What's your outlook for the season after the BYU game?

[The Dude]

I'm not as high on Wisconsin or Miami as you are, Dude. I really don't think Wisconsin is all that great of a team. Despite the fact they played an unbelievably talented and stout Alabama defense, 10 points is really...not a lot.

 

I suppose you haven't heard my conspiracy theory about Alvarez using half his administration time watching Nebraska film so they always have an edge on us?

[knapplc]

Northwestern surprised the heck out of me. They outplayed Stanford handily. That game's difficulty just ramped up significantly.

 

Wisconsin played the toughest opponent they'll face the rest of the regular season. They could win out and I wouldn't be surprised. Not sure about their O Line, though. If it isn't "vintage Wisconsin," they could lose to Nebraska and/or Minnesota.

 

Iowa played well in their win. They played a division IAA school, but it was a GOOD D1AA school.

 

It's still too hard to say how the rest of the season will play out based on this game. We still don't know how good BYU was, or how good we are. The injuries are going to play a huge role in how this season develops, too. BYU may have been a significantly better team against Nebraska than they are the rest of the season without Hill. They could go 7-5 without him, could have gone 10-2 with him. Maybe this Mangum kid will surprise everyone.

 

The injuries make gauging the rest of the season too big a wildcard. Having said that, if we fix us, I'd say we finish around 8-4 and a middling bowl game.

[bleedNUred]

Sticking with my pre season prediction of 10-2, I think we make adjustments and get better as the season goes along as well as getting guys back such as DPE etc. Besides the blown Hail Mary coverage to end the game, the defense was great in fixing what killed them in the first half. Love seeing adjustments to fix deficiencies.

[TGHusker]

As mentioned before, the injuries are the biggest unknown at this time - yet they can't be an excuse. I suspect 9-3 or 8-4 at worse. I can see the 7-5 situation if our kicking game becomes an anchor that drags us down - no DPE, No solid punter, and Brown continuing to struggle.

I see us improving on D with each game and we'll get the running game thing worked out - now it is all about special teams in my opinion as to where the record ends up.

[Minnesota_husker]

I was optimistic that we could go 10-2... I knew it was a bit of a pipe dream.

 

But now, i think we lose to Miami, Michigan state, Minnesota, Wisconsin and maybe Northwestern.

 

I think we will improve on things but this is just going to be one of those years. 8 wins(max)

[skersfan]

I am not worried about the team. In better hands, coach knows the problems, some may take better recruiting. Injuries have to be dealt with by every team.

 

I said 9-3. Three starters out, two knocked out of the game and one injured late. Tells me it was a pretty tough test for the kids. They were playing grown men.

 

Nebraska Fan and Vegas were the only ones having us win this game. Most felt we would get curb stomped. We could have won, but sometimes a loss makes you want the win more, you work harder for it.

 

Expecting to be better is okay, but everything takes time. the kids seem to be working hard for Coach Riley. I still love what I see. A team that is working together and supporting each other.

[BigRedBuster]

I said that we would lose 2-3 games this year. After this game, that probably is stretched to 2-4 games.

 

Two areas of concern are the running offense and the passing defense. I think the running offense can be helped by adding to it instead of basically running 2-3 plays constantly. Add creativity. Our O line should jell and get better.

 

The passing offense isn't going to see the mismatches they saw in this game again this year as far as size along with a really good QB. So, I see the DBs playing better moving forward.

 

I personally think we will see a very different team by the time we play either Miami or Wisconsin.

[KazLong]

I'm writing a new album called 1899 that or 2004.

 

Seriously though, I am not even angry just disappointed.

 

4-8.

 

Wins South Bama, South Miss, Purdue and Ill.

 

I do not expect to see too many blow out losses. MR is such a nice guy I doubt people will give him the Bo Pelini get ya fired blow outs that Wisky loved doing.That said I see a lot of long boring games, more mental errors and blah blah blah.

 

meh. <>.<>

 

Maybe I just need a snickers?

[BIGREDIOWAN]

WOW, I'm gonna look like a jerk with my prediction and I'm not down on the team by any means, but I'm probably trying to protect myself some here. I see 5-7 wins being the ceiling this year unless we make huge strides.

BYU: L (Obviously)

South Alabama: W

Miami: L

Southern Miss: W

Illinois: W

Wisconsin: L (Toss up) (Depends on O-line)

Minnesota: L

Northwestern: L

Purdue: W

Michigan State: L

Rutgers: W

Iowa: L (Toss up)

Bowl game: (If we make one is unknown depending on opponent)

 

As long as I see some improvement in the areas of concern from last year, penalties, mental health, etc. I'll deal with a bad year if it can get us back on track for next year. I truly hope that I'm wrong and I'm not trying to be negative, just trying to be realistic if anything to protect myself. We go on and win 11 games, I'll be thrilled as hell, but I just don't see it. The B1G West isn't as weak as the "experts" like to say it is.

[4skers89]

It's still too hard to say how the rest of the season will play out based on this game. We still don't know how good BYU was, or how good we are. The injuries are going to play a huge role in how this season develops, too. BYU may have been a significantly better team against Nebraska than they are the rest of the season without Hill. They could go 7-5 without him, could have gone 10-2 with him. Maybe this Mangum kid will surprise everyone.

Does it matter how well BYU's season goes? With poor depth and a few more injuries their season could tank. Their pass defense is not good (probably by design) and will get exploited by teams that are better at passing then we are (currently). What if Mangum is great? He didn't play that much against us. I think the most we can say is that BYU was a decent team when we played them. The good thing about that is we can look at the good and bad from the offense, defense and overall performance and project that onto the remaining opponents. After watching Hill limp down the field for 30 yards I worry about teams with mobile QBs. I thought the guy was going to go to the sideline and get some crutches first before going to the endzone.

[knapplc]

 

It's still too hard to say how the rest of the season will play out based on this game. We still don't know how good BYU was, or how good we are. The injuries are going to play a huge role in how this season develops, too. BYU may have been a significantly better team against Nebraska than they are the rest of the season without Hill. They could go 7-5 without him, could have gone 10-2 with him. Maybe this Mangum kid will surprise everyone.

Does it matter how well BYU's season goes? With poor depth and a few more injuries their season could tank. Their pass defense is not good (probably by design) and will get exploited by teams that are better at passing then we are (currently). What if Mangum is great? He didn't play that much against us. I think the most we can say is that BYU was a decent team when we played them. The good thing about that is we can look at the good and bad from the offense, defense and overall performance and project that onto the remaining opponents. After watching Hill limp down the field for 30 yards I worry about teams with mobile QBs. I thought the guy was going to go to the sideline and get some crutches first before going to the endzone.

 

It does, but only at this moment as a means of measuring Nebraska.

 

We're trying to gauge how good we are. We don't know that, even after one game, because we have no idea how good our opponent was.

 

The dumbness of what I'm saying is, we won't know how good either Nebraska or BYU are until maybe midway through the season - at which point results from this game are minimized because we have a bigger sample size. So I'm basically saying nothing, but I guess that's what we do one game into the season.