Dave Feit’s Greatest Huskers by the Numbers: 82 – Steve Manstedt

Late-blooming walk-ons, the myth of County Scholarships, and Nebraska’s “All-Name” team.

Counting down the greatest Nebraska football players by jersey number. / HuskerMax

Dave Feit is counting down the days until the start of the 2025 season by naming the best Husker to wear each uniform number, as well as one of his personal favorites at that number.  For more information about the series, click here.  To see more entries, click here. 


Greatest Husker to wear 82: Steve Manstedt, Defensive End, 1971 – 1973

Honorable Mention: Dennis Emanuel, Don Purcell, Dennis Richnafsky

Also worn by: Sean Applegate, Chip Bahe, Chancellor Brewington, Wes Cammack, Steve Davies, Colton Feist, Phil Harvey, Ryan Held, Alonzo Moore, T.J. O’Leary, Phil Peetz, Kurt Rafdal, Tyler Wullenwaber

Dave’s Fave: Chancellor Brewington, Tight End, 2021 – 2022


“Nebraska natives don’t walk on to Lincoln. They crawl there.” – Jim Nantz, CBS Sports

With that in mind, let’s talk about two more facets of the fabled Nebraska walk-on program: Nebraska natives and so-called “late bloomers.”

Seemingly every year, Bob Devaney or Tom Osborne would find some unknown upperclassman from a small Nebraska town who had been toiling away in anonymity on the scout team. They’d put him on the field and watch that player blossom into a star or solid contributor. Opposing coaches HATED it. Graduations or injuries would leave holes in their rosters too, but they couldn’t promote a player up from their in-house farm team. That jealousy is what spawned the myth of the so-called “County Scholarship” player.*

*The “County Scholarships” allegation – which usually started as whispers from a team that Osborne had pounded into submission – was that the University of Nebraska offered a state-funded, non-athletic scholarship to be awarded to a deserving local boy or girl in each of Nebraska’s 93 counties. And – gosh darn it, what are the odds? – most of those county scholarships just happened to go to strapping young men who “walked on” to the football team. Once there, they laid in waiting for multiple years for the opportunity to record five tackles against Oklahoma State.  

There was just one problem: The admissions office at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln has never offered such a program. And let’s be honest: If county scholarships were real, one of two things would have happened:  

1. The other Big Eight schools would have had the NCAA investigate (back when the NCAA actually had the ability to investigate and enforce punishments) and shut it down.
2. Every other team – looking at you, Texas, Alabama, Penn State and others – would have done the exact same thing.

The reality was Osborne’s massive walk-on program, combined with the way his teams practiced (which we’ll get to later), and the Boyd Epley strength and conditioning machine (we’ll definitely talk a lot about this too), was the perfect incubator for developing players who would eventually contribute, start, and/or star.

Because let’s face it – not every college freshman who showed up on the football team’s doorstep was ready to play right away. There is a definite jump in speed and talent between high school football in Nebraska’s Class C (or an eight-man team) and a top-10 team regularly in the hunt for conference and national championships. Young men – even without a workout plan designed by Boyd Epley – go through a lot of physical maturation between their 18th and 21st birthdays. Most go through mental maturation as well. But it takes time and patience.

Sometimes, change was needed too. There are countless examples of players – both walk-ons and scholarship recruits – who changed positions before making it onto the field. Don’t think of it as a “trial and error” thing. Sometimes talented players got caught in a position-group logjam. Or a defensive coach might see an offensive player working on the scout team and realize he would be a good fit on the other side of the ball.

To Osborne, successful in-state walk-ons weren’t “diamonds in the rough.” T.O. never cared for that expression, especially when applied to his players. At the end of his coaching career he said, “I think we did a better job of developing people than most anybody around the country. And it was very meaningful.”

Back in 1984, Sports Illustrated wrote an article about walk-ons in college football. Not surprisingly, Nebraska’s program was a big focus of that story. This line is so accurate: “By Osborne’s reckoning, 90% to 95% of Husker walk-ons are home-state products who simply wanted to play for Nebraska from the time they made their first crab block in bootees.”

Osborne – a former walk-on himself – humbly acknowledged what he and Devaney built. “I guess we’re sort of the Mecca of walk-ons.”

It’s obvious to see how this system benefitted Nebraska. But what about the players? Why did they stick around, getting beat up daily in practice, for multiple years before seeing the field? I think it was a combination of many things:

• Especially in the Devaney and Osborne eras, Nebraska kids truly wanted to play for Nebraska.
• Being the only Division I program in the state obviously helped. The football program at the University of Nebraska – Omaha (UNO) was a Division II power that sent multiple players to the NFL, but many players chose to walk on at NU instead. For many, being able to say “I played for Nebraska” was better than being a starter at a smaller, in-state school.
• Transferring was harder back then. There was no portal, and players would lose a year of eligibility. Most would stick it out.
• Osborne (and most of the coaches who followed him) have always held back a handful of scholarships to be awarded to walk-ons who have earned them. A cynic might call that a carrot being dangled, but I see it more as a tangible way to show that hard work would be recognized and rewarded.

