Head coach Matt Rhule met with the media on Wednesday in Lincoln inside the Hawks Championship Center to discuss Nebraska’s 2025 recruiting class that officially became Husker football players on the first day of the early signing period.

But before Rhule talked about the future of his program, he wanted to clear the air about something in the past: handshakes.

Or more more accurately, the lack of handshakes in Iowa City that Hawkeye players said motivated them.

During the coin toss just before kickoff in last week’s Black Friday rivalry game against Iowa, the Husker captains for the tilt — Elliott Brown, Emmett Johnson, DeShon Singleton and MJ Sherman — refused to shake the hands of Iowa’s captains.

“That’s not what we want to do. That’s not the right way to handle it,” said Rhule, who noted he didn’t know the captains didn’t shake the hands of Iowa’s players until well after the game.

When Nebraska’s players entered Kinnick Stadium for the first time a few hours before kickoff, the players made their way to the 50-yard line for their usual pregame prayer. However, there were armed police officers standing on the 50-yard line, keeping them from doing so.

The Nebraska players and coaches instead kept walking and prayed in one of the end zones.

“I do want to say, we showed up at the game and, really, for 12 years now, we show up to an away game and we always kind of go to the 50-yard line,” Rhule said. “Some guys will say a prayer for safety. Some guys will just break it down. Never really had any problems. We had a problem last year at Colorado for a few minutes. We had a problem this year at USC. But for the most part, we kind of go and do it.”

Rhule believes the presence of police officers had something to do with his players not shaking hands.

“When we came out to walk to the end zone, there were seven armed state troopers standing on the logo. And I think our players felt some type of way about police in pregame,” Rhule said. “They felt that. Wasn’t maybe channeled the right way. We’ve got great guys. We’ve got great leadership. Not the right decision, not what we wanted.”

Rivalry week in college football produced multiple fights between teams, including in the contests between Michigan-Ohio State, Florida-Florida State and North Carolina-North Carolina State, among others.

Knowing what happened in other rivalry games, Rhule was proud of how the Huskers and Hawkeyes handled business.

“I think when you watch that game, credit to both teams, it was between the lines,” Rhule said. “No unsportsmanlike fouls, no trash talking, no taunting. And watching college football, even after the game, I think both teams handled themselves in a way that a lot of people, lot of games, didn’t. So we’ll grow from that. We’ll learn from that.”