• Video Below: NU coaches Tim Beck and John Papuchis and players Rex Burkhead and Lavonte David at the Saturday press conference

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ORLANDO, Fla. — The fire that burns for perfection. Where does it come from?

Ron Brown doesn't know. But he's around the flame every day.

It's the never-ending flame inside Rex Burkhead, the unassuming superhero of the Nebraska football team who is obsessed with finding perfection.

He's a record-setting running back who will block, throw a pass, catch a ball and make a tackle. Burkhead has six tackles this season — all when the other team just stole the ball.

He's the student who changed his major this year (to history) and still made Academic All-American.

He's the idol of countless young men and women in Nebraska, including 6-year-old Jack Hoffman, a brain tumor patient from Atkinson, Neb., whom Burkhead has befriended. Jack will attend the Capital One Bowl on Monday, and Rex and his teammates are wearing "Team Jack" bracelets.

King Rex seems to be the perfect young man, on the perfect quest for perfection. Does he have any flaws?

Maybe one. Sometimes he wants it too much.

There are times when Burkhead pushes it so far that the Husker coaches literally have to order him to stop training, stop running, stop doing anything.

"You do when it's time to rest," Brown said. "When it's time to rest, you rest. Today, you're going to get 10 reps today. That's it. You have to be firm with him. You as a coach have to say, no more. I don't want him running anymore today. He's done. No more. Get out of there. And then he'll walk back in there. You say, no more. Get out.

"A lot of people, you have to light their fire. With him, you have to say, put the fire out."

But where does that come from? Burkhead is the inspiration of many. Who inspires him?

He gives credit to God. He gives credit to his parents, Rick and Robyn, who Burkhead said "instilled discipline in me at an early age — they had to work hard at an early age and they made sure I did, too."

But who did King Rex want to be when he grew up?

"That's easy," Burkhead said. "Barry Sanders is my guy. I love Barry Sanders. I just loved the way he handled himself, the way he handed the ball off to the ref. I loved the way he played. He seemed like a good guy all the way around."

Burkhead had just turned 9 when Sanders, the great Detroit Lions running back, stunned the world with his retirement in the summer of 1999. Just a few months earlier, Burkhead and his father had bought tickets to see Sanders play against Burkhead's hometown Dallas Cowboys.

"I was heartbroken when he retired," Burkhead said.

So Rex never got to see Sanders play in person. Never met him, either.

But Burkhead is still trying to emulate Sanders. It's a crazy idea, sure. Sanders made moves that looked like he was making them up as he went along. It was instincts. It was the work of genius.

And yet, earlier this season, Burkhead went to Brown and asked if he had any tapes of Sanders. He wanted to study his moves, his footwork. But how do you copy Einstein or Baryshnikov?

"Some of the moves he made are never to be repeated again," Burkhead said of Sanders. "Some of the moves he makes in small holes, I work on in practice. His footwork, a lot of it is instinctive, but at the same time you can also work on it, too."

You want to tell King Rex he can't be Barry? You just recharged his never-dying battery.

"He's on the edge of his seat all the time," Brown said. "He always wants to get out there.

"It takes courage to train the way Rex does. He does things very few people do. He does a lot of little things, from all the stuff we got to do in the weight room, to the sprints, the punching bags, the tennis balls.

"He doesn't miss a beat, and he pushes himself when he runs, so it's not just all the extra stuff you do, it's the effort you give all the time. He goes above and beyond, and he's conditioned himself to handle that load. You don't just walk out there and carry the ball 38 times a game. That's a high level of conditioning. That's tremendous mental toughness.

"There's not a lot of guys like that."

Burkhead will tell you he knows a couple. His parents. He said they are constantly pushing for perfection. His father, who works for the FBI, played football at Eastern Kentucky. He was a 6-foot-1, 245-pound fullback. He tried to make a couple of NFL rosters but never stuck.

He said his father never pushed him into football. But if he was going to do it, do it right.

"That's something my parents always preached — strive for perfection," Burkhead said. "There's so much to learn from the game, so much else out there. Michael Jordan always said he was working on the little things every day. He always had a goal every day, and that's something I tried to live up to."

Any man who quotes Jordan as a standard knows what it means to have that competitive fire and obsession.

"That's why you like those standards," Brown said. "It's a choice. It's not about athletic ability. It's not about what God did or didn't do. It's a choice.

"Why is Rex Burkhead so quick? He's the quickest I've seen from here to there. And why? Because he trains with quickness. It's a matter of telling your brain something to go from here to there. He conditions and trains his brain to do that. I don't know if he's the fastest guy we've got, but he's the quickest. He trains with quickness."

Burkhead could no doubt relate to another Texan: the late, great Ben Hogan. People used to ask the legendary golfer about his secret. "It's in the dirt," he said. People shook their heads.

It's in the dirt. It's the practice. It's in the work.

Burkhead flourished in the role of workhorse this season. He gained 1,268 yards on 261 carries, playing through a beat-up body put through the Big Ten demolition derby. But he trained for it. Burkhead carries himself like someone in the military, perhaps a Navy Seal. A quiet, humble guy who likes to kick you-know-what.

"You wish everyone was like that," Brown said. "I told him to speak up more. We need to bottle some of that, get it out there and share some of that with everybody."

But some got it, and many don't. How many young men are constantly working out because they're afraid that if they don't, they'll get soft or lose their edge? That's Rex.

"Yeah, a little bit," Burkhead said with a sheepish grin. "You always want to have that mental edge. You earn on Saturday what you put into it during the week."

Burkhead has earned this much: the right to wear No. 20 for his senior year. He didn't ask for it. I am.

Rex said he'd always worn No. 20 — Sanders' number in Detroit — throughout his athletic career, in all sports. When he came to Nebraska, he was under the impression that he couldn't wear it because it was Johnny Rodgers' number. But only two numbers in Nebraska history are retired — Tom Novak's No. 60 and Bob Brown's No. 64.

He thought about No. 21, Sanders' number at Oklahoma State, but Prince Amukamara had dibs. So he chose No. 22, the next best thing.

King Rex getting to wear the number of his idol for his senior year? Now that would be perfect.

Contact the writer:

402-444-1025, tom.shatel@owh.com

twitter.com/tomshatelOWH

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• Video: NU coaches Tim Beck and John Papuchis and players Rex Burkhead and Lavonte David at the Saturday press conference:

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