** 2018 Previews: Athlon Sports Big Ten Predictions**

Saunders

Saunders

Heisman Trophy Winner
Athlon Big Ten Football 2018 Predictions
The Big Ten heads into the 2018 college football season with five candidates to reach the playoff. After winning the conference championship last year, Ohio State is the favorite in Athlon's Big Ten predictions to win the league title once again. However, rival Michigan and division foes Penn State and Michigan State aren't far behind. In the West, Wisconsin is a clear favorite over Iowa, Northwestern and Purdue. The Badgers face a tougher schedule than they had in 2017, but coach Paul Chryst's program has the returning talent to push Ohio State or any of the teams from the East in the Big Ten Championship.

https://athlonsports.com/college-football/big-ten-football-2018-predictions
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What are the First-Year Expectations for Scott Frost at Nebraska?

Nebraska is poised to take a step forward in the coming years with Scott Frost leading the way, but 2018 is likely to be a transition season. The Cornhuskers are coming off a 4-8 record and are transitioning to new schemes on both sides of the ball. Frost has plenty of skill talent to work with in Lincoln, including Stanley Morgan and JD Spielman at receiver. If Tre Bryant returns to 100 percent, he could push for all-conference honors behind a solid offensive line. However, the biggest question mark for Frost's offense remains at quarterback. True freshman Adrian Martinez was impressive in the spring and could edge Tristan Gebbia for the starting nod. After giving up 36.4 points a game last fall, new defensive coordinator Erik Chinander has a busy offseason ahead. Chinander plans to be more aggressive with his play-calling than last year's coordinator (Bob Diaco), but the Cornhuskers have concerns at every level. The defense likely faces more of a transition period than the offense does in 2018.
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Saunders said:
The defense likely faces more of a transition period than the offense does in 2018.
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I don't even know what that means. I do know that bad teams going through a coaching change often have much improved defenses in year 1, even if the new head coach is more offensive oriented. There are a few reasons.

Bad teams almost always have wretched defenses, so there is lots of room to improve. Nebraska was 116th in points allowed last year. Let's say they are 40th next year. 40th by itself is nothing to brag about, but that's an improvement of 76 spots! That massive jump doesn't take a bunch of new players or fancy schemes, either...you just have to start tackling. 

 
Our massive jump in competitiveness will be mimimal to casual fans.  I just love the thought that all the pre season brain trusts expect us to finish middle of the pack in a weak division, can't wait to prove them all wrong and finish closer to the top.

 
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Redux said:
Our massive jump in competitiveness will be mimimal to casual fans.  I just love the thought that all the pre season brain trusts expect us to finish middle of the pack in a weak division, can't wait to prove thrm all wrong and finish closer to the top.
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To be fair, it's a 2 game jump using last year's data. 

The problem, for any prognosticator that doesn't want to throw away the abacus and use their gut, is last year's data is pretty worthless in this case. Everything has fallen pretty good for Frost since he took over, but the roster is thin. The team is off to a great start in terms of installs and preparation because of staff continuity and organization, so there is definitely an upside. But if luck goes the wrong way, it could get rough. We have potential but not much margin.

 
brophog said:
To be fair, it's a 2 game jump using last year's data. 
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What is?  Their 6-6 prediction?  Yeah I'm not referencing that, I'm talking about overall quality of play in basically every categpry imaginable.  Win total isn't the deciding factor on if we improved in a major way, maybe for pre season magazine writers since they have over 120 teams to cover.  But for us as Nebraska fans, it's not nearly as big a factor.

I'm talking about a team with actual direcrion for the first time in 3-5 years.  I'm talking about a quality staff.  I'm talking about strength, conditioning, nutrition, coaching and overall dedication.  Those improvements alone will get us to that fairly low .500 win mark and probably beyond.

Athlon predicting 6-6 is basically Athlon saying "Yeah, we don't effin know either".

 
Redux said:
What is?  Their 6-6 prediction?  Yeah I'm not referencing that, I'm talking about overall quality of play in basically every categpry imaginable.  Win total isn't the deciding factor on if we improved in a major way, maybe for pre season magazine writers since they have over 120 teams to cover.  But for us as Nebraska fans, it's not nearly as big a factor.
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Im not disagreeing with you at all, but if you're referring to the magazine you're implicitly referring to win totals, because they don't get any deeper than that. Which is a big reason they're not worth anything, IMO. 

Redux said:
Athlon predicting 6-6 is basically Athlon saying "Yeah, we don't effin know either".
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But their motto is, "Hey, what about Lindys". 

 
brophog said:
Im not disagreeing with you at all, but if you're referring to the magazine you're implicitly referring to win totals, because they don't get any deeper than that. Which is a big reason they're not worth anything, IMO. 
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Again, I never referenced their 6-6 predictiom because I don't agree with it and most are saying the same because none of them have a clue what to predict so .500 is a safe prediction.  I merely said we will be much improved from a comoetetive standpoint.  I did however reference their prediction on where we finish in the standings and claimed we would finish higher than that.

 
Point is, even if we did finish 6-6, casual fans may look at it and shrug without actually seeing much of the game play and not realize we are far better off than a season ago.

 
Prognosticators look at losses from the previous year. We lost a QB that was drafted. Prognosticators view this as negative. I view it as a positive. We lose 16 turnovers and we gain a QB that can run. Even with a QB that has never player CFB, we will be significantly better at QB this year. Throw in a defense (did we have a defense last year), and we will finish better than 5th. With the way this staff is adding late transfers, we may win the west.  

 
MichiganDad3 said:
Prognosticators look at losses from the previous year. We lost a QB that was drafted. Prognosticators view this as negative. I view it as a positive. We lose 16 turnovers and we gain a QB that can run. Even with a QB that has never player CFB, we will be significantly better at QB this year. Throw in a defense (did we have a defense last year), and we will finish better than 5th. With the way this staff is adding late transfers, we may win the west.  
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Yep. Our talent isn't 4-8 talent. If we had next year's schedule this year I'd agree more strongly with the last sentence. If we win 7 this year and win the bowl game to go 8-5 I will go into 2019 thinking 10+ wins.

 
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