Michigan: What did we learn

Nice special teams improvement. KR- no blunders. KO- through endzone- most covered inside 25. PT- pretty Consistent PR- all good minus the fair catch at the 5- Martin is VERY comfortable back there. PAT- good. FG- I dont think we were going to try many. In pre game Culp was missing almost all the kicks past the 20. No wind. 

Offense was way too conservative first half, on fire the second. Some nice X and O jujitsu in second. Spotty play by OL. Looked like we had some room at times on the edge with the option- would have liked to see more load type blocking there if the pressure was on Martinez too soon. Loved the Tim Tebow like QB follow fake up the middle- throw to Allen. Loved the killer instinct 1 play drive after the interception. 

Defense had is moments, kept us in the game the first half. Tackling regressed a bit. Couldn't close the deal. As in years past when they flashed, would give up the late game breaking drive. 

Crowd- atmosphere reminded me like the days of old. Packed Railyard, loud- top 10 of all time crowd. Referees bias is real against NU it always has been, this time it was over the top.  Have always said we have to play past it and once we stop playing so sloppy it will lessen. Not sure about that- it was ridiculous. TD pass by Michigan- 0 on the clock, PI uncatchable, spots, no review of the Michigan interception, spots, flag pickup- sheesh

 
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hskrfan4life said:
9 out of 10 times the whistle is blown on that scrum.
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Correct

On the previous play the refs let the play go on WAY past when it should have been blown dead. 

Someone at the game said- Martinez feet were still moving- It DOESNT MATTER. It isn't blow the whistle when everyone stops moving- wait until everyone is a statue- its blow the whistle when forward progress has been stopped= which it had. 

Terrible officiating. 

 
Nebraska55fan said:
Nice special teams improvement. KR- no blunders. KO- through endzone- most covered inside 25. PT- pretty Consistent PR- all good minus the fair catch at the 5- Martin is VERY comfortable back there. PAT- good. FG- I dont think we were going to try many. In pre game Culp was missing almost all the kicks past the 20. No wind. 

Offense was way too conservative first half, on fire the second. Some nice X and O jujitsu in second. Spotty play by OL. Looked like we had some room at times on the edge with the option- would have liked to see more load type blocking there if the pressure was on Martinez too soon. Loved the Tim Tebow like QB follow fake up the middle- throw to Allen. Loved the killer instinct 1 play drive after the interception. 

Defense had is moments, kept us in the game the first half. Tackling regressed a bit. Couldn't close the deal. As in years past when they flashed, would give up the late game breaking drive. 

Crowd- atmosphere reminded me like the days of old. Packed Railyard, loud- top 10 of all time crowd. Referees bias is real against NU it always has been, this time it was over the top.  Have always said we have to play past it and once we stop playing so sloppy it will lessen. Not sure about that- it was ridiculous. TD pass by Michigan- 0 on the clock, PI uncatchable, spots, no review of the Michigan interception, spots, flag pickup- sheesh
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One thing I would add in regards to ST play that still presents an opportunity for improvement is the punting game when we are between the 40’s on offense and get stopped.   It seems we either kick it in the end zone or get too cute and kick it to the 25.  I don’t remember too many times our punter pins the other team inside the 10.  
 

I realize one time on Saturday was not the punters fault but more the gunners.  In total though it’s been an issue, and that field position is huge and demoralizing to an offense.  

 
Archy1221 said:
One thing I would add in regards to ST play that still presents an opportunity for improvement is the punting game when we are between the 40’s on offense and get stopped.   It seems we either kick it in the end zone or get too cute and kick it to the 25.  I don’t remember too many times our punter pins the other team inside the 10.  
 

I realize one time on Saturday was not the punters fault but more the gunners.  In total though it’s been an issue, and that field position is huge and demoralizing to an offense.  
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Agreed= we had one that could have been downed inside the 5. Was just happy ST didnt cost us the game this time around. Like you I don't expect perfection- this and last week were nice movement in the right direction it seems. I still have no faith in our FG kicking- if Culp kicks like he does in pregame- he was just awful. 

 
Nebraska55fan said:
Nice special teams improvement.
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I came here to say this as well.

Could be too early to tell, but special teams seem fixed. If they had not been set right, we would have not been in that game at all (or in other words looked like the dumpster fire team we've been the past few years).

Prochazka's injury is a huge blow to the season and for that kid. Hope he keeps his chin up - he could be in the NFL some day.

Matt Lubick has kind of changed this offense.

