Nebraska...not feeling Frosty anymore

[entropy]

Jeff...some facts...

Nebraska has lost at home to a non ranked team each of the last 5 years

Nebraska has lost at least one home game per year for the last 10 years. The previous 10, Nebraska lost one total.

Nebraska seems to have an unfounded arrogance where the staff focuses on some games and goes through the motions on others.

[Wild Hoss]

Nebraska seems to have an unfounded arrogance where the staff focuses on some games and goes through the motions on others.

...and yet despite it biting them in the ass every single year, they continue to do it. What does that say?

They are mudheads, that's what it says.

Good news is they'll coach their way out of here within another year.

[lineygoblue]

Not to try and grease the rails or anything, but .. who do you guys see that might be available should Pelini be fired/resign?

[entropy]

No idea. UNl doesn't have a coaching tree, so it would have to be an outsider.... And to be accepted, one with Midwest roots.

[Wild Hoss]

Thanks to the debacle that is currently going on in Lawrence under Turner Gill we really have nobody with an inside track. He was the last "Nebraska Guy" left besides Bo who we could realistically hire.

I am hopeful that when the day comes some folks back home step up and force a search committee on Osborne. We need to start making decisions based on reason and observation instead of myth and nepotism.

[WingsFan]

Don't show up and you lose.

This is a perfect example why Boise should not (ever) play in the BCS NC game (what's left of the 'Big Least' probably wont cut it IMO) . . You have to bring it every week in the Big Ten (SEC, Pac 12). The best team (Michigan State) had their hands full with the goofers today.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Eh...so far it feels just like the Big 12.

I think the coaching is better top to bottom in the B1G. That's why Jerry Kill and the Gophers took MSU to the last 2 minutes of play before that game was decided. That's why Indiana hung with osu.

The talent level is up a notch top to bottom as well.

B12 conference bottom dwellers are more likely to suffer blow-outs by whoever is sitting on top at any given moment b/c the coaching and talent differentials top to bottom are more pronounced.

Admittedly that's just a hunch. Can't say I've done an adequate comparison top to bottom to make that statement. Am I right?

[Hannibal]

Welcome to the Big Ten. Northwestern is an infuriating team to play against. They win games like that but they never win a bowl game. They are something like 0-6 since the Gary Barnett era.

[Jeff Buchanan]

...... NU is an example of a well coached B1G football team that gets the most out of their roster and an occasional unexpected conference win because of it.

It's also a perfect example of a good team lacking talent and depth that loses more than it wins when it (a) plays with less emotion or is down on any given Saturday and (b) comes up against another team with better players.

I have a lot of respect for NU and Pat Fitzgerald.

[entropy]

I have a lot of respect for Fitzgerald as well.... Even when he was a player

[entropy]

From the Lincoln journal star...

Nebraska strings together a few nice wins. It gets the fans believing in big things to come -- conference championships and BCS bowls (remember those?).

To be sure, we've witnessed the phenomenon often during the past decade. The Huskers appear poised to take the proverbial "next step" as a program. Ready again for a sustained stay among the elite.

Then they take a colossal step backward. In a flash, their fans' mood swings from upbeat and hopeful to gloom and doom.

Great programs generally avoid wild mood swings.

Ninth-ranked Nebraska looked nothing like a great program Saturday at Memorial Stadium.

Northwestern (4-5, 2-4 Big Ten) in many ways bulled its way to a 28-25 upset, one week after the Huskers outmuscled then-No. 9 Michigan State in Lincoln.

Talk about a mood swing.

"We got beat. It's that plain and simple," Nebraska coach Bo Pelini said flatly. "They outplayed us, they outcoached us. What are you going to say? They won the football game. They deserve it. I give Northwestern a lot of credit. We didn't respond."

Nebraska (7-2, 3-2) entered the day in control of its destiny in the Big Ten's Legends Division plow-horse race. So much for that convenience.

Great programs typically don't win championships by relying on others to lose.

Great programs rise above the fray. Nebraska, with this debacle, shuffles back into the pack of a messy and ordinary-looking Big Ten.

Nebraska had seemed on the verge of a breakthrough season. Now, the Huskers are in a precarious position, with back-to-back road games, starting Saturday at Penn State (8-1, 5-0) and continuing Nov. 19 at Michigan (7-2, 3-2).

A team needs to pack plenty of confidence for road games. Nebraska just took a hit in that department.

After all, Pelini's crew mustered just 122 rushing yards (3.4 per carry) against a Northwestern defense that ranked 95th nationally in run defense. The Husker offensive line, a potent group most of the season, took about three steps backward.

