The sun dropped at last behind the west stands, and a splendid late-summer evening settled over the football field where Millard North played Millard West in the season opener.

The game proved up for grabs until the final play, a Millard North goal-line stand for the win. Where Millard North linebacker and tight end Pierce Mooberry will attend college, however, was settled months ago.

His father, Brandon, earned Husker football letters in 1999 and 2000, and Pierce has committed to play for the Huskers next year.

“It’s who I’ve always grown up watching,” the son said. 'Nebraska felt like home when I went there every time.'

Mooberry is one of many sons of Huskers who have pledged to play at their dads’ alma mater in Lincoln or already are playing there. Jackson Carpenter, a senior receiver and safety at Lincoln Southwest, also has committed to play for the Huskers next year. His father, Tim, played tight end for Nebraska in the mid-1990s.

When a son chooses the program his father played for – and his father gives his blessing to the decision – it’s a good sign the program is on an encouraging trajectory. Right now at least 14 sons, many of whom committed to the program after coach Matt Rhule and his staff arrived, play for the Huskers. Even those who committed under previous coach Scott Frost have shown their loyalty to Rhule by sticking with his program.

Tom Osborne, Nebraska’s head coach from 1973 through 1997, won three national championships and saw some sons follow fathers onto the team over that duration. “Yeah, we did have quite a few,” Osborne said.

He said Nebraska under Rhule also hasn’t seen many players leave for other schools through the transfer portal, another indication of progress. “And I think Matt has really good people skills,” the coach said. “I like what he’s doing.” Osborne said he appreciated the fact that Rhule shows interest in recruiting in-state players.

While Mooberry’s team secured its season opener 29-21 on the last play, Jackson Carpenter’s Lincoln Southwest team dropped its opener 7-6 in late August on a fourth-quarter touchdown by Lincoln North Star.

Both Tim Carpenter and Brandon Mooberry said they tried to leave the college choice to their sons. They naturally played a role in their sons’ love of the game, having been Huskers during some of the best years of the legendary Nebraska program.

Both also coached their sons in junior football. One of Pierce Mooberry’s teammates at Millard North, running back and defensive back Caden VerMaas, has played with Pierce for about 10 years, some of those on kids’ teams coached by Pierce’s father. VerMaas also has committed to Nebraska.

Pierce Mooberry and Jackson Carpenter have similar tall, lean frames. Jackson is 6-foot-2 and 195 pounds; Pierce is 6-4, 205. Their fathers saw more work in football’s trenches and had more bulk.

A small Husker monument sits in the Carpenters’ front yard in a quiet, tree-laden southwest Lincoln neighborhood. A Lincoln Southwest sign is on the front door – “LSW.” The Carpenters have one other child, a daughter who is a senior at Nebraska. Jackson’s mother, Amy, is a homemaker, and the family is additionally watched over by two goldendoodles.

Jackson Carpenter said he was too young to have been recruited by Frost and his staff. But Pierce Mooberry’s father said he wasn’t delighted with Frost and his staff’s recruiting when it came to his son.

“It was always kind of cold,” Brandon Mooberry said. “You just felt like a number.” Mooberry, a physician assistant at OrthoNebraska in the Omaha area, said he didn’t sense that Frost and his staff had a “high touch, intimate” interest in his son.

The elder Mooberry spent two of his years at Nebraska on Husker teams quarterbacked by Frost. “There’s nobody I wanted to succeed more,” he said of Frost, who was fired as the Huskers’ coach in 2022 after compiling a 16-31 record. Nebraska then hired Rhule as head coach beginning with the 2023 season. Rhule went 5-7 last year.

The elder Carpenter, the CEO of Timpte Inc. in Lincoln, said he has learned it’s more productive to look ahead. “I’m a believer the windshield is bigger than the rearview for a reason,” he said. Timpte produces primarily agriculture-related trailers.

But in his rearview mirror is the fact that Carpenter lettered four years as a blocking tight end for the Huskers from 1994 through 1997, the period in which Osborne won his three national titles. What Carpenter witnessed and learned from Osborne and assistant coaches like Ron Brown are what he wants for Jackson.

