Hercules

According to Twitter, we could've opted out of this matchup, but Osborne called Orlando and said "We want to play the best team available." So we're headed to Cap-One. Gotta say, as pessimistic as I am right now, I love that attitude, and it's a smart move. Gotta do whatever you can to get our players excited during bowl prep.

Would like to see Beck stick around for Martinez's last year, and I want to see his offense run by Tommy Armstrong (since I think Armstrong is exactly the kind of QB Beck wants for his system.

I'd rather play Georgia than Texas A&M. They'd likely both blow us out, but we don't really need to add a mobile QB like Johnny Manziel to our list of things to worry about.

This is what I mean. It took Tom a lot of time to get over the hump that was keeping him from "success" in the fans eyes. It's taking Bo time too. He may be able to get there, he may not. One thing I will say, though, is that Tom never, ever talked with his teams about winning and losing. Never came up. That's because he didn't particularly care much about wins and losses, he cared about educating, leading, serving, and loving the boys that he brought in and helping them to become men on the way out. The winning took care of itself because of his commitment to these other pillars. The one thing Osborne never talked about is winning. The only thing we seem to talk about is winning. I think there are plenty of people who appreciate what Bo has done in terms of the players grades and discipline off the field. I'm one of them. But you've been claiming that the fans and media are being unfair to Bo, that they're measuring him differently than they measured Osborne. They're not. Osborne was on the hot seat (which I'm not even sure Bo is really on), and Osborne's teams were never blown out in the same manner that Bo's teams have been. That 47-0 loss that Devaney suffered was brutal, but that was before we had won any national championships, before we were a national brand - standards changed after that.

Because in his 6th year, Tom Osborne finally beat Oklahoma. 1978. Finally got it done. That bought him more time. Winning a conference title once every other year is a tremendous success rate. Nobody's mad at Pelini because he hasn't won a conference title every other season. They're upset because he hasn't won one in five years. No different than how Osborne was nearly fired before that breakthrough in 1978.

We just gave up 70 points to the 84th ranked offense in the country. I think you'll be ok.

Considering mass majority was that we would go 7-5 this season, I don't know why people are so glum. Yes, it would make a much better offseason, and would be a very good season. There were some that thought we'd go 7-5, I'm sure. There always is. But It's a bit of a stretch to say it was the opinion of the majority of Nebraska fans. I'm sure most of that sentiment dissipated after we found out what a joke the Big Ten is this year. Anything less than a conference championship should be widely considered a failure in any season at a program like Nebraska. This is Pelini's 5th year, these are his guys. There's no more excuses. You think 10 out of Tom Osborne's 15 seasons as head coach were failures? Tom Osborne won 13 conference titles in 25 years, and yes, those other seasons were considered failures. Any season where we lost to Oklahoma was considered a failure.

Considering mass majority was that we would go 7-5 this season, I don't know why people are so glum. Yes, it would make a much better offseason, and would be a very good season. There were some that thought we'd go 7-5, I'm sure. There always is. But It's a bit of a stretch to say it was the opinion of the majority of Nebraska fans. I'm sure most of that sentiment dissipated after we found out what a joke the Big Ten is this year. Anything less than a conference championship should be widely considered a failure in any season at a program like Nebraska. This is Pelini's 5th year, these are his guys. There's no more excuses. Not only that, but we gave up SEVENTY points. It's not that we lost the conference championship game, it's that we got completely and thoroughly humiliated. It'd be one thing if we had a heartbreaking loss to Wisconsin in OT. 70-31 is another matter entirely.

I'm as worried as anybody about Georgia just blowing us out. But I'd rather play them than Johnny Football, and frankly, playing a top 5 team is the kind of thing that can help get our team excited about the bowl game. A chance for a big upset and a splash at the end of the year - even if it doesn't happen, hopefully it at least makes the bowl practices productive.

So did Cody Green.

If experience is the answer to our problems, then wouldn't logic hold that the more experienced this staff gets, the better they'll get? Therefore, perhaps the best thing to do is to keep everyone in the same position so they keep gaining experience? How many head coaches with more experience would we be able to hire right now?

Maybe we should just start RKIII and keep Taylor healthy for the offseason. Or run the Rexcat for the entire game.

In Bo's defense, wasn't he the first guy at Nebraska since 2001 to actually beat a ranked team? He's also won his division three out of the last four years, something which neither Solich or Callahan did (they managed only one CCG appearance each). The blowout losses are certainly troubling, but you have to look at both sides of the coin.

