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Rhule: Why he’ll succeed/Why he’ll fail


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Saw this topic on the Huskers Reddit and thought it was a good topic for peak off season. 


 

Succeed

- Stating the obvious. Rhule has a track record of builds and improvement. 
 

- Rhule’s energy. Kind of an intangible, but Rhule has a vibe about him that I think is important for the situation he’s in. This program needs some positive energy and he has that in spades. 


- Rhule’s vision sounds like the right fit. Run the ball. Play solid defense. I think we’ve had a string of coaches that have to show everyone they’re the smartest guy in the stadium and ultimately end up overthinking themselves. Winning in the B1G (and college football in general) isn’t exactly rocket science. Being a physical team that plays good defense and can run the ball should net a respectable amount of W’s. 


- The AD seems to be in a good place with Trev. Can’t exactly say that was the case with Eichorst and Moos. 

 

- Rhule wants to be here. Rhule has publicly noted that he’s making as much money right now as he would be if he was sitting at home unemployed. He doesn’t have to be here. Rhule seems to have a reverence for college football and Neb. Does anyone really believe Callahan or Riley were dying to be here? Bo was looking to bail as early as 2011. Despite all the “Golden Boy” headlines about Frost, he always had a bit of a tenuous relationship with Neb. I can’t say for certain, but I think Frost liked the idea of coming home to coach more than the reality of it. Of all those guys, Rhule seems to be the most N. 


 

Fail

- His staff’s inexperience. This is my biggest and only real concern at this point. Rhule and his staff have a combined 1 year of experience coaching in the B1G. That 1 year belongs to Donovan Raiola from last year. 6 of his assistants have zero Power 5 experience. One assistant has never coached at the college level and one has never coached at any level. Maybe this truly is the group of guys to get things on track. But I’m not going to hold my breath.

- The 3-3-5. Perhaps it’ll work. But I cant say I’m completely sold on it. I believe White has also said they won’t run it exclusively. 

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Good stuff!

 

So many teams are running what we'd call this 3-3-5. Whether you're a 4-3, a 3-4, a 3-3-5, you either have at least one physical & athletic edge rusher that can get to the passer or you don't. I think there's a good chance that if MJ Sherman & Jamari Butler are highly motivated, we're covered there. That's kind of what we've lacked on defense for the last several seasons (in addition to some bad tackling sprinkled in there).

 

As far as running the ball goes, biggest thing to talk about there is how hard that's actually going to be, in my opinion. Just saying he's going to make it a priority doesn't mean much. We've had a problem getting our running back's to produce good YPC numbers. We had Martinez padding our rushing stats for three years (2019 - 2021), but we kind of struggled to get our base running game going.

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2 minutes ago, Undone said:

you either have at least one physical & athletic edge rusher that can get to the passer or you don't... That's kind of what we've lacked on defense for the last several seasons

 

Amen. This has been such a huge frustration with our past couple of staffs. If you can't put pressure on the opposing QB, even bad QBs look like all-stars. Prime example, Ryan Hilinski last year in Dublin. Almost 19% of his total completions last year came against us. 

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1 hour ago, Undone said:

As far as running the ball goes, biggest thing to talk about there is how hard that's actually going to be, in my opinion. Just saying he's going to make it a priority doesn't mean much. We've had a problem getting our running back's to produce good YPC numbers. We had Martinez padding our rushing stats for three years (2019 - 2021), but we kind of struggled to get our base running game going.

Actually, you might want to replay some Bo coached games. There's a video, forget what team we were playing against, where we ran 20+ power sweeps. Also, are you saying Ameer (edit) or Rex (end edit) didn't have anything to do with the Husker's rushing stats? I'd say our offensive lines were pretty decent in the BP era. Might I remind you the huskers won bowl games against both Clemson and Georgia under Bo. 

 

Lastly, I am a novice arm chair type so I can't comment on what's happened since Bo but line recruitment and development surely are both reasons for Riley & Frost struggles. I think, (might be wrong) Frost recruited decent talent. Yes/No? 

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57 minutes ago, Loebarth said:

Actually, you might want to replay some Bo coached games. There's a video, forget what team we were playing against, where we ran 20+ power sweeps. Also, are you saying Ameer didn't have anything to do with the Husker's rushing stats? I'd say our offensive lines were pretty decent in the BP era. Might I remind you the huskers won bowl games against both Clemson and Georgia under Bo. 

 

 

Funny you bring this up because I was just thinking about this game as I was reading the OP's post and Rhule's 'run game and defense' mantra. 

 

The game you're referencing was 2012 against Penn State, and is, imo, the most 'Nebraska' we've been since Solich got canned. As much fun as it having an Eric Crouch or Taylor Martinez or Adrian Martinez with SCTop10 plays and electric offense, I'm over it. Give me dirty, physical and ugly football that results in wins any day. 

 

BTW, here's a compilation of the 22 times Beck ran the toss sweep in that game.

 

 

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1 hour ago, Undone said:

Good stuff!

