(I know this is kind of a late response, but I just sat down to read all of the posts in this thread. It's never too late to talk NU football anyway!)
I agree and would add that the idea of 'a one year wonder' is more and more going to be a fading concept in that all the historically weak programs that have been emerging as competitors the last five years or so--the Wakes, Rutgers, USF's, Cinci's, Boise St.'s etc(the list is growing by leaps and bounds)--will continue to establish themselves as 'valid' teams. I don't know about you guys, but, for me, last season was the hardest it's ever been for me to fill out my weekly top 25 fan polls. I mean, I had a pretty clear sense of the top 3-4 teams--LSU, USC--ok, the top two, but from 5-25 it many times looked like a toss up. In fact, teams 26-30 didn't look so bad either.
True, but at the same time, one could say that it's easy to have one successful year. It is more difficult to sustain that success over many, many years. We will see how those teams you mention perform this season, and the next, and the next, and the...well, you get the point.
CFB is just different these days, there are more excellent coaches across the board and great h.s. players coming up to fill roles in all schools. More and more colleges are building state of the art facilities to compete with the big boys. It's getting harder for tradtional powers to stockpile ALL the great talent that is out there and the best players and JUCOS are around for fewer years. By the time you've developed a championship level team, you gotta rebuild the thing all over again every 3-4 years.
It is also pretty clear that the spread offensives have delivered what they were designed to do: level the playing field. Personally, this is bad news for me since I much prefer the old fashioned smash mouth thing(mix in a healthy passing attack). I get tired of watching TTech and now MO, and all the others, pass, pass, passing it all over the place; it's an annoying brand of FB, but no doubt is here to stay, in fact is quickly becoming the norm.
I find the the new offensive playbook - some rendition of The Spread - exciting to watch. Not because I enjoy high scoring games, but because I am seeing how the defenses and defensive coaches are countering the attack. Sometime down the line, The Spread will not be as effective as the defenses catch up. It is just interesting to me how each team attempts to counter such an attack.
I do think Osborne knew what he was doing when he brought in Pelini. At first, I was not happy with the decision, but thinking it over in my head now, I think he made a very smart decision.
I do not need to tell anyone that NU's defense was pitiful last season. Sure, Osborne could have brought in some well known coach with proven success, but would that have helped our defense right away? Maybe...maybe not. Tom went with someone that he knew could have an immediate impact on the defense. Bo is one of the most brilliant defensive minds in the game. Why not match him up with one of the most pitiful defenses in the game to see what happens? :clap
Anyway, I feel this puts Nebraska back on track. Sure our defense won't be ranked number one in all categories next season, and probably won't even be in the top 30 or 40. However, it will be greatly improved, because how could it get any worse? There's no direction the defense can go except for up, and Bo and Company are the perfect people to lead the way.