This Season Seems Hollow . . .

[Not since 97]

When did I cry because Callahan was gone? I thought he should be fired for retaining dud coaches. What I am saying is watch the Texas, Washington, Iowa state, OU, A&M, Wisconsin, Northwestern games and tell me Nebraska is improving

I'll raise you this year's games against PSU, MSU, '10 and '09 Missouri, '09 Arizona, and '09 Oklahoma. All wins, all good teams.

 

Let's just go ahead and put the clamps down on this "We are Nebraska" B.S. that you and so many others talk about these days. We are Nebraska, but that doesn't mean much of anything in the scope of college football today. Everybody has athletes now unlike two decades ago. Coaching is far more sophisticated. Game film review is far more advanced. Schools that didn't have money are making more of it. Furthermore, we're in the middle of the U.S., subjected to frigid winters and stifling summers. We're not going to ever be able to recruit like the LSU's and Florida's of the world. We're just not. And inadvertently demanding that we should be better than everybody else just because we're Nebraska is naive and unfocused.

 

Second of all, go back and look at T.O.'s first years, and recall the fact that he was almost fired after the first several years of his coaching tenure. He took over a championship winning team, had big wins, had bad foul ups and could never beat Oklahoma. I'm sure you're glad we held onto him, aren't you?

you will raise me PSU this year? Seriously? A team that not only lost their head coach and Programs 50 year mascot but played for a program most of the Nation saw as child raping enablers? I bet those practices were really focused and the preparation was top notch. It would be like being a boxer that KOed another boxer that just got hit by a truck. Zona? Really, as in the Mike Stoops was fired for being terrible Zona? I could possibly give you that weak OU team but thats digging. This years MSU is and always be MSU. Great win for sure but touting a win against Michigan state and using that as an argument to counter our completely horrid losses against Texas , Northwestern, Iowa State and other sludge teams AT Home come off WAY more ridiculous than stating " We are Nebraska"

 

Trust me I understand we aren't the Nebraska Brand we were in 97, not even close. I do doubt recruits are fighting to get here but if you can't build off of N'Suh and our amazing secondary and produce anything other than this years defense, there's issues. Being in the top 10 all-time wins does the same thing for recruiting it does for Michigan, tOSU, Notre Dame, that are in a lot colder regions than Lincoln will ever be. So you're say there is no "We are Nebraska" and basically the same as Hawaii as a brand except Hawaii gets better recruits because of the weather? There is a Brand and tradition that constitutes not having linemen on both sides of the ball not being manhandled by Div 2 teams IMHO

This diatribe is becoming useless, but lets break this down into segments.

 

First, PSU has a Top 10 defense (scoring and total yards). Regardless of extenuating factors, they're a good defensive football team. Second, I'm failing to see your point about Stoops. Things didn't pan out for him, but that '09 Arizona squad came within a field goal in double overtime of defeating then #11 ranked Oregon. They also beat #18 ranked USC 21-17 before the Holiday Bowl, finishing the season at 8-5. Great football team? No. Good football team? Yes.

 

Your MSU comment is just as naive as your "We Are Nebraska" diatribe and the overtly/not-so-well-concealed pessimism in your name. MSU has a good squad that beat both Michigan (a team favored against us this weekend at home) and Wisconsin (a team we failed to beat). "This years MSU is and always be MSU." Really? It's quite obvious you're putting Nebraska on a pedestal here, yet you seem to be inadvertently saying that we're bad? Your clarity is poor here.

 

Your final paragraph perfectly exemplifies the issue many people on this board simply don't comprehend - football is different today than it was 20 years ago. You say you understand, yet you think we should be able to build off one of the best defenses in '09 two years later? Players leave and coaches leave. In today's game, it's near impossible to reload every year, especially with scholarship limits. You're going to have down years. Remember how everybody wanted to fire LSU's Les Miles a couple of years ago, and now all of a sudden he's God down there again? That was coming off of a championship season. This should be more than enough evidence to you that fans can be completely full of themselves and completely unrealistic about today's college football.

 

Lastly, ND and Michigan are more tradition rich programs than we. tOSU is almost geographically similar to Nebraska on a map - their winters are no different, but they're right in the middle of a fantastic recruiting hot bed and are one of "the" premiere programs in the country. Maybe not today, but they were the last several years. Nebraska hasn't been there since the late 90's and early 2000's. You misunderstand me. We're better than Hawaii and we do have a tradition of excellence here. However, recruits are going to a lot of different places now and recruiting is tougher today than it ever has been. As far as the lines are concerned, I'll be the first one to tell you I believe Cotton is the sole reason our offensive line isn't consistent. Defensively, we're undersized and undermanned right now. We're transitioning from a new conference where size wasn't as big of a deal. What more does your unrealistic and over-demanding world want from Nebraska?