After that game, I'm pretty much done with this year. I would rather just skip the bowl game and dive straight into spring practice. A lot of people are talking about coaching changes. I think that something probably needs to happen there - not sure what, but I've never seen a Nebraska team more out-coached than they were last night. However, as bad as the coaching was - players win championships. Last night, Wisconsin's players completely dominated Nebraska, especially on the lines of scrimmage. My question to you is - how are we going to fix that? On the defensive line, we lose Eric Martin and Baker Steinkuhler, by far the two most important players there. We also lose Cameron Meredith and Joseph Carter, while Jason Ankrah, Thad Randle and Chase Rome return. I've seen nothing from the latter three players that make me think they can form the kind of defensive front that will win a conference championship. So - who steps up, or what juco player is going to come and rescue us? Are Vincent Valentine or Aaron Curry going to be ready? I think the LB spot looks a little more optimistic. Zaire Anderson returns from injury, and I'm fairly certain he would have been our team's leading tackler by now if he had stayed healthy. David Santos also returns while Michael Rose and Thomas Brown join the fray. If guys get their heads in the game and learn the defense (and practice form tackling day and night), I think it's possible our LB position could be much stronger next year. I think we've got plenty of talent in the secondary, especially at the corner position. Ciante Evans, Josh Mitchell, Andrew Green, Stanley Jean-Baptiste, Charles Jackson, and Mohammed Seisay all return. At safety we're much thinner, with Courtney Osborne, PJ Smith, and Daimion Stafford all leaving. However, if we can just find two guys (maybe Corey Cooper and Harvey Jackson) who simply know how to take an angle and wrap up, we'll be better off than we were this year. On offense, it's all about the the offensive line and tight end. For the second year in a row, I believe we'll have the best collection of skill position players in the Big Ten (Martinez returns, Armstrong joins; Abdullah, Heard, Cross return; Bell, Enunwa, Turner, Steven Osborne, Tariq Allen all return, while Jordan Westerkamp joins that battle for playing time). At tight end we lose both Cotton and Reed, while we return Jake Long. Jake Long looked hideously bad in the Minnesota game, but there was also an article written about how NFL scouts are already looking at him, so maybe he will be able to fill in appropriately. On the offensive line, we lose Justin Jackson, but we return Sirles, Qvale, Long, Pensick, and Rodriguez. Behind them, we have little to no proven depth. It's possible they put together a solid starting 5, but who is going to step up to provide depth should someone go down (like Justin Jackson)? In 2013, it should be an awfully good offense, depending on the offensive line. It's hard to imagine the defense being worse than it was last night, but I'm very, very worried about the defensive line. What say you?

The game got pretty chippy for the next 15 minutes or so. Didn't change the momentum really - Nebraska still scored on the drive and the game was already well out of hand. People here aren't mad because it changed the game, they're mad because it was a fantastic play by Bell and by Turner.

If Kenny Bell can't do that, you might as well just play touch football. You can't block the guy below his waist, and you lead with your head, and now you can't hit the guy in his chest with your shoulder? What the hell is Kenny Bell supposed to do? What are coaches supposed to tell him? "Hey, Kenny, block that guy, but do it nice and gentle-like."

This seems pretty fair to me. The offensive line is by far the weak link on the offense, and you can't have that. The front seven on defense has been atrocious most of the last two years, with the exception of Lavonte David. Not sure about Dobson - I think our problems might have more to do with technique than with speed or strength.

Terrible call. Play football.

Firing a guy who just went 11-3 or 10-4 and won his division would put the Nebraska football in the dumps worse than the Callahan era. You don't fire Pelini. Does he need to change assistant coaches? Probably... It was a pretty bad defense for most of this year, and in three games in particular, they put up some of the worst performances in school history. Obviously, something needs to change. Right now, I'm most tempted to agree with Damon Benning - they need to change the way they practice.

Disagree all you want. In the aftermath of that loss, people wanted Osborne fired, they were down on the program, and this state was in a funk for a year. People will forget about this loss soon enough. It's just another of many for Pelini. But that 1983 loss stuck with people for a long time. It was different. People aren't going to forget about this loss soon. You don't get humiliated like that in a conference championship game and forget about it. I'm not saying this is the worst loss ever, but it is really, really bad.

Ok, let me rephrase the question. Was this the worst loss in Husker history? That was the spirit of the question anyways. Without question, no. It was the 1983 Orange Bowl. wow Knapp. what a swing. 70-31 loss to a one point last second loss. One extreme to the other. my land. How did you feel after that loss? I guarantee that was worse for Husker nation than this. Disagree. That game was more heartbreaking, but even today it's one of the greatest sources of pride for Nebraska fans. 30 years from now, fans are going to want to remove this game from the records like a wrinkly tattoo that your friend-nemesis tricked you into getting after slipping you some roofies.

I'm not sure what coaching changes need to be made, but you need better gameplanning on defense, and you need to have much, much better play and much better depth on both lines.

The offense is fine. We need a defense. edit: wouldn't mind seeing Beck use some imagination though. Could take a lesson from Wisconsin's OC...

They've scored 63 on us with their 3rd string QB. And we haven't even gotten to the 4th quarter yet.