 

So many teams are running what we'd call this 3-3-5. Whether you're a 4-3, a 3-4, a 3-3-5, you either have at least one physical & athletic edge rusher that can get to the passer or you don't. I think there's a good chance that if MJ Sherman & Jamari Butler are highly motivated, we're covered there. That's kind of what we've lacked on defense for the last several seasons (in addition to some bad tackling sprinkled in there).

 

As far as running the ball goes, biggest thing to talk about there is how hard that's actually going to be, in my opinion. Just saying he's going to make it a priority doesn't mean much. We've had a problem getting our running back's to produce good YPC numbers. We had Martinez padding our rushing stats for three years (2019 - 2021), but we kind of struggled to get our base running game going.


I know it was just the spring game, but Sherman had a couple “Whoa” moments. Hopefully he can be that pass rush presence we’ve desperately needed. 
 

OL is going to have to take a step forward this year if the running game is going to be a threat. I wasn’t thrilled about DR being retained, but I also realize OL cannot be fixed overnight. If there was one improvement from last year, I feel like they at least played more disciplined. I don’t have the numbers in front of me, but I feel like there were fewer drive killing false starts and holdings. 2021 felt like we were good for one or two of those at the worst possible moment. 2022 seemed like those were cut back. 

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1 hour ago, Loebarth said:

Actually, you might want to replay some Bo coached games. There's a video, forget what team we were playing against, where we ran 20+ power sweeps. Also, are you saying Ameer (edit) or Rex (end edit) didn't have anything to do with the Husker's rushing stats? I'd say our offensive lines were pretty decent in the BP era. Might I remind you the huskers won bowl games against both Clemson and Georgia under Bo.

 

Not exactly sure what made you think I was talking about the Bo Pelini era. I was talking about the Frost era, and specifically referenced the 2019 - 2021 seasons.

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24 minutes ago, Fru said:

I don’t have the numbers in front of me, but I feel like there were fewer drive killing false starts and holdings. 2021 felt like we were good for one or two of those at the worst possible moment. 2022 seemed like those were cut back. 

 

Yes. If the only major improvements on offense are not chronically fumbling and not chronically getting false starts/holds/away-from-the-ball penalties, we'd probably take a significant jump forward.

 

There's a lot of talk about how Rhule will use big, bunched sets to run the ball out of, in an effort to help the offensive line by having extra blockers. There's nothing about that plan that absolutely means our running back productivity is going to be any better than it was in the last couple seasons at all; the players still have to actually isolate defenders & create holes.

 

It'll take a ton of steps forward in execution for any of that to be better than it has been.

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1 hour ago, Lorewarn said:

 

 

Funny you bring this up because I was just thinking about this game as I was reading the OP's post and Rhule's 'run game and defense' mantra. 

 

The game you're referencing was 2012 against Penn State, and is, imo, the most 'Nebraska' we've been since Solich got canned. As much fun as it having an Eric Crouch or Taylor Martinez or Adrian Martinez with SCTop10 plays and electric offense, I'm over it. Give me dirty, physical and ugly football that results in wins any day. 

 

BTW, here's a compilation of the 22 times Beck ran the toss sweep in that game.

 

 

I don't understand the reverse pivot with Martinez and having him follow the play.  He never really blocked anyone.  Could have had him open play side with a boot action after the toss that would have had to freeze the back side end and probably a LB.  Then when they stop caring he could have run for days.  

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1 hour ago, Lorewarn said:

 

 

Funny you bring this up because I was just thinking about this game as I was reading the OP's post and Rhule's 'run game and defense' mantra. 

 

The game you're referencing was 2012 against Penn State, and is, imo, the most 'Nebraska' we've been since Solich got canned. As much fun as it having an Eric Crouch or Taylor Martinez or Adrian Martinez with SCTop10 plays and electric offense, I'm over it. Give me dirty, physical and ugly football that results in wins any day. 

 

BTW, here's a compilation of the 22 times Beck ran the toss sweep in that game.

 

 


Yeah, Tim Beck is remembered with such vitriol by so many fans but I don't really get it.

 

He had a good knack for running both inside and outside power. His formations, plays, and the execution he got out of his players were pretty impressive when you consider how much steam the Nebraska "brand name" had lost by the time Callahan had been fired.

 

But then as @Loebarth mentioned, he also had the luxury of running backs named Rex Burkhead and Ameer Abdullah. I think Abdullah was possibly the fourth best Husker running back of all time (with Phillips, Rozier, & Green ahead of him). He was potentially even right there with Green. So...that gave the Bo era's offense a boost that can't be overstated.

 

Swinging over into the Frost era, it seemed like Frost wanted to run quite a bit of outside runs when he had Maurice Washington for a brief stint, and then he sort of switched to favoring the inside zone attack, and we just didn't do it very well under him IMO.

 

To bring it forward to Rhule, whether or not he'll run outside power consistently is something I'm pretty interested in finding out. I'd like to watch this team try that with Johnson.

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2 hours ago, knapplc said:

 

Amen. This has been such a huge frustration with our past couple of staffs. If you can't put pressure on the opposing QB, even bad QBs look like all-stars. Prime example, Ryan Hilinski last year in Dublin. Almost 19% of his total completions last year came against us. 

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