ESPN: Year in Review - Grading the Huskers
- Thread starter Mavric
- Start date
SuperBigFan69
Head Coach
Did they grade the fans?
wiuhusker
Starter
Found that interesting as well. Drew Brown was the lone bright spot on special teams. I think even giving them a C would have been too nice.
ColoradoHusk
Heisman Trophy Winner
Maybe the grader gave the special teams a free pass due to the passing of Foltz. NU was good on place kicking and kickoff, but terrible on kickoff returns, punting, and punt receiving.
This is my thought as well. He did mention Foltz so perhaps gave punting a pass for the year.
There are more ST than just punt team. Punt team was terrible last year pretty much do to with the inconsistant punting. Kick off and kick return were both about as good as you could get last year. I can only think of 1 or 2 KO returns against NU that really were real good. Kick return was good. PAT/FG was good. The teams weren't bad as a unit IMO it was the orgainization of the teams which falls on the ST Coordinator that was bad. Not having enough guys on the field, being off sides, letting your freshman punter have a green light to try and pick up a 1st down, having the wrong blocking on punt team, doing too many punt return safes and not allowing your outstanding punt returner a chance to return things.
ColoradoHusk
Heisman Trophy Winner
I thought kick return was not especially good. There were no TD returns (although that would enable a much higher grade) and while Bryant showed glimpses of promise would good returns, there were plenty of returns that got stuff inside in the 20. Ohio State did an amazing job of kicking it to NU's 5 and then tackle Bryant inside the 20 to give NU terrible field position for much of that game.
Sam McKewon has questioned the use of true freshmen RB as the main kickoff returners two years in a row. I understand wanting some young kids exposure into the college game, but kickoff return is an important part of special teams, I would think there could be a more experienced guy that can be used. I also realize that Abdullah did this job as a true freshman in 2011, but he was a special return guy and talent.
We were #41 in the country in Kickoff Return Average. I'm pretty sure that's not as good as you could get. Not terrible. But pretty average.
Our Kickoff team seemed to fare pretty well but that's apparently mostly on the strength of Brown often kicking touchbacks. We were #89 in the country in Kickoff Return Allowed Average (on non-touchbacks) which is obviously not very good.