TonyStalloni

Exactly, this whole SEC run, while ESPN blows themselves over it all day, is cyclical, just like anything else in college sports. At some point in time, someone is going to crack the code on how to tap into their talent down there, and then it's game over. Things can change quickly on the college scene. While the SEC as a conference will probably be strong for years to come, individual teams can change in short order. Before Urban Meyer left Fla there was no end in sight to their success. Tennessee seemed to string together strong teams year in and year out. While it's doubtful the NCAA will find any wrongdoing in their cashcow teams, that possibility exists. Saban could decide to retire for health reasons as could Miles. Life has a way of evening out teams success level. Who could have foreseen Nebraska's fast tumble out of the top ten in 1997 before Tom retired. It seemed like there was no end to the pipeline, running backs and great qb's who would come here to play. Don't think Nebraska can't find it's way back to the top ten consistantly. A few players on defense who have the light go on in the Pelini system and an upgrade at a few positions on offense, improvement in special teams and we'll be on even ground with the 2nd tier teams. Today I'm putting teams like Alabama, LSU, Okla St, Stanford and Oregon in the top tier...possibly USC as soon as they come off probation. 2nd tier would include teams like Georgia, Arkansas, probably Okla if they hadn't lost Broyles, Boise St (most years), Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio St (again most years) West Virg looked lightning fast, and probably Virg Tech. If we played 12 games against the teams I mentioned we would probably win 2 0r 3 games at most. My hope is we can get on even footing with better recruiting. Last year and I think this year will be the start of the turnaround. In a few years our coaches will have matured enough to see the finer details they seem to be missing now. Better days are ahead!

My thoughts too. If Peat is the player we hope he is maybe he could anchor the middle. I hope he has replaced his high school fat with Husker weight room muscle and is ready to be a force inside.

I have heard that Bo's scheme is very difficult to learn. Even harder than some pro teams defensive system. I wonder if he would pare it down enough so some of this fast young talent could get on the field sooner? With so many good young linebackers available might he go with a 3-4 sometimes to confuse the defense and get more speed on the field?

Newspaper writers everywhere have one goal these days. Report the news as it is? Far from it! Their goal is to sell newspapers and if that means they need to drum up some controversy to do it, they always have and always will. I'm sure their editors have told them the bottom line and for hard print papers these days, that line is close to red in most cases. Tom is just trolling for some response to see if anything grabs the bate. After the bowl game there is always some discontent. As soon as signing day passes we'll mostly be drinking the kool-aid again about how this new crop will lead us to the promised land again finally. Only about 10 schools get most of the kids they go after. The rest of the 120 odd schools get to fight for the scraps left over. Every year it's a crap shoot and Bo and the coaches have to find a way to coach them up. The good talent we have is mostly young but the learning curve is high. Bo isn't perfect and neither are the young coaches.....they win some and lose some. I'm not ready to throw away 4 years of hard work because we "only" have 9 win seasons. About 100 other Div 1 programs would love to have a 9 win season.

Congrats to the Huskers on the win vs OSU!

Even in the Cap One Bowl the commentators were still talking about the Fumblerooski. Have to love the Statue of Liberty vs Oklahoma! Boise has always been the little guy with a chip on its shoulder. This game really put them over the top.

Even though the reason for the coaching search was different thankfully, there are similarities. Replacing a long established coach, no one seemingly wanted the job, a search done very closed door and much negative reaction when the new coach was announced. PSU has a very bumpy ride ahead. I hope they are strapped in for some tough years. Probably some difficult recruiting years ahead with a coach who has never been the head guy. he won't even take over till after the Super Bowl.

Bill Snyder always gets the best from his teams. I'm not sure if his teams confidence comes from excellent preparation or not but they always think they can win and they don't crap the bed if they fall behind. K State beat some good teams this year both at home and on the road. They had a few drops by receivers in this game which would have kept drives going. Kudos to the Wildcats!

It looks like the whole defensive line is out for basketball at that school. #5 to me should be a flagrant foul. The kid made no attempt to move his feet in the lane and reached for the guard's arms not the ball. There is a difference between a hard foul with the body trying to get position and a hard foul trying to take a player down while he is up in the air. Plus the fat kid laughed while he was standing in the lane on the free throw. He knew what he was doing.

Wildcats all the way for me. I love how they play and how they are coached. Their linebackers and safeties all can make open field tackles. They play hard and don't back down from anyone. May not be the most talented team in America but they are well prepared.

It looks like the pessimists think we'll be a .500 team next year and if the injury bug hits hard we could be. We have some good athletes returning but we won't be deep with experience at any position....especially QB. The optimists think we'll play for the BCS championship. We'll probably fall somewhere in the middle in my opinion. Two key areas we will need to improve are defensive line (espec D ends) and Qb. While Taylor continues to improve I have never felt he is "The One" (Matrix reference).