Rahmir Johnson is the f****** man.

 
Undone said:
I came here to say this as well.

Could be too early to tell, but special teams seem fixed. If they had not been set right, we would have not been in that game at all (or in other words looked like the dumpster fire team we've been the past few years).

Prochazka's injury is a huge blow to the season and for that kid. Hope he keeps his chin up - he could be in the NFL some day.

Matt Lubick has kind of changed this offense.

Rahmir Johnson is the f****** man.
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If ST is "fixed" and they may be- it seems they have been fixed over the course of the last couple of weeks after being ranked 100+ in most categories for the last 4 years. If that is true- then the answer- whatever it may be has been there all along. You don't go from 100+ to pretty competent in 2 weeks thanks to a geometric progression on what you've always done??

Teddy is huge loss

Offense is trending right direction. Even saw a nice counter run and some 2 back stuff this week. 

RJ is much better than I had thought. Still need another back to move the pile forward when needed- he just isn't that guy. 

 
Nebraska55fan said:
If ST is "fixed" and they may be- it seems they have been fixed over the course of the last couple of weeks after being ranked 100+ in most categories for the last 4 years. If that is true- then the answer- whatever it may be has been there all along. You don't go from 100+ to pretty competent in 2 weeks thanks to a geometric progression on what you've always done??
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All I can tell you is that the eyeball test showed we made zero mistakes on special teams on Saturday night. Zero.

 
Mavric said:
So you're mad that we kept running inside and also mad that we didn't play the better inside runner more?
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Not mad - puzzled was the word I used.  We weren't gaining anything up the middle.  Some have suggested that it was to set up Allen on that scoring play - maybe so. But there was a lot of non-production getting there.    Perhaps Yant would have made the inside run game more effective - if he doesn't run into the QB (supposed reason we didn't  see him again)

 
Undone said:
All I can tell you is that the eyeball test showed we made zero mistakes on special teams on Saturday night. Zero.
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  Like you- Im VERY happy with the improvement. Zero- not sure. Martin fair caught a punt at the 5 and we missed downing a punt inside the 10. 

Yes on the eyeball test. My point was in the last 2 weeks the special teams have been really good- AFTER all the outcry- Dirks article. So was the answer always there  for the taking? Very plausible- the results are the results. 

 
Nebraska55fan said:
If ST is "fixed" and they may be- it seems they have been fixed over the course of the last couple of weeks after being ranked 100+ in most categories for the last 4 years. If that is true- then the answer- whatever it may be has been there all along. You don't go from 100+ to pretty competent in 2 weeks thanks to a geometric progression on what you've always done??
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The answer is that most of the "special teams problems" were mainly just kickers and punters who couldn't get the job done.  If you can't kick it in the end zone, it makes it a lot harder for your kickoff coverage teams.  If you can't get the right balance between height and length on punts, you're either letting them fair catch a short punt or out-kicking your coverage.

Most of the issues this year have been just one guy not being able to do his job.  Missing kicks.  Bad punts.  The missed kicks were basically all in one game.  The bad punts were basically all in one game.  But people like to overreact and insist that we don't care about special teams.

So, like you said, it didn't just all get fixed in two weeks.  We had fixed most of the placekicking issues last year.  It just cropped back up in one game.  We fixed most of the kickoff issues coming into this year.  Punting has still been a little shaky but it's mostly just been one guy not being able to perform, not a systematic failure.

 
Nebraska55fan said:
and we missed downing a punt inside the 10. 
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...actually, thank you for that correction - I did completely forget that one. And I was thinking "Dang, that's a guy with decent ball skills, too."

Yes - that one did cost us a bit. Made a good effort but just didn't quite have the coordination to get the old meat hook on it to bat it back in.

 
You'd have probably been very shocked preseason if somebody told you that through game 7, playing Oklahoma away, that the offense that puts up the most points on our D would be Michigan.

It was just a really terrible game to have the defense give out in the fourth quarter.

Frost talked about how we scored so fast in the 3rd that our defense didn't have chance to rest. That may be one relatively legitimate excuse...but to me what really happened was that their tight end delay ate our lunch in the second half.

We have the horses to snuff out that play and we just didn't do it. That's really frustrating to me.

Sunday was the least upset I've been about a Husker game since...well, possibly ever to be honest. Except for the officiating. And I don't want Husker fans to get a rep of b*****ng about calls, but they got gifted that touchdown in the second quarter.

 
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