653 Yards Aside.....I Think There Is Hope for the Defense

funhusker

funhusker

All-American
Bend, but don't break. This is what we've come to expect from Pelini's defense. And this is still what we are getting, 653 yards of UCLA bending the defense like a yoga instructor, but the defense actually does have hope for holding their end of the deal. Don't blast me yet, keep reading

For the season:

Nebraska has allowed only 5 offensive TD's (4 were in the UCLA game)

Nebraska has played red-zone defense 14 times and has allowed 2 TD & 5 FG. 50% of the time a team gets inside the 20, they get ZERO points.

I honestly believe Beck tried to "out hurry" UCLA and got caught. This is why UCLA ran over 90 plays. Well, that and some missed tackles. But the defense kept points away from the Bruins in 7/11 trips into the redzone. Two of the trips resulted in fieldgoals, and two missed FG's. I think a team that allowed those kind of yards and plays, but only surrendered 34 offensive points, did not break.

I'm still waiting until after Ohio State to decide what kind of defense the Huskers have this year, but I do believe this defense is good enough that the offense isn't going to have to score 35+ to win games.

 
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Good stuff. I agree with you, but I still think we need to brush up the overall defense. Red zone stats are great, but I'd rather see the other team have a hard time getting the ball across midfield on our D.

 
funhusker said:
Bend, but don't break. This is what we've come to expect from Pelini's defense. And this is still what we are getting, 653 yards of UCLA bending the defense like a yoga instructor, but the defense actually does have hope for holding their end of the deal. Don't blast me yet, keep reading

For the season:

Nebraska has allowed only 5 offensive TD's (4 were in the UCLA game)

Nebraska has played red-zone defense 14 times and has allowed 2 TD & 5 FG. 50% of the time a team gets inside the 20, they get ZERO points.

I honestly believe Beck tried to "out hurry" UCLA and got caught. This is why UCLA ran over 90 plays. Well, that and some missed tackles. But the defense kept points away from the Bruins in 7/11 trips into the redzone. Two of the trips resulted in fieldgoals, and two missed FG's. I think a team that allowed those kind of yards and plays, but only surrendered 34 offensive points, did not break.

I'm still waiting until after Ohio State to decide what kind of defense the Huskers have this year, but I do believe this defense is good enough that the offense isn't going to have to score 35+ to win games.
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You obviously haven't been reading all the other posts about how bad the defense sucks this year. :lol: I tend to agree. A couple of things. UCLA was not too bad. They will win 9 at least this year. The tackling in that game was terrible, and the scheme was terrible. Pelini gets too cute and complicated sometimes and that is what he did against UCLA.

NU will have a decent defense by years end. It may not be as good as most want but I think it will end up being better than last year.

 
week 3 NCAA stats: NU rushing defense #111 LINK

Rushing defense: #111, 226 yds per game.

Passing defense: #25, 174 yds per game.

If we don't figure out a way to stop the run we're gonna be in a world of hurt once we get into our B10 sched. Braxton and Shoelace will eat our lunch.

 
I agree with you as well. Our defense will be pretty stingy this year. I think time will prove that UCLA is pretty good, and will give USC a run for the division. Hundley is the real deal. Even as bad as the defense played, and the bad play calling by Beck in crunch time, we still had a chance to win the game.

I wouldnt be surprised to see us shut out our next 2 opponents. Wisconsin is terrible on offense, and they are extremely lucky they beat Utah St. If you think about it, the defense really only gave up 3 points to a decent Arky St offense. The other 10 were from turnovers.

 
NUance said:
week 3 NCAA stats: NU rushing defense #111 LINK

Rushing defense: #111, 226 yds per game.

Passing defense: #25, 174 yds per game.

If we don't figure out a way to stop the run we're gonna be in a world of hurt once we get into our B10 sched. Braxton and Shoelace will eat our lunch.
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We won't have much of a test next week against Idaho State, it appears...and in spite of the troubles Wisconsin has (sorry Bucky), we *should* get a decent litmus test when we try and stop Montee Ball.