So, Nebraska prepares for a rugged Penn State defense that ranks 24th against the run.

Husker sophomore quarterback Taylor Martinez was excellent throwing the ball against Northwestern. But there's no way NU will win in Happy Valley with a one-dimensional offense.

Nebraska will be hard-pressed to win at either Penn State or Michigan if it allows 207 rushing yards, as it did against Northwestern's salty and intelligent spread attack. The Wildcats deftly worked the Huskers' injury-plagued defensive midsection. Didn't see that coming.

"I don't know, it just leaked," Pelini said of the rush defense.

Granted, Penn State generally has struggled offensively. But the Nittany Lions feature the Big Ten's second-leading rusher in Silas Redd. Joe Paterno's squad wins the old-school way -- with stout defense and a solid ground game. Go figure.

Maybe the Huskers had too much of Penn State in their brains and not enough Northwestern.

"I thought we had a really good week of practice," Martinez said when asked if his team perhaps overlooked the Wildcats.

However, "Maybe some players were overlooking them today, just getting ready for Penn State," Martinez said.

Even great teams overlook an opponent now and then. But they ultimately find a way to win.

Nebraska came up with several ways to lose.

If Rex Burkhead's second-quarter fumble near Northwestern's goal line warned of trouble, then Quincy Enunwa's fumble on the next possession confirmed it.

Leading 7-3 at halftime, Northwestern was the aggressor in the third quarter, starting with a tone-setting 41-yard kickoff return to begin the half.

The Wildcats, even without injured starting quarterback Dan Persa, kept taking advantage of coverage busts. Do-it-all Kain Colter was bobbing his head to rap music on the loudspeakers. A team with a 3-5 record had crashed the party and was taking over the living room.

For Nebraska, there was one final indignity. Northwestern -- remember, this is a spread offense -- ran the ball on every play of its final scoring drive -- a 13-play, 66-yard march. It might as well have been Alabama blowing open holes.

Yeah, Nebraska was tired. But teams often are tired in the fourth quarter, said Husker safety Austin Cassidy. You have to dig deep into your soul and find a way, he said.

"Defenses here in the past have done that," he said.

Especially in the 1990s. Nebraska last won a conference title in 1999. The Huskers last played in a BCS bowl in 2001. They were above the fray -- the vast majority of it, anyway.

Saturday, Nebraska once again looked like just another ordinary team.

[UMStan White]

"A team needs to pack plenty of confidence for road games. Nebraska just took a hit in that department.

After all, Pelini's crew mustered just 122 rushing yards (3.4 per carry) against a Northwestern defense that ranked 95th nationally in run defense. The Husker offensive line, a potent group most of the season, took about three steps backward.

Saturday, Nebraska once again looked like just another ordinary team."


Sounds like us. Listen, I like Nebraska. I think adding Nebraska to the Big Ten was a great idea and only helps to enhance the conference. I thought adding PSU to the conference was a wise move. But I'm sure I speak for most Big Ten fans when I say I don't want Nebraska waltzing into the conference and winning the championship (or even playing for the championship) in its first year.

That said, next Saturday's game is huge for both teams. PSU wins and they have the inside track to the division championship. Nebraska loses and you have no chance to win the division championship regardless of the outcome of our game with you.

[hack]

I friggin hate Nebraska and they can go fuck themselves forever and ever after '97, but yes fully agreed that no newbie should be able to come into the conference and waltz right into the first championship game.

AND - after this I'm officially on the Harbaugh bandwagon if they beat Michigan in Ann Arbor. No excuses, Hoke.

[lineygoblue]

AND - after this I'm officially on the Harbaugh bandwagon if they beat Michigan in Ann Arbor. No excuses, Hoke

I don't think there is any way we'll ever see Harbaugh in Ann Arbor as HC, Hack ...

He's got a 5 year deal with SF, and is off to a good start with them.

And, I don't think Brady is doing such a bad job anyway... ... but that's just me.

[hack]

No, he's not. I shouldn't have said that so strongly. But now that the honeymoon's over, it would be nice to drop the ``he's better than Harbaugh'' craziness. Hoke's a good coach and I think he's going to have success here despite his flaws, which are emerging but will be better known and articulated in a year or two. Harbaugh on the other hand is special. A candidate to be a generational talent as a coach. What he's done and is doing now is simply unreal. If UM ever gets the chance to get him, even if only for a few seasons, they should pay him whatever he wants. The MNC and hopefully well-groomed successor he would provide would bring more money to the university than it would be spending.