Before his son pledged to go to Nebraska, Tim Carpenter talked it over with Brown, who was his receivers coach in the 1990s and who serves as director of player support and outreach under Rhule, as well as recently adding the title of fullbacks and returners coach. Carpenter said he has great respect for Brown.

“I asked him a very specific question – ‘Is this thing on the right path and is it going to give my son what it gave me?’ And when he says, ‘Yes,’ then, yeah, I’m going to have a little bit of a personal interest,” Carpenter said.

Jackson Carpenter said he was excited to play for Rhule and his staff. “They’re all great people,” he said. “They’re smart. They work hard. They know what they’re doing.”

The fact that his dad played at NU “was obviously a factor, but like I said, I didn’t want to go there just because of that. I wanted to make sure it was the right fit for me,” Carpenter said.

The Mooberrys had close to 10 family members and friends sitting with them in the stands for Millard North’s season opener. Brandon Mooberry was clearly focused on the game (“Good job, D!” he bellowed to the Mustang defense), but he said his wife, Janette, is more intense.

Janette, who is in real estate, was at the other end of the Mooberry clan with the eye of an eagle on the game. The Mooberrys have a married son in Omaha and a daughter who is a sophomore on the track team at Nebraska Wesleyan University.

Pierce Mooberry said the new coaching staff at Nebraska made it clear they wanted him in Lincoln. “I could just tell they were interested in me,” Mooberry said. “They just felt like family to me and treated me like family.”

Both fathers compared the Rhule regime to Osborne’s. Tim Carpenter said Rhule emphasizes the “we” of the team and not the “I.” Knowing your role is important to Rhule, Carpenter said, and so is the stability of the coaching staff that was a hallmark of Osborne’s career. Rhule’s work habits and competitive drive are familiar, Carpenter said.

“These guys are doing a lot of the right things,” Carpenter said, “and I think it’s as close as I can think of based on all the college teams and coaches that we met with that will give him the experience that I got in college. And that’s saying something.”

Tim Carpenter, who attended high school in Columbus, said his role on the Nebraska team was to block and not to catch passes, even though he was a tight end. At one point he got up to 280 pounds and clearly was there to knock defensive linemen and linebackers backward. He caught only two passes in his time at Nebraska, he said, but he played a lot and started for two seasons. He loved his role.

“I had the blessing for five years to be around coach Osborne and his entire coaching staff, and they taught us more about life than football, and how those two things are in relation,” Carpenter said.

Brandon Mooberry walked on at Nebraska after a strong football career at Lexington High School. He said his Husker career long ago didn’t go as he had hoped it would.

The 6-5 defensive end, who got up to 270 pounds with the Huskers, never had the impact he wanted to have. He played behind star defensive ends such as Grant Wistrom, Mike Rucker, Kyle Vanden Bosch and Kelsay brothers Chris and Chad, all of whom later played in the NFL. They made it hard for Mooberry to ascend the depth chart.

Brandon Mooberry said when he was a Husker, Osborne and his staff made it clear to backups that they were important. “And I was able to be part of some really great things,” he said.

Mooberry said Rhule is comparable to Osborne in his passion, sincerity and personal contact. “I see a lot of similarities,” he said. “Getting to know them more and more, it’s only solidified my mind that he’s (Pierce) in a great place with guys that I’m super-excited about leading him.”

Millard North head coach Allen Burrell Jr. described Pierce Mooberry as a good student, an example for others and a smart, talented athlete. He’s a physical outside linebacker and tight end, the coach said. “I look forward to the things he will achieve in the future,” Burrell said through an email message.

Lincoln Southwest head coach Grant Traynowicz said Jackson Carpenter is an excellent leaper with reliable hands. He blocks well, runs crisp routes and also plays safety on likely pass plays and against throwing teams. Carpenter is a humble leader of the team, Traynowicz said.

In their final year of high school, Carpenter and Mooberry are proven players and among the best on their teams. They have been through battles with their teammates and coaches and know what’s expected of them.

They will start all over as Huskers next year, and so will the task of proving themselves – just as their fathers did all those years ago.