Caliborn72

I would think somewhere around a touchdown, which would be fair in my opinion.

I'm nervous about the game but I still say we win by 10.

55 minutes ago, VectorVictor said:

One thing that's being overlooked/forgotten in the defense discussion is how the offense could help them out...but failed to do so. How many times, late in the 4th quarter, did Langsdorf stop the clock by going for a pass instead of running the ball? 

 

The best teams with the best coordinators realize there's a symbiotic relationship between the offense and defense.

This is a good point and what has me the most concerned. I'm willing to buy the idea that Diaco wanted to be as vanilla as possible to not show his hand for future games. I'm not sure that's the case, but I'm willing to buy it because I believe in his coaching ability.

The problem is, the rest of the team should have been on the same page then. We should have been working the clock from the get go and limiting the amount of times our defense was on the field. At the very least, we should have been doing this late in the game. The only explanation/excuse I have is that DL and MR wanted to try to get the offense even more plays to see what they had (?) kind of a weak one but that's all I got.

I blame DL for it but I also blame MR. It's his show and it should have been a part of the pre-game plan if they really were trying to keep our defensive scheme hidden. Nothing about the offensive side of the ball suggested that was the case.

They ended up losing but they gave Louisville a fight and took the lead in the 4th quarter. Brohm looks like one of the best hires this off-season and this is a game that looks tougher than it did a week ago. Need Jones back.

I expected a sloppy, close game that resulted in a win by less than 10pts. But I didn't expect it to be because our defense got gashed like they did.

I expected a vanilla defense for most, if not all of the season. I don't think Diaco trusts our corners and we can't just go blitz and pray. The problem is that there were still so many holes despite trying to play it safe.

We will win more than 5, I think those claims are an overreaction but this game was pretty eye-opening. I had us with 8 wins but hoped we'd knock off a team to get to 9. I don't know if 8 is a reality at this point but we will see.

We struggle with Arkansas State, not looking especially sharp on offense while giving up a few big plays on defense. Final score of 23-17. This has many fans rightfully nervous until we beat Oregon on the road by 10 the following week.

There's a bit of a cult feel to it which is the weird part to me. I don't mind the corn. I don't even mind the commercial really, I'm just saying.

Weird stuff can happen to even the most experienced offenses in week 1. Pre-snap penalties and holds that kill drives. Not being completely sharp and missing throws, that kind of thing. Always the safe bet to assume lower scoring output even if the opponent is a G5.

I'd be more than okay with the offense putting up 30 or so points assuming it's a comfortable win and there are promising flashes that suggest the offense will get better as the season goes on. But I understand why that seems like a pretty low O/U.

https://www.twitter.com/AndrewGreif/status/902215398434643968

Lots of freshmen in the two-deep. We should be able to take advantage of their inexperience at NT. Nervous about their offense but I feel better about this game.

The IMG game is tomorrow.

Tom Loy tweeted that Clemson offered. Bring on that 5th star.

Sounds like he had a great fall camp. We have the benefit of redshirting him thankfully, which sounds likely, but if we weren't solid at ILB then he'd be a contender for early PT.

He didn't get the Florida/FSU/Miami offer so he went unnoticed but this guy is an ideal 3-4 ILB in my opinion and I think we got super lucky to land him (or land him as easily as we did I should say). He also didn't play the recruiting game, which hurt his chances at being a 4th star that I believe he should have been.

Bray and Diaco will turn him into a conference all-American is my bullish take.

He does have an excellent offer list, no denying that. I think he has tremendous potential and those offers reflect that. But I've thought he might be boom or bust at the next level. An interesting prospect who I will trust our staff's judgement on if he commits to us but I won't be overly concerned if he ends up elsewhere.

Even if he is never able to cover an outside WR, you still need DBs like him in today's football. Quick twitch guys who can cover the slot while also stepping up and blowing up run plays and screens.

Only issue with a DB that height would be physicality which Bookie has in spades. He's a fiery competitor and I really don't care about his height. Bookie will be on the field a lot and I love that national people keep sleeping on him, it only adds fuel to the fire.

Comparing and contrasting the "5 takeaways" from Dienhart, he's far more bullish about Wisconsin. He was very complimentary of our practice but I thought he did an unfortunately good job of being complimentary without really saying anything. Which was fine, I figured he'd do that for most of the teams. Then he went out and basically said Wisconsin is impressive everywhere and that losing their defensive MVP hasn't really shaken them up.

"A lot will have to come together," was his takeaway from Lincoln. Seems like we have a lot of good in places, with the hopes that greatness will rise, both from the talent here and from the system on both sides of the ball. I'm still cautiously optimistic, could use some more good news though.

Tommy Bush seems really boom or bust. Obviously, I'll trust our staff and KDub to help him reach his potential. But I'm also interested to see if he ends up at a place like Texas or FSU (or here), or ends up somewhere more like Baylor. Texas seemed like such an early favorite that it's weird to me that he hasn't committed there yet.

Does make you wonder how the heck the OLine could have had such a bad day with Stoltenberg out. If anything, you'd think we'd hear about how the OLine dominated up front and then the observers would remind us that the DLine was missing the key man in the middle and not to freak out that the defense got worked over. ??? All around.

There was a mention that Stoltenberg might get some days off as a precaution with his injury history and to also get valuable reps for other guys. Is there more to it?

https://www.twitter.com/HuskerExtraSip/status/898239905263886336

Well, okay. I've seen some speculation that Knevel is really struggling lately. There's still some time left to get things figured out.

Will OV Oregon for the game against Nebraska. Wise choice so he can check out both teams

Great reports. Have to love that the tempo was impressive despite new coaches on one side of the ball. Easy to see Diaco was worth the money.

Not pointed at you Norhusker because I completely agree, but I've seen some people on twitter and other boards suggesting that Freeman is all they have. I just want to say, Herbert scares me a great deal - possibly even more than Freeman. He's a really good QB, he had a great true freshman season, and is primed for a breakout year.

http://www.cfbanalytics.com/predictions.php

This was posted on Scout. This site has us going 8-4 with 1pt losses to Ohio State and Wisconsin, a 7pt loss @Oregon, and a 16pt loss @PSU. They have us in a lot of dog fight wins, which probably signifies that their formula doesn't know what to expect from us at this point (how could it?). Seems fair but it would be brutal to have all these close games this year haha. How would people feel about this version of an 8 win season? A close loss to Ohio State would be heartbreaking, but also promising. Another close loss to Wisconsin would suck though, need to get over that hump already.

Wisconsin: 11-1

Northwestern: 9-3

Iowa: 6-6

Just for discussion purposes, obviously can't take any analytics as complete truth yet, especially with how many changes we have in place.

http://sportsformulator.com/en/college-football-predictions-week-1-2017/

This site has us as a 70% favorite, winning 34-16. I'd be more than happy with that output from the offense in game 1.

Mod Edit: Link removed

A quick, bastardized summary is that he thinks we have some real strengths this year, Lee is the real deal and the offense can finally do some of the things DL and MR want them to do. He thinks the OLine can be good this year but is also in the "prove it" stage. Defensively, we are good on DLine, ILB, and S - depth is the only concern. He feels CB and OLB are the biggest weaknesses on the team. He concluded with his thoughts that we probably have enough strengths to win 9, maybe 10 games if the right things fall in place, but we also have enough weaknesses to exploit to think we won't end up with 10. 8 is his prediction, reminding everyone that @PSU is a tough swap on the schedule and that 8 could still mean a better year than last year.