AN 8-SECOND TWEET

Dylan Raiola is going to be a Husker and he’s bringing friends.

(Side note to Dylan - just kidding about the hell stuff. Lincoln is a wonderful and friendly city. Although, in the interest of full disclosure, I have to add it does get a little grosser when Iowa fans come to town - sorry, can’t be helped.)

Joe Rondone/The Republic / USA TODAY NETWORK

Nebraska Cornhuskers