Well football friends, despite the promise and hype of a new season, we have the same Husker football team... or possibly an even worse one. The Huskers opened up the 2021 campaign with a disturbingly familiar looking performance in a loss to Illinois. This post will break down my thoughts and analysis of the game. For new readers, I like to break this post into three sections: GOOD, EXPECTED and BAD. So, without further ado, let's take a look at Nebraska versus Illinois.
The Huskers had a tremendous amount of both hype and hope behind them as they traveled to Champaign, IL for the season opener against conference foe Illinois, and some of us around the Cornhusker state probably sipped a little too much Kool-Aid. I will defend myself a bit though, as I was very weary of this team and did not have very high hopes on the season as a whole. But surely a team with a 4-year starter at QB, a now fairly established head coach and a variety of new talent could open the season with a performance that turns some heads. Especially when looking for revenge from last year and facing an Illini squad with a new coaching staff. However, those hopes were cut short quite quickly, especially after watching a veteran, team captain, attempt to field a punt from the two yard line, backup into his own endzone and then attempt to throw the ball out of the endzone while being tackled. That play really summed up a majority of the game for me, and the biggest takeaway is this team still has no clue what they're supposed to be doing on the field. Let's break this down a little bit more.
GOOD: There wasn't too much good to talk about in this game, but I want to give a big shout-out to the pass rush of the Blackshirts and Oliver Martin, the Junior WR. Starting with Martin, he was arguably the only bright spot on offense apart from Martinez's 75 yard TD run late in the third. The walk-on transfer racked up 103 yards on 6 catches and looks to be one of the favorite targets in this offense. I'm excited to see how he develops this season. Another development I'm excited for is the pass rush. I don't think Nebraska's had a decent pass rush since Randy Gregory was here in Lincoln, but what I saw up front from the D-line on Saturday really impressed me. The Blackshirts racked up 3 sacks and 9 tackles for loss. To put that in perspective, the Huskers have averaged 2 sacks per game during the Scott Frost years and only had 13 total last season. If the defense can keep pressure on opposing QBs, this could be a very fun unit to watch. The run defense was good as well, giving up just 167 on the ground compared to 285 last year versus the Illini. This unit is easily the strength of this team, and watching them dominate the line of scrimmage was very exciting. We haven't had a strong pass rush in a while!
EXPECTED: In all honesty, I fully expected this team to have some chemistry issues and look like they didn't know what to do for good chunks of the game. I was sad to see it was much more than the chunks I had imagined, but it has become very clear that Scott Frost does not know what to do as head coach with these players. They are consistently unprepared for their games and that was made even more clear when Frost said half of their game plan went out the window when the Illini lined up in a different defense than expected. This team has hit a bar lower than low in my opinion, and all the fingers need to be pointed at the man in charge. He has not developed the players on this team, he has not built the culture he promised and most importantly, he has not taken actionable steps to show this team is moving in the right direction. When Frost started his tenure at Nebraska, he wanted to run a fast-paced offense that pushed the tempo to keep the opposing defense off balance. Over his 3 seasons and now into his 4th, the number of plays per game have gone down, the total yardage and points per game by the offense have gone down, and last but not least, the turnovers are still a major issue. Scott Frost has a lot to fix if this team is going to show any signs of improvement.
BAD: My usual BAD category for Husker game reflections is the special teams, and there's no exception today. It was almost unbelievable watching each and every special teams unit screw up in so many ways each time they took the field. The easiest place to start is with Cam Taylor-Britt's horrendous attempt to field a punt at the two, run back into the endzone and attempt to throw the ball away when he realized he was about to get drilled, thus leading to a safety for the Illini. In addition to CTB just being flat out stupid, there's plenty of other blame to go around like how absolutely no other Husker player on the field attempted to block. Then we have the issue of the new punter hitting not one, but two punts under 30 yards. Then, the cherry on top was the All-BIG 10 Kicker (the only all-conference player in the Scott Frost era for the Huskers) mis two PATs. This special teams unit is easily one of the worst in all of football, and I say that with the 6th and 7th graders that I coach in mind. Clearly the analysts have not done their job and someone should really start focusing on coaching this area of the team. In addition to the tragedy that was special teams, we have the Husker offense, another kind of tragedy all on their own. There are so many places to start with this one, but my favorite is the center. Cam Jurgens is in his 3rd year at the position and still cannot snap the ball cleanly. The other linemen can't block, so there's a massive pass rush bearing down on a QB who doesn't move his feet when throwing the ball and regularly misses his receivers. The running backs have little room to operate, but even if they did, I doubt they could run North and South on the field if they had a compass. They don't hit the holes well when they are developed and key blocks are missed to spring them. Again, I acknowledge there are a lot of new faces and chemistry must be made, but execution on basic football functions is crucial for teams to have success. The Huskers still cannot run any sort of two minute drill and players are constantly missing blocks and/or out of place on the field. The talented backs and receivers who have been the talk of the town throughout all of fall camp rarely saw the ball due to an inability to get open and create space combined with Martinez's lack of ability to throw. This unit needs to figure things out quick because they are completely lost.
I really did have a bad pit in my stomach about this game. A conference game on the road for your season opener is never a good match in my mind, and Brett Beilma has plenty of experience with beating Nebraska. The Huskers still aren't ready for their games, especially those against conference opponents who are ready to hit them in the mouth. The O-Line needs to block significantly better if this team has a chance at winning and the playmakers need the ball in their hands. Most importantly, the head coach needs to be prepared for different scenarios and actively adjust his game plan to counter and respond to what the opposing team is doing. Hopefully the Huskers can start piecing some of those things together before it is too late. Time to make something happen Frost.
Quick Hit Notes from around College Football:
- UCLA looks to be the dark horse I predicted them to be. The Bruins dominated Hawai'i 44-10 in their season opener, and with the talent on that roster, they could really make a run in the Pac-12. Keep an eye on this team throughout the season, they have a lot of offense.
#CFBKnowItAll
Alex Fernando
