New AD or Head Coach

[Ulty]

47 minutes ago, All Hail Herbie said:

At this point, while I remain skeptical of this staff's ability to turn it around, I think we have little choice but to stay the course for another couple of seasons.  Not out of confidence in there being light at the end of the tunnel, but out of a true lack of options.  We are truly in a box.

This is where I am, too. I'm not happy about any of it, but I am simply resigned to it.

[knapplc]

27 minutes ago, Husker in WI said:

 

I'm actually with you, but I think most doubters' contention is the bottom game could easily be 2018 or 2019. We quickly improved from the end of Riley's tenure, but losing "better" does get old 3 years in. It took one year to get to a point where we could stay within a score of Iowa. 2 years later, that's still where we are.

 

I do think this year was an improvement despite the end result.. 2018 we only had a shot because Ferentz decided to try and be cute for once and let us back in. Last year we were scrapping for a lot of the game and managed to make it close, but we were not the better team. This year, we outplayed them for the majority of the game in my opinion - we just have to get out of our own way.

 

This is what's galling to me. Iowa doesn't beat us, we lose to them. We beat ourselves with dumb penalties or bad snaps, poorly-run routes or lack of ball security. These are mistakes we should not be making three years in. 

 

[HuskerNation1]

48 minutes ago, All Hail Herbie said:

Given the persistent discipline problems that I have seen for 10 years (spanning 3 coaching staffs), I do not think staff changes now will fix our problems.  These are structural issues that seem engrained in what is now a losing culture.  Moreover, staff changes not only mean disruption, but also come at significant monetary cost as well as time to transition to a new approach.  

 

At this point, while I remain skeptical of this staff's ability to turn it around, I think we have little choice but to stay the course for another couple of seasons.  Not out of confidence in there being light at the end of the tunnel, but out of a true lack of options.  We are truly in a box.

 

The only complaint I have with Moos is that he has put us in a box longer than any of us would have liked.  Frost's initial contract ran through 2024 I believe, and then he extended it two more years to 2026 in late 2019.  I am not sure why the rush to extend it as keeping it at 2024 for another year or two would not have a drastic effect on recruiting.  Thus, let's say in 2021 or 2022 that program leadership wanted to make a change after giving Frost 4 or 5 years. It will be more difficult to do so given the financials of the 2 extra years Frost is under contract. 

[Hilltop]

2 minutes ago, HuskerNation1 said:

 

The only complaint I have with Moos is that he has put us in a box longer than any of us would have liked.  Frost's initial contract ran through 2024 I believe, and then he extended it two more years to 2026 in late 2019.  I am not sure why the rush to extend it as keeping it at 2024 for another year or two would not have a drastic effect on recruiting.  Thus, let's say in 2021 or 2022 that program leadership wanted to make a change after giving Frost 4 or 5 years. It will be more difficult to do so given the financials of the 2 extra years Frost is under contract. 

This is done virtually everywhere.  If you don't extend your coaches, it shows that you are considering making a change in the coming year or two.  This can have a very damaging effect on recruiting.  Who wants to agree to go play for a coach that might not be there?

[Ulty]

Just now, knapplc said:

 

 We beat ourselves with dumb penalties or bad snaps, poorly-run routes or lack of ball security. These are mistakes we should not be making three years in. 

 

Since we are also talking about Pelini in a couple other threads...some of these same issues frustrated us during the Bo years as well. I remember thinking that Pelini under-achieved his way to 9 wins every year while we struggled with ball security, poor tackling, penalties, and lack of offensive identity. All these years later, it is the basic fundamentals of the game that still leave us scratching our heads, but the 9 annual wins has turned into 4 consecutive losing seasons.

 

I don't have answers for any of this. It all just makes me sad. 

[TheSker]

2 minutes ago, HuskerNation1 said:

 

The only complaint I have with Moos is that he has put us in a box longer than any of us would have liked.  Frost's initial contract ran through 2024 I believe, and then he extended it two more years to 2026 in late 2019.  I am not sure why the rush to extend it as keeping it at 2024 for another year or two would not have a drastic effect on recruiting.  Thus, let's say in 2021 or 2022 that program leadership wanted to make a change after giving Frost 4 or 5 years. It will be more difficult to do so given the financials of the 2 extra years Frost is under contract. 

This is not just Moos.

 

Here are some names that are all on board in making sure there's a long term commitment to Frost......Moos, Cater, Green, Osborne.

 

Frost absolutely expected the team to be better record-wise at this point.  But the names mentioned above know why we're not, and they know the plan to get us there.

[Mavric]

1 minute ago, HuskerNation1 said:

 

The only complaint I have with Moos is that he has put us in a box longer than any of us would have liked.  Frost's initial contract ran through 2024 I believe, and then he extended it two more years to 2026 in late 2019.  I am not sure why the rush to extend it as keeping it at 2024 for another year or two would not have a drastic effect on recruiting.  Thus, let's say in 2021 or 2022 that program leadership wanted to make a change after giving Frost 4 or 5 years. It will be more difficult to do so given the financials of the 2 extra years Frost is under contract. 

 

Pretty sure it was basically going to happen anyway.  But there were two or three second-year coaches getting fired already so my guess is he wanted to make it emphatic that Frost wasn't going anywhere.  It was basically the same as giving him the standard extension he would have gotten after this year.

[HuskerNation1]

I put together some data to see how the program has done over the past 10 years, and I was interested to see the differences under Pelini, Riley and Frost.  A few things jump out at me looking at this data:

 

1.  2014 was the most points scored by far and the 2nd greatest positive point differential in the past decade.  This was also the year Pelini was fired.  

2.  The 2010 defense was by far the best we have seen in the past decade.  We were still in the BIG 12 but this was near the height of Pelinis success coming off the amazing 2009 defensive season.

