During a team meeting in the fall of 2012, Burkhead asked Coach Pelini if Jack could suit up for the spring game. The idea was simple: Let Jack experience one carry, just for fun. No one could have predicted what happened next. April 6, 2013. Memorial Stadium, Lincoln, Nebraska. More than 60,000 fans had shown up for the annual Red-White scrimmage. But this year, the crowd was different. Word had spread about Jack. Many in attendance wore grey "Team Jack" t-shirts.
With 1:24 remaining in the second quarter, Coach Pelini called a timeout. He walked onto the field, took the microphone, and announced: "We’re gonna put Jack in the game." During a team meeting in the fall of
So the next time you see a kid wearing a worn-out No. 22 jersey at a football game, remember: that’s not just a number. That’s Jack. April 6, 2013
Nebraska’s spring game attendance has since declined, and the program has struggled to recapture its 1990s glory. But the "Team Jack" moment remains untarnished. It is the Huskers’ most significant win of the 21st century—not a trophy, but an act of grace. As of this writing, Jack Hoffman is 19 years old. He has outlived his initial prognosis by more than a decade. He lives in Atkinson, Nebraska, with his family. He attends special education classes, loves playing video games (especially "Mario Kart"), and still watches every Huskers game on TV. He rarely gives interviews because his speech has been affected by the tumors and treatments, but when he does, he always says the same thing: "Go Big Red." But this year, the crowd was different
But Jack kept fighting. And the football program never forgot him. In 2014, new head coach Mike Riley invited Jack back as an honorary captain. In 2017, Scott Frost—the former Nebraska quarterback who had watched the spring game run from afar—named Jack an "honorary Husker for life."
By 2015, the foundation had expanded nationwide. They began funding clinical trials for new immunotherapies, hoping to find treatments that were less toxic to developing brains than traditional chemotherapy and radiation. Jack’s journey was never linear. He underwent multiple brain surgeries, including a second major resection in 2014. He suffered from seizures, hormone deficiencies, and cognitive delays caused by radiation. There were dark periods when doctors offered little hope.
The diagnosis was devastating: , an aggressive and malignant brain tumor. The average survival rate for adults with GBM is 12-15 months; for children, the prognosis is often equally grim. Jack underwent emergency brain surgery to remove as much of the tumor as possible, followed by months of radiation and chemotherapy.