I would assume my diatribe would become useless to you when you don't see PSUs distinct disadvantage last week. Lets say we discover Monday that Tom Osborne knew we had assistants raping little kids and did nothing and Bo got fired on Wednesday, you think we would be competitive against Iowa? I don't throw much on " Top 10 defense" either, throw Penn State in the SEC and lets check their defensive stats out, heck, throw them in the Pac10 or Big XII South and lets check their stats. To Say MSU is a good team I would have to acknowledge that their coaching staff isn't completely off their rockers,against us, they came out with run, were marching down the field like everyone does against our vaunted run defense and then decided to go pass happy the rest of the game, with terrible coaching like that, we still have a good shot at a conference title game. Yes they are still just Michigan State. The fact they beat Wisconsin means zilch to me because I see Wisconsin as Wisconsin and thats not a Ron Dayne Wisconsin either. Your whole Nebraskas nobody compared to Notre Dame, Michigan and tOSU in tradition comes off as outlandish for recruiting purposes considering Im not the oldest fart in the world but during my lifetime, Nebraska has completely dominated all those programs in National Championships, Heisman winners ( tOSU had a nice run on those) and outright New Years eve bowls when New years was the standard in who's who. So todays players parents and Grandparents see Michigan, Notre Dame and probationized tOSU as more tradition rich than poor lil old Nebraska? I Might give you players great Grandparents that watched us beat the Four Horsemen or Bud Wilkensons unbeatable Sooners, but Im not buying into your argument of arctic Lincoln whatsoever. Nebraska was known for linemen up to 97 and also with Suh, this is where I come up with "We are Nebraska". I do agree "We were Nebraska" is more factual but our tradition is much more recent than anyone else's cold weather schools not on probation.

[sd'sker]

i'm just going to say it; nebraska will never be unbeatable.

 

our loss to NW was not a fluke, they outplayed us. should we have won? sure. should we be ashamed of losing to a great coached team? absolutely not. bo has done nothing to warrant serious criticism. does he fail expectations? who does not. should his teams be better? what team should not be.

 

we ARE nebraska, and this IS what nebraska is. accept it.

[Not since 97]

i'm just going to say it; nebraska will never be unbeatable.

 

our loss to NW was not a fluke, they outplayed us. should we have won? sure. should we be ashamed of losing to a great coached team? absolutely not. bo has done nothing to warrant serious criticism. does he fail expectations? who does not. should his teams be better? what team should not be.

 

we ARE nebraska, and this IS what nebraska is. accept it.

Then why have discussion boards? To praise bad clock management and buddy hires? Lets be clear here, we didn't need the interwebs for Osborne to feel the heat from choking away seasons with percieved slow walk-ons, it didn't take much of a Rocket scientist to see our slowness was our downfall and go get some speed/thugs. They did just that, on defense

[The Dude]

I first read the username "Not since 97" and my first thought was "this guy has to be a troll". Then I clicked on the thread and read half a post and thought "yep, confirmed".

[It'sNotAFakeID]

Yeah, I'll bite. That's not a Ron Dayne Wisconsin? What the hell does that even mean? The Wisconsin team CREAMED us. And then Michigan State beat that SAME Wisconsin team which CREAMED us. It doesn't matter what Michigan State team was or will be. It is what they are and they proved on the field that they were BETTER than Wisconsin. That same Michigan State team, which BEAT the SAME team that CREAMED us, came into Lincoln and got SHUT DOWN, 24-3.

 

Callahan inherited a team that was very high in caliber. He turned the team into a team which couldn't even win 6 games. Because Southern Mississippi was SUCH a great team. Kansas State was being coached by Ron Prince. We lost to Iowa State that year, a real JUGGERNAUT in the Big XII. The Oklahoma State of 2006 was such a dominant team, considering they were unranked, we lost that game, and we were ranked 20th. Colorado 2007 ring any bells.

