Nebraska vs. USC "Reserves"

[HSKRNOKC]

I apologize if i come off as conceited. That was not my intention at all. After the USC loss, I've just heard so much negative about our team's future and hardly any positive. I've even heard predictions of Ball State beating us. Two weeks ago, this was going to be a cupcake game. I still feel like we have the ability to be contenders, but Callahan's subsitutions and play calling are so sporadic and most of the time i have no idea what Cosgrove is thinking. Thanks for your posts!

Heh, I think that Cally's offense is looking pretty decent, they just aren't dominant enough to function well in conjunction with an ineffectual defense. In one thread, and I wish I could recall who it was off the top of my head, someone asked if the offense had kept it close the entire game, would we be complaining about the defense? I thought that was a really good question and I didn't have a good or even a smart-assed answer for it beyond "That's a good question." I think that a really great offense can make a bad defense invisible. I don't think that we would have been complaining that they hung 49 (or however many points they would have put on us had the game remained close because of the offense) if we had a "quality loss" or a win. I was at the KU game last year (and couldn't talk the next day... that was exciting). We did win, but it was frighteningly close. In *that* game, I think it was okay to complain about the defense because the game shouldn't have been close.

I don't think we'll lose to Ball State, but I also don't think they ought to be able to score much at all against us, but there is a chance that we will (but they probably won't be able to stop our offense, either). If we do hold their offense to 3-and-out most of the time, that will be a good sign. But if they move the ball a lot and we still win, I think it's still legit to complain about the defense if a team that shouldn't move the ball does. Am I making much sense here?

Well, anyway, I know what you were saying-- sometimes it can look like too much criticism can come off as hate, and that is definitely not the case!

Great post.

Our D is going to be a big ????? all season. I hope we can shore it up enough to contend for our conference title but either way I will be rooting the Huskers on

 

[junior4949]

I apologize if i come off as conceited. That was not my intention at all. After the USC loss, I've just heard so much negative about our team's future and hardly any positive. I've even heard predictions of Ball State beating us. Two weeks ago, this was going to be a cupcake game. I still feel like we have the ability to be contenders, but Callahan's subsitutions and play calling are so sporadic and most of the time i have no idea what Cosgrove is thinking. Thanks for your posts!

Heh, I think that Cally's offense is looking pretty decent, they just aren't dominant enough to function well in conjunction with an ineffectual defense. In one thread, and I wish I could recall who it was off the top of my head, someone asked if the offense had kept it close the entire game, would we be complaining about the defense? I thought that was a really good question and I didn't have a good or even a smart-assed answer for it beyond "That's a good question." I think that a really great offense can make a bad defense invisible. I don't think that we would have been complaining that they hung 49 (or however many points they would have put on us had the game remained close because of the offense) if we had a "quality loss" or a win. I was at the KU game last year (and couldn't talk the next day... that was exciting). We did win, but it was frighteningly close. In *that* game, I think it was okay to complain about the defense because the game shouldn't have been close.

I don't think we'll lose to Ball State, but I also don't think they ought to be able to score much at all against us, but there is a chance that we will (but they probably won't be able to stop our offense, either). If we do hold their offense to 3-and-out most of the time, that will be a good sign. But if they move the ball a lot and we still win, I think it's still legit to complain about the defense if a team that shouldn't move the ball does. Am I making much sense here?

Well, anyway, I know what you were saying-- sometimes it can look like too much criticism can come off as hate, and that is definitely not the case!

Here's another question: If we lost 49-10 which could have easily have happened had Carroll not unloaded the bench, would everyone be saying the offense looked decent? I mean I don't want to beat a dead horse, but the offense did put up a whopping 38 yards rushing or 1.1 yard/carry. This is not decent offense. Maybe the reason the run D is so poor is because they're practicing against a horrible run O? It's pretty difficult for me to see how we can really say anything was decent last Saturday. USC fumbles 5 times, yet NU recovers just one? USC tied for the most points put up on the Hskers in one quarter in quarter #3. The offense was part of the reason for this as Keller had the INT's. It's pretty hard for me to give the offense a pass against USC.

Btw, there is no such thing as a "quality" loss. Look it up in the Husker Dictionary. You will not even find it in the vocabulary!

 

[Glendower]

I apologize if i come off as conceited. That was not my intention at all. After the USC loss, I've just heard so much negative about our team's future and hardly any positive. I've even heard predictions of Ball State beating us. Two weeks ago, this was going to be a cupcake game. I still feel like we have the ability to be contenders, but Callahan's subsitutions and play calling are so sporadic and most of the time i have no idea what Cosgrove is thinking. Thanks for your posts!

Heh, I think that Cally's offense is looking pretty decent, they just aren't dominant enough to function well in conjunction with an ineffectual defense. In one thread, and I wish I could recall who it was off the top of my head, someone asked if the offense had kept it close the entire game, would we be complaining about the defense? I thought that was a really good question and I didn't have a good or even a smart-assed answer for it beyond "That's a good question." I think that a really great offense can make a bad defense invisible. I don't think that we would have been complaining that they hung 49 (or however many points they would have put on us had the game remained close because of the offense) if we had a "quality loss" or a win. I was at the KU game last year (and couldn't talk the next day... that was exciting). We did win, but it was frighteningly close. In *that* game, I think it was okay to complain about the defense because the game shouldn't have been close.