Steve Manstedt (82) joins other Huskers in tackling a Kansas Jayhawk in 1973. / Nebraska Football Media Guide

All of this gets us to our honoree today: Steve Manstedt,* a walk-on defensive end from Wahoo, Nebraska.

*Just so we’re all on the same page, I’m not stating – or even implying – that Steve Manstedt was a late bloomer or developmental project.  

I’ll also note that I’ve been using “late bloomer” and “developmental” somewhat interchangeably in this chapter. Without going down a semantics rabbit hole, I’ll freely acknowledge there is a difference between those types of players. For the most part, I think it’s fair to place guys who didn’t start – or play much – until their upperclassmen years into one of these categories, although it’s clearly not a one size fits all situation.

As for Manstedt, his Nebraska career occurred before I was born. But I’m of the opinion that anybody good enough to make any type of “greatest” list at a school like Nebraska was not a developmental project. Being a three-year letterman tells me that he wasn’t a late bloomer either. Heck, even the timeline isn’t that great. His senior year was Osborne’s first season.

But part of what I’m hoping to do in this series is discuss the various factors that made Nebraska such a dominating program for such a long period of time. Getting scholarship player level contributions from walk-ons who had paid their dues on the scout teams was a vital cog in the Big Red machine. Manstedt’s entry is arguably the closest fit, even if it admittedly a square peg / round hole situation. I certainly mean no offense, nor slight to his legacy.

Originally a walk-on, Manstedt became a three-year letterwinner. In his career, he logged 145 career tackles, including 17 for loss, playing on some of the great Monte Kiffin Blackshirt defenses. A backup to John Adkins on the 1971 team, he started as a junior in 1972 and received second-team All-Big Eight recognition with 61 tackles and two interceptions.

In his senior season (1973), Manstedt earned first-team All-Big Eight recognition.

Steve Manstedt / Nebraska Athletics

In his final game, the 1974 Cotton Bowl against Texas, he caught a fumble in midair and ran it 65 yards to set up a score.

In 2012, Manstedt was inducted into the Nebraska Football Hall of Fame.

His career remains a shining beacon for every walk-on to follow in his footsteps.

***

Chancellor Brewington runs with the ball against Illinois in 2022. / Nebraska Athletics

Chancellor Brewington is a personal favorite for three reasons.

1. He was a viciously effective blocker.
2. He knew his role and executed it to perfection.
3. He’s a starter on the Nebraska All-Time Greatest Names Team.

The selection criteria for the Greatest Names Team is simple:

• Played for Nebraska (or at least, appeared on a roster)
• Have a great, unique, and/or amusing name.

Without any further ado – and with no disrespect intended – here are your greatest named Huskers of all time:

Offense
QB: Monte Christo (1994 – 1998)
RB: I.M. Hipp (1976 – 1979)
FB: Edsel Wibbels (1938)
WR: Decoldest Crawford (2022)
WR: Otis Whipple (1893 – 1896)
TE: Chancellor Brewington (2021 – 2022)
T: Ritchie Incognito (2002 – 2003)
G: Tanner Famer (2014 – 2018)
C: Barney Cotton (1976 – 1978)
G: Cornealius Fuamatu-Thomas (2004 – 2005)
T: Chongo Kondolo (2013 – 2015)

Honorary Captain: I.M. Hipp

Defense
DE: Joe Spitzenberger (1989 – 1990)
DE: Pheldarius Payne (2020 – 2021)
MG/NT: Oudious Lee (1976 – 1979)
DL: Freedom Akinmoladun (2014 – 2018)
DL: Ndamukong Suh (2005 – 2009)
LB: Octavius McFarlin (1994 – 1997)
LB: Chief Borders (2023 – 2024)
LB: Princewill Umanmielen (2023 – 2024)
CB: Wonderful Terrific Monds, Jr. (1973 – 1975)
CB: Syncere Safeeullah (2023)
S: Major Culbert (2006 – 2008)
S: Keyuo Craver (1998 – 2001)

Honorary Captain: Wonder Monds

Special Teams
P: Isaac Armstrong (2016 – 2019)
K: Barrett Pickering (2018 – 2019)
LS: Will DePooter (2023)
Returns: De’Mornay Pierson-El (2014 – 2017)

As somebody with a slightly sophomoric sense of humor, there’s also a PG-13 version of the All-Name team (featuring I-Back Randy Butts, among others), but that’s going to remain hidden in my notes.

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