3.  The 2017 and 2020 seasons (3rd years for Riley and Frost) have been by far the worst point differentials over the past decade at -10.6 and -12.  

4.  The 2015 season had a better point differential than the 2016 season despite only winning 5 games in 2015 and 9 games in 2016. This shows how winning some close games can make a huge difference.

5.  We have had only one winning season in the past 6 years which was Riley's 2nd year.

 

Year	Points Scored	Points Allowed	Differential	Wins	Losses	Win Percentage
2010	30.9	17.4	13.5	10	4	0.714
2011	29.2	23.4	5.8	9	4	0.692
2012	34.8	27.6	7.2	10	4	0.714
2013	31.9	24.8	7.1	9	4	0.692
2014	37.8	26.4	11.4	9	3	0.750
2015	32.8	27.8	5	5	7	0.417
2016	26.5	23.9	2.6	9	4	0.692
2017	25.8	36.4	-10.6	4	8	0.333
2018	30	31.2	-1.2	4	8	0.333
2019	28	27.8	0.2	5	7	0.417
2020	20.6	32.6	-12	1	4	0.200

[HuskerNation1]

6 minutes ago, Hilltop said:

This is done virtually everywhere.  If you don't extend your coaches, it shows that you are considering making a change in the coming year or two.  This can have a very damaging effect on recruiting.  Who wants to agree to go play for a coach that might not be there?

 

I agree that having a coach with an extra 2 to 4 years is common in many major programs to help with recruiting.  But this extension was done in 2019 and it was extended out 7 years....that is where it got excessive.  

[Guy Chamberlin]

8 minutes ago, Hilltop said:

2017 Illinois also went winless in the B1G and was starting a roster full of underclassmen.  It was Lovie Smith's reset...  Nebraska just played against many of the same players with 4 years of experience.  

 

I think you over-estimate my seriousness. There's not much to learn from these cherry-picked comparisons.

 

Although now that you mention it --- Illinois and Nebraska both sucked balls in 2017. And they still suck balls in 2020. But Illinois was clearly the better team this year.  There aren't any good excuses. 

 

Losing to Iowa by only 6 points doesn't really change things. Beating Purdue and Minnesota does. 

[Mavric]

25 minutes ago, HuskerNation1 said:

3.  The 2017 and 2020 seasons (3rd years for Riley and Frost) have been by far the worst point differentials over the past decade at -10.6 and -12.  

 

Great look at that data.

 

Fortunately for Riley he had a non-conference schedule in 2017 to bring that average down (up?  closer to 0?).

[HuskerNation1]

6 minutes ago, Mavric said:

 

Great look at that data.

 

Fortunately for Riley he had a non-conference schedule in 2017 to bring that average down (up?  closer to 0?).

 

Yes I think that is a fair point, but I also think had we played our non conference schedule this year we may have gotten blown out by Cincy and had a close game with SD State and thus a big win against Central Michigan would have been needed to decrease the current point differential.  But we also did not play Wisconsin who Frost has lost to by 16 and 17 points the prior 2 years and would have added to the point differential if the outcome was similar in 2020.  Perhaps Frosts Year 3 could be slightly better than Riley's year 3 was but it's still nothing to be excited about as both are by far the worst over the past decade.  

[Hilltop]

42 minutes ago, Guy Chamberlin said:

 

I think you over-estimate my seriousness. There's not much to learn from these cherry-picked comparisons.

 

Although now that you mention it --- Illinois and Nebraska both sucked balls in 2017. And they still suck balls in 2020. But Illinois was clearly the better team this year.  There aren't any good excuses. 

 

Losing to Iowa by only 6 points doesn't really change things. Beating Purdue and Minnesota does. 

Fair enough - my point is that we look like a different team.  Essentially, we are sucking in a different way that is much easier to correct.  We are currently losing due to mental mistakes and youth lack of experience.  In 2017, we were losing because our guys were getting man handled.  

[FrantzHardySwag]

3 minutes ago, Hilltop said:

Fair enough - my point is that we look like a different team.  Essentially, we are sucking in a different way that is much easier to correct.  We are currently losing due to mental mistakes and youth lack of experience.  In 2017, we were losing because our guys were getting man handled.  

I agree youth and mental mistakes are issues, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy to correct. We’ve seen the same thing for 3 seasons. Sure there is glimpses of hope, but I’m not sold that someday we are just gonna figure it out. I think Frost is here two more seasons regardless, he has his staff, he has his recruits - I guess we just hope everyweek is the week they put it together. I think it’s still an IF and not a WHEN. 

[Huskers93-97]

4 minutes ago, FrantzHardySwag said:

I agree youth and mental mistakes are issues, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy to correct. We’ve seen the same thing for 3 seasons. Sure there is glimpses of hope, but I’m not sold that someday we are just gonna figure it out. I think Frost is here two more seasons regardless, he has his staff, he has his recruits - I guess we just hope everyweek is the week they put it together. I think it’s still an IF and not a WHEN. 

Something of note. Because I have been pretty hard on Frost the last few weeks on this board. Hedley Lamar posted a thread earlier today and some of what he says makes sense. He is one of the guys on this board who does have a legit inside source. He mentions Frost is trying to do too much- essentially he needs to hire a legit P5 staff and not the guys he has now. I think we all knew that- but if Frost is spread too thin because he doesn't trust his staff that could be a lot of the issues we see. He needs to be less in the details of just offense and have his fingers on all parts of the program. Moos and Nebraska needs to have a no s#!t conversation with him- this makes me feel like Frost could still be the guy but he needs to stop the loyalty and get the RIGHT staff. These guys have ridden his coat tails long enough- get a P5 staff.