While I think we have some very good recruits committed for the next class, and I'm excited and hopeful all will sign an LOI, part of me knows most of them were not recruited by LSU, Alabama, USC, or OSU (Okla St or Ohio State) or Stanford. Most would not be recruited to Texas or Okla even though those two teams haven't produced based on their recruiting level. UCLA is a team trying to rise from the ashes. They know they can't immediately challenge the top teams for recruits, but they can challenge for USC's leftovers in California and possibly other west coast kids who want to play in the big lights. They would be ticked pink to pull a few recruits from teams like Nebraska, California, the Ariz schools, Oregon and Washington, who all hit the state of California hard.

What a nightmare trying to defend speed like this! A ball control offense would be a good way to slow it down.

http://www.cleveland.com/ohio-sports-blog/index.ssf/2012/01/holly_rowe_of_espn_elbows_asid.html I've seen reporters at political press conferences all try to talk at the same time but I've never seen this before. I would have liked to see the other reporter deck Miss Holly for the thrown elbow. Granted ESPiN has dibs on the coaches for the first interview but show some couth sweetheart.

His lack of playing time was due to injury which was stated after the Iowa game. He had a hamstring that hampered him severely if I remember. The 5 weeks off probably did him good but he had some rust on him yesterday.

I think (hope) we have help coming on the interior D Line. Todd Peat and a few of this years redshirts need to step in next year and fill the holes. I'm not as confident we have D end talent we all want. I'm hopeful the redshirt and juco linebackers can do the job. Also our returning D backs and the Seisay kid should do a decent job at corner and safety. Depth will be a factor and injuries could limit our success. On O I think the crop of receivers are adequate.....sometimes pretty good. We need a good possession receiver and a burner with great hands. As much as I appreciate Taylor M, he has serious limitations. While I'll agree he has improved, I don't see him hitting streaking receivers in stride. More often the receiver has to stop his route and hook back in a straight line to TM. On any deep route the defender has as much of a chance to catch it as our receiver. The ball is lobbed as high as he can throw it and with luck the receiver has been able to get behind the d back. He isn't the least bit elusive and usually runs into the tacklers arms rather than make an attempt to avoid a tackle. On a straight line he is speedy but defenses seem to have that weapon figured out. Cotton caught some good balls yesterday. I hope our young O linemen are ready to put on their big boy pants and play Big 10 football next year. There are lots of questions and few sure answers. Lots of possibility but we've said that for years.

The one we all saw was the pass interference penalty on our DB when the ball was 8 yards beyond the receiver and the only contact was a slight hand touch to the chest.....something that was allowed all day. However it happened after Dennard and their receiver were both tossed and I wonder if it was a makeup call or a "we're going to make a statement" call by the refs. If I remember that was a third down and SC would have either punted or attempted a FG....instead they have a first down inside the 20.

I agree that it would be a high scoring game. Our defense is better than Washington and our offense is more run oriented. If our offense was able to control the clock and keep them off the field we should win by 10. Their D would be equally as tired against us as they were vs Washington by the middle of the 3rd quarter. I think our only problem would be scoring too quickly and not taking time off the clock.

Even if he was completely healed from the tear he hasn't done any lifting since the injury and I'm of the opinion he had a partial tear earlier in the season which was why he was less than effective. I think his pec just tore completely in his last game and he had been trying to play through the injury before that.

Bill Sloey a linebacker from Hawthorne Calif was # 42 on the 1971 team. And what do you mean "Old man"? Thanks for this post...very cool! Our family Dr was on the 1970 team. I always wait till after we've talked treatment for whatever I'm in his office before I start talking Husker football. He'll keep patients waiting for 10 mins talking football with me once we start. Once a Husker always a Husker!

Thanks for the reminder that baseball season is just around the corner. I'm not a huge bb fan but enjoy Husker bb. It will be fun to see if Coach E can get them rolling again.

Frank Solich "accidentally" landed Bo upon the suggestion of Monte Kiffin. Solich originally wanted to hire Kiffin, but he declined and set him up with Bo instead. Which makes my point. Solich could have said no because he didn't know Bo but he did the homework and discovered there are good coaches outside of the Nebraska family. There are also good coaches outside of the Youngstown family.

I posted last night about my remorse over hiring another "Youngstown" coach. It's not that a good coach can't or hasn't come from that city for plenty have. To me it shows the limited number of connections Bo has if he only feels comfortable hiring guys he grew up with or knows through his high school. These hires would be great if he was coaching in high school or maybe even Youngstown State. While we shouldn't hire a coach based on what others will think, by the same token recruits need a "buy in factor" when they are contacted and after they sign an LOI. One thing Solich did when he was looking for a D coordinator was beat the bushes and step out of his comfort zone. It would have been easy to hire someone with Husker connections but he went another route.

Now we know the truth! Lately if you don't have a Y-town (Cardinal Mooney) connection you won't get hired onto this staff. If a man from Youngstown wants to coach he just needs to put his shingle out and either Stoops or Pelini's will hire them. Nepotism at it's finest.

Refresh me on 92 Bama? I don't remember what thay had.