Special Teams Trending Up

Mavric

Mavric

Yoda
Staff member
Helped by sophomore JD Spielman’s 77-yard punt return touchdown and walk-on Isaac Armstrong’s 73-yard punt against Bethune-Cookman, Nebraska is second in the Big Ten in yards per punt return (11.1). A month ago, Nebraska was last.

The Huskers also are second in the conference in gross punting, with a 44.08 average.

“Our special teams did get better, and I think they have been improving,” coach Scott Frost said Saturday.

Armstrong replaced scholarship punter Caleb Lightbourn midway through the Wisconsin game. He is averaging 48.7 yards per boot, second in the conference and top 10 nationally. His 73-yarder Saturday was the fourth longest in school history.

But he’s not just outkicking Lightbourn. Armstrong’s placement has reduced opponent return yards.

Frost replaced Lightbourn, he said, because Armstrong kicks it where he wants him to. The walk-on from Lincoln Southwest consistently puts returners near the sideline. Lightbourn often kicked the ball down the middle, which led to a return touchdown for Troy — helping cost Nebraska the game — and a return touchdown by Michigan.

Nebraska is still near the bottom of the country in punt return defense, allowing around 15 yards per return. But that doesn’t reflect what has happened since Armstrong took over. Lightbourn punted 24 times in the first five games, and teams returned those for 180 total yards and two touchdowns.

In Armstrong’s four games, he has 13 punts and only one has been returned — that went for 7 yards.
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OWH

 
Moiraine said:
With the punting, I wonder why that didn't come out in practice.
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Maybe Lightbourn was able to do it in practice and couldn’t do it in games. He had been inconsistent his first 2 years at NU, but did better last year with Diaco working with him. I also think Frost didn’t want to upset the apple cart by benching a 2-year starter so early into the season. Finally, it got to a point where Frost had no choice. 

 
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Wondered the same thing about Lightbourn as far as practice.  Couldn't believe he was our starter while sitting up in the stands at the Wiscy game watching one of the worst punting performances that I can remember as far as Husker punters go.  

 
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ColoradoHusk said:
Maybe Lightbourn was able to do it in practice and couldn’t do it in games. He had been inconsistent his first 2 years at NU, but did better last year with Diaco working with him. I also think Frost didn’t want to upset the apple cart by benching a 2-year starter so early into the season. Finally, it got to a point where Frost had no choice. 
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Ya that's possible.

One thing I found interesting (even at the time) is in a fall camp interview he gave credit to pretty much everyone except for the new coaches. He mentioned Diaco and the camp he went to. It sounded a little like he didn't think he had anything to learn from the new coaches. Of course I could be reading too much into it.




 
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10 minutes ago, Moiraine said:





Ya that's possible.

One thing I found interesting (even at the time) is in a fall camp interview he gave credit to pretty much everyone except for the new coaches. He mentioned Diaco and the camp he went to. It sounded a little like he didn't think he had anything to learn from the new coaches. Of course I could be reading too much into it.

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I remembered thinking that the staff didn't spend much time with special teams, and that was a huge concern of mine before the season started.  Until recently, nothing proved to me that wasn't the case.  Whether or not they did spend as much time on it as they should have, they've definitely made some improvements recently.

 
Dilly Dilly said:
I remembered thinking that the staff didn't spend much time with special teams, and that was a huge concern of mine before the season started.  Until recently, nothing proved to me that wasn't the case.  Whether or not they did spend as much time on it as they should have, they've definitely made some improvements recently.
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I think the coaching staff probably tried to get by without putting too much into special teams for this season. They had major overhauls in the offense and defense to do, so they couldn’t spend a lot of time focusing on special teams. They had a returning 2 year starter at punter, so they didn’t expect it to be a problem. Once the poor special teams play cost NU a couple games, the coaching staff had no choice but to put more time into it for this year. 

 
Trending upwards? With the way this year has started, we had nowhere to go but up with special teams.

Hope this is a continuing trend. We need all the juice that can be squeezed out of special teams... mostly because I fear our penalty-itis and mental gaffes may resurface at any time.

 
ColoradoHusk said:
I think the coaching staff probably tried to get by without putting too much into special teams for this season. They had major overhauls in the offense and defense to do, so they couldn’t spend a lot of time focusing on special teams. They had a returning 2 year starter at punter, so they didn’t expect it to be a problem. Once the poor special teams play cost NU a couple games, the coaching staff had no choice but to put more time into it for this year. 
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That's exactly my thought.  I dont want to "accuse" them of slacking off, but yeah, once it cost them games, no choice but to pay attention, whether or not they were in the first place.

 
Dilly Dilly said:
That's exactly my thought.  I dont want to "accuse" them of slacking off, but yeah, once it cost them games, no choice but to pay attention, whether or not they were in the first place.
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It’s not so much slacking off, it’s just putting focus elsewhere in the team. Frost probably expected a 2-year starter to be able to punt the ball like they wanted to. Frost probably expected a place kicker to make short field goals early in the season. Frost and the staff tried to “get by” for this season, and then they could focus on the special teams and other finer points next season and going forward. 

 
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