Nebraska...not feeling Frosty anymore

[entropy]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_11g71lpjU"]1110 KFAB Tom Osborne Commercial.mov - YouTube[/ame]

[entropy]

heading to NW this weekend. It has been a few years since I've been in Chicago. Should be a fun weekend.

that said, I don't like this matchup for UNL. NW will run a lot of 3 wr sets to one side and use their athletes against Neb in space, specifically the LB's and safeties. LB's at UNL can't cover very well and the safeties can by motioned or ran out of their responsiblities. On offense, road game, a team with an offense that can score... pressure on UNL to keep up. that will mean TM will press and make some errors. NW also has good ST, which UNL does not.

NW 37
UNL 23

[lineygoblue]

I'm probably in the minority here, but I like watching games at Ryan Field. Its an older style stadium, with a lot of reminders of old time B1G football. To me, the best seating for visiting fans is right at the tunnel where our team comes out. A lot of those seats are within handshake reach of the players and coaches as they come on and off the field. I slapped hands with several Michigan players and coaches the last time I was there. Fred Jackson even stopped and talked with a few of us as he came on the field. Its a fun experience ... especially when you win ...

[iam416]

Ryan Field is great for visiting fans. Passive home fans. 20,000 tickets available (for a 45,000 seat stadium). A trip to Chicago. And almost always a sure win.

I expect UNL to win on Saturday, despite Entropy's negativity.

[THE_WIZARD_]

NW 84 UNL 16

[lineygoblue]

Nah ... I think UNL pulls this one off.

Huskers 23

NW 17

[WM Wolverine]

I expect quite a few more points than that with those defenses; Neb 34, NW 27.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Actaully, Entropy may have it right.

Road game for Pelini. He does not seem to do well either scheming for the opponent or coaching away games.

I think Fitz, who is an excellent coach, and his players will steal this one in a close one.

[Hannibal]

Northwestern is very overrated. They got way too much credit for beating up on an abysmal OOC schedule, and they did it in very unimpressive fashion. They only put up 23, 22, and 21 points against Vandy, BC, and Minnehaha, respectively. A mediocre (at best) Penn State outgained them by 200 yards. Nebraksa wins this one easily, I think.

[Hannibal]

Nebraska easily gets 40 in this one. Northwestern is giving up 381 yards a game to a schedule consisting of:

Boston College
South Dakota State
Vanderbilt
Minnehaha
Penn State
Indiana
Syracuse

For the most part, that is a wretched schedule when it comes to the offenses.

[WM Wolverine]

That's a really horrendous schedule, with teams playing such lousy OOC schedules we just now are figuring out how good these teams are. If we had more teams playing competitive OOC games, we'd have a lot more data on how good team A vs team B is. I'm actually a HUGE fan of rankings systems like Sagarin and others but they just don't have anywhere near enough data after 12 games which consist of about 8 conference games, ~3 cupcakes in OOC, maybe one or two games against BCS competition...

With so little OOC games of significance, it's really difficult to compare Michigan State to Kansas, Stanford to Nebraska, Michigan to Clemson, Wisconsin to Texas, etc... I'm glad there was 'talk' of OOC strength of schedule being a major component of the committee. I don't expect it to be much more than talk but it's a baby step towards OOC games that makes CFB better as a whole.

[Hannibal]

Yeah comparisons are virtually impossible, since there are almost no games in the OOC schedule between two ranked teams anymore.

This is mostly related to home game revenues for the big teams, and not efforts to avoid good competition. If you want to eliminate this problem, you've got to find a way to connect the financial rewards for good TV ratings to the teams that earn them. The way that the system is set up right now, Indiana and Northwestern benefit as much from the TV ratings of Michigan vs Bama as Michigan does. That's why everyone is financially motivated to play home games against shitty teams.

[WM Wolverine]

Good test for M's defense next week, Nebraska is pretty good at throwing the ball and you have to respect Martinez's ability to pull it and get yards on the ground. Tough, night game in Lincoln. Denard should have things easier relative to Sparty...

Expecting a close game decided by what QB makes the least amount of mistakes.

[lineygoblue]

I'm expecting the Huskers best effort of the year.

That was a gritty performance by them today in Evanston. NW can be a tough place to win a ballgame, even though the visiting fans are sometimes in the majority.

Right now, I'd make the Huskers a +3 point favorite.

[Hannibal]

NU-NW was not nearly as close as the score indicates. I'd still make Michigan a slight favorite. I feel like we match up well against Nebraska.