On Saturday, The Omaha World-Herald teamed up again with VoterTide to bring you the Social Gridiron, a web project that measures the popularity of tweets and fan photos from Saturday’s Nebraska-Penn State game.
The Huskers won 32-23 on the field with a second half surge to rally from a 20-6 halftime deficit and also won the social media battle, nearly doubling up Penn State fans in tweets. Nebraska fans tweeted 24,586 times compared to 12,921 from Penn State fans.
What game moments brought up some of the biggest spikes in tweets or interesting trend words? Here’s a run down:
>> Zach Zwinak’s 50-yard touchdown run to open the scoring reached 491 tweets, including 290 from PSU fans.
>> The Huskers’ quick start to the second half resulted in three quick spikes on Imani Cross’ two scores and Daimion Stafford’s interception, with the biggest spike coming after the Huskers tied the game at 20. The 2-yard TD run by Cross resulted in 460 tweets, including 392 from NU fans.
>> The biggest joint spike came on the game’s most controversial play, where Penn State’s Matt Lehman fumbled on the goal line. The play was ruled a fumble but some felt it should have been a touchdown. The play resulted in 728 tweets, with 385 of those from PSU fans. Some of the trending words? robbed, fumble, touchdown, wrong.
>> The biggest individual spike for a team came as the Huskers finished off another comeback victory, reaching 477 NU tweets. A few of the top tweets? Former Husker kicker Adi Kunalic said, “It’s not how you start, it’s how you finish!” and New York Times political correspondent Jeff Zeleny said, “We interrupt SEC action to give a ‘Go Big Red’ for Nebraska’s come from behind win over Penn State in Lincoln.”
Check out the Social Gridiron for more top tweets, trending words and fan photos from the game.



