A random "what if?"

[Redux]

Not sure what caused this thought to begin with but I thought I would share.

 

Lets pretend it's 2008 again and Bo Pelini just won his first game against Western Michigan. Midway through the SJSU game Joe Ganz goes down with a season ending injury and Zac Lee is thrust into starting the remainder of the year. Nebraska struggles but posts a 7-5 record on the year. No worry its the honeymoon period and its still better than 5-7 under Cally.

 

Fast forward to 2009. Ganz is granted another year of eligibility. Nebraska never loses in Blacksburg, beats Iowa State Handily, and manages a couple scores in the Big 12 title game to win it and post a 12-1 record. I know Cincy was undefeated and Floridas only loss at that point is against Bama whose a lock. But, what if Nebraska slides into the BCS title game against Bama that year?

 

Behind Ganz and the nasty '09 Blackshirts its possible to think what could have been. Where would we be now?

[ScottyIce]

I like the way you are thinking...

 

What if we won all of our games last year? Just think where Bo would be on the pedestal.

[cg_8]

I seem to always forget how close we were to winning so many of our games. Each loss seems so devastating...

 

I do believe O'Hanlon's blown coverage was the dagger vs. VT.

 

8 turnovers vs. ISU.

 

:01 second vs. Texas.

 

Wow, that's insane when you actually look back and realize how flippin' close we were to that actual scenario even without Ganz.

 

Does the presence of Ganz make the team better? Perhaps. With as close as those games were, it doesn't seem out-of-this-world to think Ganz being more productive could put us over the hump for those 3 close games.

 

Jesus, turnovers... VT, ISU, TTech all had 0 turnovers. We had a combined 12 for those 3 games... Good flippin' lord. I know the turnover thread is going on, but it's hard not to make those associations now. Especially for that ISU game.

[Redux]

All Niles Paul had to do against ISU was NOT fumble the ball before scoring a Touchdown. I mean he was alone for 20 yards and he just fumbled it!

 

yeesh.

[Redux]

I personally think that with Ganz in 2009 we win at least 3 more games. Lee was hurt most the year and he just didnt have the necessary chemistry a lot of the time.

[Redux]

All we had to do against ISU was NOT fumble the ball before scoring a Touchdown. I mean he was alone for 20 yards and he just fumbled it!

[deedsker]

All we had to do against ISU was NOT fumble the ball before scoring a Touchdown. I mean he was alone for 20 yards and he just fumbled it!

A million times, this.

[Count 'Bility]

There were two more fumbles in that Iowa St game. One by McNeill and one by Helu. Both inside the 5. Both were two of the closest, toughest to review, fluke fumbles probably in the history of the game. That was just a case of the football gods speaking, and we just were not gonna win that game that day.

[Hunter94]

Not sure what caused this thought to begin with but I thought I would share.

 

Lets pretend it's 2008 again and Bo Pelini just won his first game against Western Michigan. Midway through the SJSU game Joe Ganz goes down with a season ending injury and Zac Lee is thrust into starting the remainder of the year. Nebraska struggles but posts a 7-5 record on the year. No worry its the honeymoon period and its still better than 5-7 under Cally.

 

Fast forward to 2009. Ganz is granted another year of eligibility. Nebraska never loses in Blacksburg, beats Iowa State Handily, and manages a couple scores in the Big 12 title game to win it and post a 12-1 record. I know Cincy was undefeated and Floridas only loss at that point is against Bama whose a lock. But, what if Nebraska slides into the BCS title game against Bama that year?

 

Behind Ganz and the nasty '09 Blackshirts its possible to think what could have been. Where would we be now?

dude, you must stay up all night dreaming this stuff up..........just sayin'...........WOW!!!!!!!!! everyone, enjoy.

[admo]

Does Zac Lee get hurt? And does Ganz automatically beat him out as starter? If Zac never suffers that secretive injury, he might have done a nice job after all.

 

Either way, we do finish 12-2. 11-3 at the very worst (Tech torched our defense).

[admo]

All we had to do against ISU was NOT fumble the ball before scoring a Touchdown. I mean he was alone for 20 yards and he just fumbled it!

Don't mess the with Universe!

[cg_8]

I know Zac Lee was injured for 2010, but was he for 2009? I don't think he was.

 

Either way, yes, Ganz beats Lee.

 

But yeah, that ISU game was just such a freak thing. It was as if Bo said something bad about the football gods or sorcerers or whomever is in charge of that sort of thing... They watched and said "oh yeah? won't be sayin' that sh*t after you lose by 2 in a total of 16 pt game to Iowa State at home... Man you're a d*ck! I've got it on tape!"

[Redux]

Does Zac Lee get hurt? And does Ganz automatically beat him out as starter? If Zac never suffers that secretive injury, he might have done a nice job after all.

 

Either way, we do finish 12-2. 11-3 at the very worst (Tech torched our defense).

No matter how many different scenarios I have played out in my head for the 2009 season, we never beat Tech in one of them. Just the sheer stupidity of the fumble recovery by Tech for 6. We just looked awful in that game.

 

ISU on the other hand, our defense held them to 9 points at home. Thats WITH 8 turnovers. Giving up 8 turnovers and holding a team to 9 points should be an automatic win but somehow....

[bale]

I seem to always forget how close we were to winning so many of our games. Each loss seems so devastating...

 

I do believe O'Hanlon's blown coverage was the dagger vs. VT.

 

One thing people always overlook on that game is that we actually ended up getting VA Tech into 3rd and goal from the ten (after first and goal from the three) and our D line has their QB dead to rights, 3 guys surrounding him. But they just shuffle around and let him stand there and throw the game winning TD pass. That play was 20x more infuriating to me than the 'blown coverage' by O'Hanlon (I'm pretty sure the corner made a mistake as well).

 

 

Watch around the 3:00 mark to see what I'm talking about.

[NUance]

I seem to always forget how close we were to winning so many of our games. Each loss seems so devastating...

 

I do believe O'Hanlon's blown coverage was the dagger vs. VT.

 

8 turnovers vs. ISU.

 

:01 second vs. Texas.

 

Wow, that's insane when you actually look back and realize how flippin' close we were to that actual scenario even without Ganz.

 

Does the presence of Ganz make the team better? Perhaps. With as close as those games were, it doesn't seem out-of-this-world to think Ganz being more productive could put us over the hump for those 3 close games.

 

Jesus, turnovers... VT, ISU, TTech all had 0 turnovers. We had a combined 12 for those 3 games... Good flippin' lord. I know the turnover thread is going on, but it's hard not to make those associations now. Especially for that ISU game.

 

True enough. But we all know the close losses weren't the problem with Pelini teams. It was the blowout losses. And they got worse the longer he was at NU. 2010 was the only year under Pelini that we didn't suffer a blowout loss. (2009 had only one minor blowout: 21 point loss to Texas Tech). Then for the last four years of Pelini's tenure we could count on at least a couple of blowout losses. The kind of losses that make a fella pull his hair out. Very perplexing.

 

My own personal theory is that Pelini was incapable of making real-time game day adjustments. If the other team threw a curve ball at his defense he could not come up with an answer until he watched the films late Saturday night. Either that or the football Gods just didn't like Bo's pottie mouth. Maybe that was it.