tschu
Banned
So here are some thoughts.
There are some small reasons why this is a big game - let's start with those.
Coaching
I think many people would agree that UCLA was Beck's worst playcalling game of the year last year. A series of bizarre decisions left the offense sputtering when we needed it most in the 3rd and 4th quarters. I'm sure Beck wants that game back, and I'm sure Taylor wants the mistakes back. Well now they both have the chance.
On the other side of the ball...boy. I think we all have "653" burned into our brains from last year. Spread out the offense, then get a lot of big and tall bodies moving vertically. They exploited our lack of athleticism in a huge way. They embarrassed our head coach. Bo hasn't forgotten this, he's had a year to prepare for their offense, and we have more speed and athleticism on the field this year. This is going to be trial by fire for a lot of guys and is going to put Bo's coaching ability to the test.
Players
The game is huge for our offense because, in my opinion, they haven't really been trying yet. We have yet to unleash our 2013 scoring explosion. Everything that I've seen from Beck seems very standard and vanilla, designed to not give anything away while still being solid. He seems to be protecting Taylor and Ameer as much as possible in the first two cupcake games - as well he should. But I think we're going to see the stops pulled out on Saturday. It could be glorious. It might have to be glorious. because on the other side of the ball...
We might be starting two true freshmen at linebacker in a huge game against a ranked opponent who put up 653 yards on us last year. How scary is that. The defense can gain a ton of confidence or lose a ton of confidence here. Individual players may gain or lose confidence.
But here's the meat of the argument.
Here's where we are as a program right now - and it's not really pretty. Last season we we took a shot fairly early against this very same foe. However, we were never really gone from the spotlight - a couple of weeks later we had a big home game with Wisconsin and then, of course, the trip to Columbus. Big primetime games.
Which brings me to my next point. What are the last four times that Nebraska has been seen in a marquee game in front of a big national audience?
-@ Ohio State
-Michigan
-Wisconsin (B1GCCG)
-Georgia
And what do these games have in common? Well, we allowed 570+ yards in 3 of them, lost two ugly blowouts where the game completely got out of control, and against Michigan struggled to a win that may have seemed illegitimate to many due to the fact that Denard was knocked out fairly early. We are not sitting pretty night now on the national scene - something that I argued vehemently in the infamous "relevancy" thread. The last few times that we have been seen on a national stage have been downright embarrassing for the most part, dating back 2 years even.
Now, we know what the goal is for this program - to be consistently finishing in the top-10, competing for and winning conference championships, and if we get into the national title picture then that's great. I think we can agree that's a realistic goal. But at this point, I'm not even sure that a conference championship is so much a final goal as it is a means to accomplish the greater and more general goal that we have for this program. What we really want as a fanbase is to get back in the national picture and garner national respect. Which, combined with our schedule and Saturday's schedule, is why this game is HUGE.
Speaking about national picture in terms of Saturday only: We are the only game worth mentioning until Alabama and Texas A&M kick off at 2:30. This means a couple of things:
1. More people than usual are going to be paying attention to college football Saturday because the biggest game of the year (Bama-aTm) is that day.
2. We are the only noteworthy game happening between Gameday finishing and the opening kickoff in College Station.
The eyes of the nation will be upon us.
Now the ultimate reason this game is huge isn't because this would be some giant signature win (it's 16th ranked UCLA. Come on). It's because the doors opened by winning are significant and because the consequences for losing are so ridiculously enormous. The outcome gap between a win and a loss is very large.
A win: Great! A big blue-chip program won a home game over a ranked opponent in which they were 5.5-point favorites. In itself, nothing truly special. But it will be with the nation watching. We will almost certainly be winning our next 4 games, slowly climbing in the rankings until we are ranked ~9th for a home game with Northwestern. Beat Northwestern and we are an undefeated top-10 team traveling to Ann Arbor to challenge Michigan for the Legends division title. Doesn't that sound exciting? We could be looking forward to something like a #4 vs #7 matchup of undefeateds on November 9th.
A loss: Bo does it again. Gets out-schemed and embarrassed at home in a winnable game. Nebraska falls out of the rankings, at the very least, until November. We are nowhere on the national scene. We have no Wisconsin and Ohio State games coming up. We have far less national media run, less clout with recruits, and we're stuck biding our time playing the likes of Illinois and Purdue on the Big Ten Network - out of sight and out of mind. We can't afford to be that far out of the national spotlight for another entire season, especially one that we've had circled on our calendars for the last 3 years. There's also the reality check that losing to UCLA at home means that the team we are fielding this year probably isn't good enough to beat both Northwestern and Michigan and get back to Indy. Could we get back to Indy? Sure, but the odds are not in our favor. It took a crazy string of luck for that to happen last year, and Michigan and Northwestern both have better teams this time around. There will be no backing into the conference championship game. We would start seeing questions about Bo as our coach for the future, a general air of uncertainty about the program, and beating cupcakes for 5 weeks would do nothing to calm the storm.
I can't honestly remember a game like this. Feels like the fanbase is less pumped up and more holding their breath.
A win catapults a young team into the spotlight.
A loss - well, here we go again.
But enough with the gloom and doom, because I'm thinking we come out on top. 40 to 28. Bright days ahead. GBR.