Granted, Ball doesn't look like he's 100%, and we're fully aware of the drama...but Wisconsin can still run the ball, and a slightly gimpy Ball is better than 75% of the RBs out there in the FBS. It should be a more than adequate test to get the kids ready for tOSU.

 
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funhusker said:
Bend, but don't break. This is what we've come to expect from Pelini's defense. And this is still what we are getting, 653 yards of UCLA bending the defense like a yoga instructor, but the defense actually does have hope for holding their end of the deal. Don't blast me yet, keep reading

For the season:

Nebraska has allowed only 5 offensive TD's (4 were in the UCLA game)

Nebraska has played red-zone defense 14 times and has allowed 2 TD & 5 FG. 50% of the time a team gets inside the 20, they get ZERO points.

I honestly believe Beck tried to "out hurry" UCLA and got caught. This is why UCLA ran over 90 plays. Well, that and some missed tackles. But the defense kept points away from the Bruins in 7/11 trips into the redzone. Two of the trips resulted in fieldgoals, and two missed FG's. I think a team that allowed those kind of yards and plays, but only surrendered 34 offensive points, did not break.

I'm still waiting until after Ohio State to decide what kind of defense the Huskers have this year, but I do believe this defense is good enough that the offense isn't going to have to score 35+ to win games.
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You're exactly right. the yards were worse than 2007. But the effort and fight never left the kids. It was just fundamentals that killed us. fixable stuff on all accounts.

And you're right again, we should have been running the ball too keep the defense off the field so that they could rest and Bo could inform them of the adjustments he wanted too make. This is a similar problem we had in 2007.

But we can't be too angry at Beck, he came from kansas were they had a hard time on D, if the offense didn't score enough points they lost big. So it makes some sense why he did what he did.

I just don't like that he did it.

 
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Something I thought about while rewatching the game yesterday.

I have been frustrated that our D line doesn't get pressure on the QB. But, yesterday I began to wonder if pressure on the QB isn't a big priority in our defense. We go against so many teams where the QB takes three step drops and gets rid of the ball very fast. The D lineman literally would have to come off totally unblocked to be able to get to him in time to sack him most of the time.

SO, is it a situation where Bo has decided that covering the WRs and stopping the run is more of a priority than putting pressure on the QB?

Now, even saying that, if this is the case, it shows even more of a problem with our run defense.

As to the OP, I agree that keeping the other team from scoring is really the only thing that counts on D. I see some potential on this defense and think we can be pretty good by year end.

 
After thinking about it more, and looking at the remaining games for UCLA, I predict they finish 8-4 9-3

 
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I think it is interesting that for all of the rushing yards the team has given up they haven't allowed a rushing touchdown yet.

 
NUance said:
week 3 NCAA stats: NU rushing defense #111 LINK

Rushing defense: #111, 226 yds per game.

Passing defense: #25, 174 yds per game.

If we don't figure out a way to stop the run we're gonna be in a world of hurt once we get into our B10 sched. Braxton and Shoelace will eat our lunch.
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This is ultimately our biggest problem. Our defensive rushing statistics over the last few years in yards per carry...

2009 - 2.9

2010 - 3.9

2011 - 4.0

2012 - 4.8 (through three games)

We've gotten steadily worse through four years. I think it's reasonable to ask whether we have the the players to do what Pelini wants them do. It's not like we're sitting in the SEC with massive guys that have athletic talent to match. Maybe his system would flourish with better players, maybe it wouldn't. Maybe there's another issue somewhere. I'm just spit-balling here. Something's gotta be changed though.

 
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Reminds me of an old quote "stats are like bikinis, they show a lot, but still hide some vital information" We've seen this before it takes some time for the defense to gell because in our system the players rely on each other so much. That's a lot of why Bo chooses experienced upper classmen over younger guys, but they did adjust and came out strong last week and I think JP and the defensive staff will find the right formula. We do have a good team whether or not some people want to believe it or not. Not a national championship caliber team, but a good team. There isn't another game on the schedule that we can't win. I see Ohio State being the toughest and the Michigan teams will be interesting but I think out of those three we can easily win two and maybe come together and win out. Time will tell.

 
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