Cornicator Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 Its kind of hard to believe considering just how bad the defense looked about a month ago, but ever since halftime of the Ohio State game, NU has started playing some shut down defense. Now that could just be an abberation because Ohio State without Braxton Miller is bad offensively, Minnesota sucks against every team not from Iowa, and Michigan State's offense is just bad anyway. We will get a much bigger test against a terrific offensive football team in Northwestern. The defense will really need to step up next week. But none-the-less, our defensive numbers are creeping up the National Rankings and looking much better than a month ago: 29th in Total Defense at 334.63. I'm actually surpised NU is in the top 30 with that number. Defensive numbers as a whole this season are less impressive unless you're named Alabama. 12th in Pass Defense at 179 ypg. That number is a bit misleading because of the bad passing games we've seen. It will continue to get better though just because of the competition. 23rd in Pass Def Eff- This is a more important number than Pass Defense. It factors in completion percentage and interceptions. NU has been among the best teams in the country the last few years in this category which is a good reason of why Gomes, Prince, and Hagg are all in the NFL. 33rd in scoring D- 22.5 ppg. I want this number to keep going down. Its the most important number in football. It doesn't just guage a defenses strength. It also takes into account how good teams are on special teams and avoiding points off of turnovers. Get this number below 20 and the Huskers will be primed for a special season. Our rush defense is still bad, allowing 166 yards per game. However, they've only surrendered 12 rushing touchdowns in 8 games. That's not great, but its not terrible. NU is 51st in total offense at 412 ypg. There is nothing wrong with averaging more than 400 ypg. The Huskers are 9th nationally in rushing at 252 yards per game. The most impressive part of that stat is Ohio State and Michigan State are both ranked in the top 25 Nationally in rush defense. Nebraska rushed for 441 yards and 4 touchdowns against those two teams. Michigan State has allowed 7 rushing TD's all year. NU had 2 of them. Ohio State has only given up 5 rushing TD's all year. NU has 2. Huskers are 22nd Nationally in scoring at 35.88 PPG. Expect that number to rise with teams like NW, Michigan and Iowa left on the schedule. Penn State will be tough to score on though. 1 Quote Link to comment
JJ Husker Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 Getting our scoring D under 20ppg would be quite a feat. A shutout next game would get us to 20 or we would have to average under 14ppg for our remaining 4 games. I'd love to see it but I don't think it makes us primed for a special season unless you're referring to next season. Quote Link to comment
suh_fan93 Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 I don't think it should be so surprising that a defense improves or has that 'one game' where things start clicking for them. I just want to see consistency now. Really proud of the defense. They were awesome against Michigan State. Would love to see these guys start having more games like Saturday and I'm optimistic that we will. Quote Link to comment
bshirt Posted October 30, 2011 Share Posted October 30, 2011 It really does seem hard to believe as our defense was absolutely horrible the 1st half of the year. The run defense is marginal as hell still but even that is improving slowly. It came at the nick of time, that's for sure. GBR!! Quote Link to comment
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