 

Remember Bo Pelini took over in 2008. That was still when the booger eater was at Missouri, that was that Mike Leach team which competed for a BCS bowl that year [remember they beat Texas and went 7-1], that was still the Mangino Kansas team which was fighting for BCS bids. Bo lost to Mizzou, took Texas Tech to OT in THEIR place, and beat the Kansas team. Since he has taken over, Nebraska has not lost to Kansas State, Kansas, or Colorado. Since he has taken over, he was a winning record in bowl games, against Missouri, and Iowa State. He has been to conference championships and we really should have 2.

 

Bill Callahan was 3-9, yes THREE AND NINE against ranked teams. Meaning he only played twelve ranked teams. Bo Pelini is 7-8 against ranked teams. It's not a great record but it's ~22% better than Bill in the same amount of time against more ranked opponents. Don't even use the Bill had a tougher schedule argument. Callahan lost against ranked teams by 27, 3, 18, 2, 14, 3, 18, 35, 3, and 37. Bo has lost to ranked teams by 35, 6, 34, 1, 1, 3, 3, and 31. That's 5 games out of 8 within a score of winning. Callahan had 4 in 9 games. Even more, the 35 and 34 point loss by Bo's teams, were pretty much Callahan's team, look at what we've done as he's gotten more time.

 

But keep saying he's not a good coach.

[AK-47]

It's year 4 in the Pelini era and we have terrible coaching including obvious recruiting flaws, game management ( timeouts used up by defense, end of Northwestern game???) Not getting Backups in in garbage time, no depth or lack of playing certain people due to vendettas, buddy hires gone wrong (also known as Cosgrovean Cottonism) and playing like crap over the last 2 years against arguably the easiest schedules in YEARS. When Wisconsin and MSU are the biggest games of the year you know you have a NC schedule on your hands. We tried as hard as we could to let a dysfunctional PSU beat us, a decent team would have hung a half a hundred on them last week and emptied the bench after the turmoil they went through. We canned Callahan after 4 years, our 3 million dollar man better step up to the plate SOON. Remember that Callahan was playing KU,Missou, Leached TT's teams that were battling for BCS bowls not to mention strong Texas/Sooners/USC teams. At least we saw talent being recruited

 

Nice first post. If you're here to troll, don't get comfortable. You won't be here long.

Wait a second, you repeated half my post almost word for word than cut it out for this response and Im trolling? I actually thought I treated Pelini with kid gloves considering I left out his sideline antics, media presence, and the way he's handled our offense the last 3 years

Nah, you said we have horrible coaching and we're coming off of consecutive conference championship game appearances and we are in the running to make it three straight. It was not an intelligent (and more importantly, accurate) statement.

 

EDIT: And when you are referring to his media presence, are you intentionally ignoring the accolades Pelini has received for his post-game interviews following the Penn State game regarding the delicate (and infuriating) situation in State College? Only someone who doesn't want to see it could state that Pelini hasn't improved markedly in this area this year.

Accolades for saying the game shouldn't have happened and taking away even more from PSU Collegiate Athletes who expeirienced the most horrendous week one can imagine? A trained monkey knows the victims of the PSU debacle were top priority but to strip away the PSU players chance to live out their dreams of going un-beaten in the B1G seems ridiculous to me.

Im referring to the way he handles the media and the officiating crews not to mention his attitude towards the fans responsible for his 3 million dollars he receives. His consistant blaming of the players for the Northwestern type losses is ridiculous, what I am seeing on the field is a product of coaching/recruiting.

 

He made it too consecutive conference games in a Big XII North who replaced most of their head coaches, who couldnt with the athletes he had. What other Big XII North team could possibly make it? So being in the running for a third on the hopes and prayers of MSU is respectable after that home game disaster that was Northwestern? Lets see how the next 2 games go before we get too excited about relying on MSU to send us in the back door of a "down" Conference Championship. You really think if the PSU players had not experienced the worst possible scenerio possible last week, lost their head coach and all the emotion they endured we would still be in the hunt?

 

[sd'sker]

I first read the username "Not since 97" and my first thought was "this guy has to be a troll". Then I clicked on the thread and read half a post and thought "yep, confirmed".

and in all fairness, 'not since '97' ain't that long ago.

[champaignhusker]

Over the past four years the only thing that makes a season hallow to me is the consistency of losing one game to a team with a losing record. Oh well, GBR!

[sd'sker]

i'm just going to say it; nebraska will never be unbeatable.

 

our loss to NW was not a fluke, they outplayed us. should we have won? sure. should we be ashamed of losing to a great coached team? absolutely not. bo has done nothing to warrant serious criticism. does he fail expectations? who does not. should his teams be better? what team should not be.

