1939 Nebraska Cornhuskers football team The 1939 Nebraska Cornhuskers football team was the representative of the University of Nebraska in the 1939 college football season . The team was coached by Biff Jones and played their home games at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln , Nebraska . Before the season . Coach Jones was under some scrutiny upon the start of his third year at the helm of the program , as it wasn ' t entirely clear if his successful first year in 1937 was a product of his leadership or a remnant of former head coach Dana X . Bible ' s legacy . After suffering a 3 - 5 - 1 campaign in 1938 , the most losses in a single season since 1899 , coach Jones needed to get the program back on its feet . Game notes . Indiana . Indiana scored first and held Nebraska off with the narrow 7 - 0 lead for most of the rest of the game . Finally , as time was running out , the Cornhuskers pulled up to the Hoosier 1 yard line . After two subsequent scoring attempts were turned away , Nebraska executed a reverse around the right and scored with less than 90 seconds remaining to play . Indiana responded valiantly , quickly driving from their own 35 to the Nebraska 10 before a turnover ended their last hope with 35 seconds still on the clock . Indiana thus remained winless against Nebraska in all four of their attempts . Minnesota . Nebraska brought old nemesis Minnesota to Lincoln and attacked the Gophers with a powerful running offense , while the Cornhusker defense put up an outstanding effort to keep Minnesota off the scoreboard all day long . Nebraska threw only a single pass during the contest , and made their lone score using the same play that slipped past Indiana in the previous game . The rare win was savored by the Cornhuskers , but Nebraska had a long way to go if they ever hoped to even up the series , as the Gophers still held a dominating edge of 15 - 4 - 2 over the Cornhuskers . Iowa State . Nebraska opened the 1939 conference slate with a relatively easy win over Iowa State , running out to a 10 - 0 lead by the start of the 4th quarter . The Cyclones did manage a late rally to put up 7 late points , but the Cornhuskers successfully avenged the previous year ' s upsetting loss to Iowa State and padded the series lead over the Cyclones to 28 - 5 - 1 . Baylor . Baylor met Nebraska for the first time in what was presented initially as a marquee matchup of two highly touted lines . The day belonged to Nebraska all the way , however , as the Cornhuskers pulled up to a 6 - 0 lead by the half before breaking away with two more touchdowns in the 3rd quarter on their way to blanking the Bears in Lincoln . Kansas State . Kansas State found the scoreboard first on an early field goal , but a punt returned for a touchdown turned the tide , and two Wildcat fumbles later on handed additional points to the Cornhuskers , who never looked back . It was Nebraska ' s fourth straight win over Kansas State as the series was advanced to 20 - 2 - 2 all time . The game was the second televised college football game of all time , and the first ever televised homecoming game . Missouri . Missouri handed Nebraska its first and only loss of the season in Columbia , easily holding Nebraska off by a two - touchdown margin to hold onto the Missouri - Nebraska Bell . It was the second straight Tiger victory , but Missouri still lagged in the series 8 - 22 - 3 . Kansas . The Cornhuskers wasted no time in finding the scoreboard early on , but wasted two scoring attempts soon afterward to lost fumbles . The game remained fairly evenly matched thereafter , until a late spirited attack by the Jayhawks put a brief minor scare in Nebraska before being warded off . This was the 14th straight game dropped to the Cornhuskers , and the Jayhawks fell to 9 - 34 - 3 against the Cornhuskers in the series . Pittsburgh . The bitter rivalry with Pittsburgh was continued when the Cornhuskers arrived for the game at Pitt Stadium with hopes to end the long streak of Nebraska futility against the Panthers . The Cornhuskers battled to a slim 7 - 6 halftime lead , a margin which would eventually prove enough for the win after both teams each managed a second half touchdown apiece . Nebraska ' s six - game losing streak and twelve - game winless streak against Pittsburgh , both all - time program records to date , were snapped at last . Still , this was only Nebraska ' s second win against Pittsburgh in all 14 attempts , leaving a long way for the Cornhuskers to go to catch up . Oklahoma . Oklahoma , a recent source of frustration to Nebraska after defeating the Cornhuskers in the previous year and drawing up a tie the year before that , once again fell to Nebraska as the Cornhuskers wrapped up the conference slate with just one loss overall , to Big 6 champion Missouri . Though the Sooners scored early , Nebraska promptly answered before the half to take the lead , and no further scores were attained by either team afterwards . Nebraska improved in the series to 13 - 3 - 3 . After the season . Coach Jones redeemed himself in a convincing manner following the disappointing 1938 season . Although Nebraska did not bring home a conference title this year , the Cornhuskers were able to defeat both bitter rivals Minnesota and Pittsburgh in the same season for the first time ever , and wrapped up the season with a defeat of # 14 Oklahoma to move into the rankings themselves in the postseason poll . Coach Jones saw his overall career record at Nebraska bounce back substantially , to 16 - 7 - 4 ( . 667 ) , while his conference total also improved to 9 - 4 - 2 ( . 667 ) . The Cornhuskers now owned an overall record of 286 - 96 - 31 ( . 730 ) and a Big 6 conference record of 96 - 15 - 11 ( . 832 ) .