I don't think we'll lose to Ball State, but I also don't think they ought to be able to score much at all against us, but there is a chance that we will (but they probably won't be able to stop our offense, either). If we do hold their offense to 3-and-out most of the time, that will be a good sign. But if they move the ball a lot and we still win, I think it's still legit to complain about the defense if a team that shouldn't move the ball does. Am I making much sense here?

Well, anyway, I know what you were saying-- sometimes it can look like too much criticism can come off as hate, and that is definitely not the case!

Great post.

Our D is going to be a big ????? all season. I hope we can shore it up enough to contend for our conference title but either way I will be rooting the Huskers on

Oops! I truncated a sentence or just started writing 2 things at once-- "I don't think we'll lose to Ball State, but I also don't think they ought to be able to score much at all against us, but there is a chance that we will "

That's not what i meant to write at all! The "we will" should have said "they will" and by that I meant... or would have meant... that they'll score more than they should. Not in the 30s or anything, but just more. If they score even once after a series of big runs, that will be too much even if the score is 7-35 (and it's not the 4th quarter). Wait... or I meant that "we will score a lot." Either way... or both ways. I don't remember-- what i do remember is that i didn't mean that there is a chance that we will lose.

So just to be clear, I don't think that there is but the very thinnest of chances, predicated on a big disaster, that we will lose on Saturday. :lol:

 

[Glendower]

I apologize if i come off as conceited. That was not my intention at all. After the USC loss, I've just heard so much negative about our team's future and hardly any positive. I've even heard predictions of Ball State beating us. Two weeks ago, this was going to be a cupcake game. I still feel like we have the ability to be contenders, but Callahan's subsitutions and play calling are so sporadic and most of the time i have no idea what Cosgrove is thinking. Thanks for your posts!

Heh, I think that Cally's offense is looking pretty decent, they just aren't dominant enough to function well in conjunction with an ineffectual defense. In one thread, and I wish I could recall who it was off the top of my head, someone asked if the offense had kept it close the entire game, would we be complaining about the defense? I thought that was a really good question and I didn't have a good or even a smart-assed answer for it beyond "That's a good question." I think that a really great offense can make a bad defense invisible. I don't think that we would have been complaining that they hung 49 (or however many points they would have put on us had the game remained close because of the offense) if we had a "quality loss" or a win. I was at the KU game last year (and couldn't talk the next day... that was exciting). We did win, but it was frighteningly close. In *that* game, I think it was okay to complain about the defense because the game shouldn't have been close.

I don't think we'll lose to Ball State, but I also don't think they ought to be able to score much at all against us, but there is a chance that we will (but they probably won't be able to stop our offense, either). If we do hold their offense to 3-and-out most of the time, that will be a good sign. But if they move the ball a lot and we still win, I think it's still legit to complain about the defense if a team that shouldn't move the ball does. Am I making much sense here?

Well, anyway, I know what you were saying-- sometimes it can look like too much criticism can come off as hate, and that is definitely not the case!

Here's another question: If we lost 49-10 which could have easily have happened had Carroll not unloaded the bench, would everyone be saying the offense looked decent? I mean I don't want to beat a dead horse, but the offense did put up a whopping 38 yards rushing or 1.1 yard/carry. This is not decent offense. Maybe the reason the run D is so poor is because they're practicing against a horrible run O? It's pretty difficult for me to see how we can really say anything was decent last Saturday. USC fumbles 5 times, yet NU recovers just one? USC tied for the most points put up on the Hskers in one quarter in quarter #3. The offense was part of the reason for this as Keller had the INT's. It's pretty hard for me to give the offense a pass against USC.

Btw, there is no such thing as a "quality" loss. Look it up in the Husker Dictionary. You will not even find it in the vocabulary!

That's why I put it in scare quotes. I mean there is a horrible loss, and then there is a loss that came out of a good game. I have seen some good, close, losing games that were crushing but weren't humiliating.

I only consider the offense to have scored 10, maybe 17 points, but they could move the ball through the air and I guess I thought that it was positive that they could compensate for a lack of a ground game. No, I don't *like* that there was no ground game, but glenn did run for (I think) over 2.5 YPC, which really isn't too terrible at all. Lucky did relatively poorly and sacks count as negative yards rushing. NOt saying that the over-all stats are shiny and beautiful if you remove the sacks, just saying that there is a small silver lining (and one that isn't actually, "We could have done a lot worse" ).

I like lucky, but one thing that I noticed last year is that if he doesn't break away from the line untouched, he's going to get stuffed. That's why I thought Jackson was a better back, he could always escape with a fair chunk of yards-- lucky had the more spectacular runs (IIRC) but he wasn't always as productive. If lucky got hit, he was probably going down. I hate to sound like I'm talking trash, because he has that potential for huge yards. I think that the coaches waited too long to put Glenn in. When the defense is in position and they're consistently hitting the back, you have to have one in who can get some YAC.

I've kind of wandered. Yes, "quality loss" is an ugly phrase, but not all losses are equal.