Nebraska gets a Bowl Game, but the Transition Starts Now!

Donte' Williams, New Husker DB Coach

The last time I wrote this blog, Nebraska was gunning for a tenth win in the regular season for the first time since 2001, with an outside shot at possibly playing for a Big Ten title and even still with an outside shot of playing in the Rose Bowl.  And then this giant thud happened in Iowa and the Huskers have went from having a very successful season to a transition that has been a long time coming.

Despite getting blown out by Iowa in a game that was probably less close than the 30 point score would lead you to believe, Nebraska is closing the door on the Bo Pelini era.  Mike Riley has done a good job getting this team to rebound from the previous year’s debacle, but they just weren’t quite ready for prime time this year, at least not without a healthy Tommy Armstrong.

In college football, much like the pro game, a team only goes as far as the quarterback can take them.  If you aren’t Alabama or Ohio State and recruit four star kids at every position, the only shot you have to win a national title is to have a dynamic quarterback.  Nebraska has been fortunate that Tommy Armstrong is the great athlete that he is, otherwise, another six to seven win season would have happened again in Lincoln.  That’s all fine and dandy, but for Mike Riley to win big, he probably is going to have to do it with his type of quarterback and his type of offense.  Unfortunately, Tommy Armstrong wasn’t that player.

Mike Riley has ran his offense with a pass first quarterback in mind, pretty much his entire coaching career.  It’s not that he didn’t want Tommy Armstrong to play well, but the offense that he has in mind isn’t conducive to Tommy playing to his strengths.  Riley wants a quarterback to look at three or four options in the passing game.  Tommy was often limited to making one or two reads and that was it.  Tommy also wasn’t exactly a master of the short passing attack that so often works as a running game in today’s college game.  This severely limited the types of plays that offensive coordinator Danny Langsdorf wants to call.  Clearly a change is needed for these coaches to coach like they want to.

Imagine if Tom Osborne was dropped into Florida when Danny Wuerful was the quarterback.  Do you think that Dr. Tom would have turned Wuerful into an option running, play action passing quarterback?  I’m guessing he would have made it work with the Heisman trophy winner, but I would imagine that Coach Osborne would have followed up in recruiting to get someone that plays the position more in the mold of the offense that he was comfortable with.

I’m not comparing Coach Osborne to Coach Riley, simply because that’s a disservice to both men.  I’m simply saying Riley needs to do what he is comfortable with.  And so Tanner Lee, Patrick O’Brien and Tristian Gebbia are going to be the new normal in Lincoln.  If Nebraska is going to play for conference titles, they will need quarterbacks that can hit open running backs, wide receivers and tight ends at closer to a 70% clip than the last two years and the 55% clip that Nebraska has had.

It will be an interesting change on the plains here in Nebraska.  The good thing is, from all accounts and having been to practice, the new guys coming in are pretty good.  In some cases I would say that the quarterbacks that sat out this year have a skill set that we have never seen in Lincoln.  For the first time since Sam Keller and Joe Ganz battled it out, we will have an actual quarterback battle in the spring and fall camp.  Riley will continue to bring in his players and for the first time next season, Nebraska fans will see the future of their offense.

That may not mean a conference championship next season, but I will promise you that when Nebraska gets behind, loading nine players in the box won’t be the obstacle that it was this season.

Cool T-Shirts!

ON WITH THE REWIND…

Our previous score prediction for Iowa game was Nebraska 21 – Iowa 17.  The actual score was 40-10 and Iowa pretty much kicked the crud right out of Nebraska.  The game itself was disheartening because Nebraska was so limited in their passing game that Iowa was able to load the box and once Nebraska got too far behind, they simply made Tommy try to beat them.  It was a disaster for Nebraska and the score could have been worse than it was.  When Tommy can’t run, it’s basically a surrender flag against a decent defense.  Iowa wanted the game from start to finish and it showed.

Quick Notes:

Nebraska needs more Player leadership.  Iowa came to play and beat the Huskers.  You can’t say that a lot of Huskers came to beat Iowa.  Outside of a few players that play hard every week, it was a snoozefest for a lot of the game.  When Nebraska finally turned up the heat on offense, the defense basically mailed it in.  Not a good look for a team that had a lot left to play for.  Nebraska needs players to step and be leaders.  Performances where Nebraska is that flat require player leadership every bit as much as coaching leadership.  Nebraska needs players to step up and light a fire under the team when they don’t have one.  I just didn’t see it this year out of this squad.

Offensive Line Needs a Boost.  When Nebraska played against Northwestern at the beginning of the season, the offensive line flat whipped the Wildcat defensive line up front.  I expected a lot more of that as the season progressed and yet we got less.  A lot of that had to do with injuries, but recruiting has really left Nebraska helpless.  That should be adjusted next season.  A talented class of redshirts join a group of will be redshirt sophomores that should finally give the Huskers the depth and competition that they need.  Nebraska is probably two more classes away from having the 15-20 players they need to truly rebuild the pipeline.  Next season is a big step forward.  Nebraska also needs more development of the younger guys.  To not have any redshirt freshman able to play this year was a big letdown.

Recruiting, Recruiting, Recruiting.  It can’t be stressed enough, Nebraska needs more athletes and they need to get better in the trenches.  Nebraska for 40 years rolled out athletes on offense and defense that were better than 90% of the teams that they played.  During the last 15 years, it’s felt like the only time that Nebraska has been close to that was the 2009 defense led by highly rated recruits like Ndamukong Suh, Phillip Dillard and Prince Amukamara.  The highest rated offensive lineman in 15 years was Baker Steinkuhler and he played defensive tackle.  

Nebraska needs more Jimmies and Joes to keep up with the best teams in the conference.  Ohio State simply put better athletes at nearly every position than Nebraska.  I’m not saying we have to have 5 star kids at every spot, that’s not going to happen at Nebraska.  What I’m saying is, if you can sprinkle 1 or 2 every year and collect a nucleus of highly recruited offensive and defensive lineman, you can and should start to consistently beat Wisconsin and Iowa, and sometimes upset the Ohio States and Michigans of the world.  Don’t be fooled by the run that Nebraska had under Osborne and Devaney, they recruited highly rated kids from all over the U.S.

Coach Riley has put his focus on recruiting.  He has done it by cutting the fat on the coaching staff replacing coaches with John Parella and Donte' Williams.  Williams is considered one the best recruiters in the entire country.  Nebraska can afford to pay handsomely, it’s imperative that they bring in the best assistant coaches in all of college football.  Coach Riley is doing that.  It should shape up into some of the best classes in recent memory.

Credit needs to be paid.  I think it’s important to keep in mind what this team was able to accomplish this season.  They started out 7-0 for the first time in 15 years.  They were ranked, albeit short lived, in the top ten in the country.  They were an overtime away from playing for the conference championship.  As we saw with Penn State, you never know what can happen when you get there.  This group of seniors had to endure a coaching change that was emotional and sometimes childish for the parties involved.  They came back from a disaster season to get the Huskers back in the nine win column with a chance to win a bowl game and have less than 4 losses for the first time since 2003.  These things need to be celebrated.  

Carriker Chronicles

Score Prediction: Nebraska versus Tennessee

I’m going to hang on to this prediction until closer to game time.  Nebraska will be going into the lion’s den to play the Volunteers, as I would expect the crowd in Nashville to be pretty pro-Tennessee. Never the less, I think Nebraska will come ready to play.  I don’t have a score prediction just yet, but I do know if Tommy Armstrong isn’t healed up by then, it could be a long night.  Let’s just hope that he gets better and the Huskers are ready to finish 2016 on a high note.  As always, GBR!!