There are some small reasons why this is a big game - let's start with those.
Coaching
I think many people would agree that UCLA was Beck's worst playcalling game of the year last year. A series of bizarre decisions left the offense sputtering when we needed it most in the 3rd and 4th quarters. I'm sure Beck wants that game back, and I'm sure Taylor wants the mistakes back. Well now they both have the chance.
On the other side of the ball...boy. I think we all have "653" burned into our brains from last year. Spread out the offense, then get a lot of big and tall bodies moving vertically. They exploited our lack of athleticism in a huge way. They embarrassed our head coach. Bo hasn't forgotten this, he's had a year to prepare for their offense, and we have more speed and athleticism on the field this year. This is going to be trial by fire for a lot of guys and is going to put Bo's coaching ability to the test.
Players
The game is huge for our offense because, in my opinion, they haven't really been trying yet. We have yet to unleash our 2013 scoring explosion. Everything that I've seen from Beck seems very standard and vanilla, designed to not give anything away while still being solid. He seems to be protecting Taylor and Ameer as much as possible in the first two cupcake games - as well he should. But I think we're going to see the stops pulled out on Saturday. It could be glorious. It might have to be glorious. because on the other side of the ball...
We might be starting two true freshmen at linebacker in a huge game against a ranked opponent who put up 653 yards on us last year. How scary is that. The defense can gain a ton of confidence or lose a ton of confidence here. Individual players may gain or lose confidence.
But here's the meat of the argument.
Here's where we are as a program right now - and it's not really pretty. Last season we we took a shot fairly early against this very same foe. However, we were never really gone from the spotlight - a couple of weeks later we had a big home game with Wisconsin and then, of course, the trip to Columbus. Big primetime games.
Which brings me to my next point. What are the last four times that Nebraska has been seen in a marquee game in front of a big national audience?
-@ Ohio State
-Michigan
-Wisconsin (B1GCCG)
-Georgia
And what do these games have in common? Well, we allowed 570+ yards in 3 of them, lost two ugly blowouts where the game completely got out of control, and against Michigan struggled to a win that may have seemed illegitimate to many due to the fact that Denard was knocked out fairly early. We are not sitting pretty night now on the national scene - something that I argued vehemently in the infamous "relevancy" thread. The last few times that we have been seen on a national stage have been downright embarrassing for the most part, dating back 2 years even.
Now, we know what the goal is for this program - to be consistently finishing in the top-10, competing for and winning conference championships, and if we get into the national title picture then that's great. I think we can agree that's a realistic goal. But at this point, I'm not even sure that a conference championship is so much a final goal as it is a means to accomplish the greater and more general goal that we have for this program. What we really want as a fanbase is to get back in the national picture and garner national respect. Which, combined with our schedule and Saturday's schedule, is why this game is HUGE.
Speaking about national picture in terms of Saturday only: We are the only game worth mentioning until Alabama and Texas A&M kick off at 2:30. This means a couple of things:
1. More people than usual are going to be paying attention to college football Saturday because the biggest game of the year (Bama-aTm) is that day.
2. We are the only noteworthy game happening between Gameday finishing and the opening kickoff in College Station.
The eyes of the nation will be upon us.
Now the ultimate reason this game is huge isn't because this would be some giant signature win (it's 16th ranked UCLA. Come on). It's because the doors opened by winning are significant and because the consequences for losing are so ridiculously enormous. The outcome gap between a win and a loss is very large.
A win: Great! A big blue-chip program won a home game over a ranked opponent in which they were 5.5-point favorites. In itself, nothing truly special. But it will be with the nation watching. We will almost certainly be winning our next 4 games, slowly climbing in the rankings until we are ranked ~9th for a home game with Northwestern. Beat Northwestern and we are an undefeated top-10 team traveling to Ann Arbor to challenge Michigan for the Legends division title. Doesn't that sound exciting? We could be looking forward to something like a #4 vs #7 matchup of undefeateds on November 9th.
A loss: Bo does it again. Gets out-schemed and embarrassed at home in a winnable game. Nebraska falls out of the rankings, at the very least, until November. We are nowhere on the national scene. We have no Wisconsin and Ohio State games coming up. We have far less national media run, less clout with recruits, and we're stuck biding our time playing the likes of Illinois and Purdue on the Big Ten Network - out of sight and out of mind. We can't afford to be that far out of the national spotlight for another entire season, especially one that we've had circled on our calendars for the last 3 years. There's also the reality check that losing to UCLA at home means that the team we are fielding this year probably isn't good enough to beat both Northwestern and Michigan and get back to Indy. Could we get back to Indy? Sure, but the odds are not in our favor. It took a crazy string of luck for that to happen last year, and Michigan and Northwestern both have better teams this time around. There will be no backing into the conference championship game. We would start seeing questions about Bo as our coach for the future, a general air of uncertainty about the program, and beating cupcakes for 5 weeks would do nothing to calm the storm.
I can't honestly remember a game like this. Feels like the fanbase is less pumped up and more holding their breath.
A win catapults a young team into the spotlight.
A loss - well, here we go again.
But enough with the gloom and doom, because I'm thinking we come out on top. 40 to 28. Bright days ahead. GBR.
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