 

we ARE nebraska, and this IS what nebraska is. accept it.

Then why have discussion boards? To praise bad clock management and buddy hires? Lets be clear here, we didn't need the interwebs for Osborne to feel the heat from choking away seasons with percieved slow walk-ons, it didn't take much of a Rocket scientist to see our slowness was our downfall and go get some speed/thugs. They did just that, on defense

you can have any opinion you want, and i am glad you share it. i just do not see the rationale or purpose. it is hard enough to be consistently good in football this day and age, let alone make it to a national championship.

 

 

and let us be honest, the best thing in college football is the anticipation of getting to a national championship. after it is a little anti-climatic because everyone is already looking toward the next year. and look at some teams after their championships, they completely drop-off. being a husker fan has been a lot of fun lately because of the ups-and-downs.

[It'sNotAFakeID]

Not since 97, so Mike Gundy must be an awful coach as well.

[bshirt]

Yeah, those miserable Clones just beat a 10 - 0 Okie St team that was ranked #2 in the nation. Gundy needs to be fired too.

[It'sNotAFakeID]

That whole staff is just a complete failure.

[Not since 97]

Yeah, I'll bite. That's not a Ron Dayne Wisconsin? What the hell does that even mean? The Wisconsin team CREAMED us. And then Michigan State beat that SAME Wisconsin team which CREAMED us. It doesn't matter what Michigan State team was or will be. It is what they are and they proved on the field that they were BETTER than Wisconsin. That same Michigan State team, which BEAT the SAME team that CREAMED us, came into Lincoln and got SHUT DOWN, 24-3.

 

Callahan inherited a team that was very high in caliber. He turned the team into a team which couldn't even win 6 games. Because Southern Mississippi was SUCH a great team. Kansas State was being coached by Ron Prince. We lost to Iowa State that year, a real JUGGERNAUT in the Big XII. The Oklahoma State of 2006 was such a dominant team, considering they were unranked, we lost that game, and we were ranked 20th. Colorado 2007 ring any bells.

 

Remember Bo Pelini took over in 2008. That was still when the booger eater was at Missouri, that was that Mike Leach team which competed for a BCS bowl that year [remember they beat Texas and went 7-1], that was still the Mangino Kansas team which was fighting for BCS bids. Bo lost to Mizzou, took Texas Tech to OT in THEIR place, and beat the Kansas team. Since he has taken over, Nebraska has not lost to Kansas State, Kansas, or Colorado. Since he has taken over, he was a winning record in bowl games, against Missouri, and Iowa State. He has been to conference championships and we really should have 2.

 

Bill Callahan was 3-9, yes THREE AND NINE against ranked teams. Meaning he only played twelve ranked teams. Bo Pelini is 7-8 against ranked teams. It's not a great record but it's ~22% better than Bill in the same amount of time against more ranked opponents. Don't even use the Bill had a tougher schedule argument. Callahan lost against ranked teams by 27, 3, 18, 2, 14, 3, 18, 35, 3, and 37. Bo has lost to ranked teams by 35, 6, 34, 1, 1, 3, 3, and 31. That's 5 games out of 8 within a score of winning. Callahan had 4 in 9 games. Even more, the 35 and 34 point loss by Bo's teams, were pretty much Callahan's team, look at what we've done as he's gotten more time.

 

But keep saying he's not a good coach.

Excuse me, I did mention that MSU came out running and was blowing through our wet paper towel defense and all of a sudden they just stop cold and start heaving the ball around the rest of the game. Why would you spend an entire paragraph trying to to change my mind that MSU is good with idiotic coaching like that? Most High School and Pee Wee coaches aren't that stupid right? then you proceed to this

Callahan inherited a team that was very high in caliber

seriously, thanks for the good laugh but wow, theres no need continuing on after that analysis. You might be the only person Ive ever met that thought recruiting was a strong point of the Solich era

[tschu]

[Not since 97]

Not since 97, so Mike Gundy must be an awful coach as well.

You said a mouthful there, no defense, same as always with OSU, they will dump their traditional last 3. Its amazing how good some appear when Texas is down. This is the same team that scored at will on Pelini last year but thankfully Watson and Martinez out heaved them in the end. So the way people around here like to say that somehow teams stay exactly the same from year to year maybe they get their rationale from the fact we went to OT with the clones last year and we beat OSU who was exposed as over rated as always.