Do we need top 5 classes to be successful?

[Jeremy]

Wisconsin just pushed Miami up and down the field, winning 35-3. Miami is loaded with 4 stars and a few 5s. I don't know if Wisconsin has any 4 stars, much less any 5s. 

The Badgers' consistency, lack of mistakes, and solid coaching gets them a fair amount of wins every year, but one could argue the one thing keeping them from the top is their lack of 4 and 5 star talent. 

Hard to say, but it was nice to see the canes get bullied and wilt in a northern cold bowl game. 

 

[LumberJackSker]

Wisconsin just pushed Miami up and down the field, winning 35-3. Miami is loaded with 4 stars and a few 5s. I don't know if Wisconsin has any 4 stars, much less any 5s. 

The Badgers' consistency, lack of mistakes, and solid coaching gets them a fair amount of wins every year, but one could argue the one thing keeping them from the top is their lack of 4 and 5 star talent. 

Hard to say, but it was nice to see the canes get bullied and wilt in a northern cold bowl game. 

And they have lost something like 8 out of their last 10 vs ohio state. A lot of their success is because they play in the west

 

[Landlord]

2009: Stanford and Ohio state

2010 Auburn

2011 lsu and usc

2012 Stanford 

the bolded is not that weird. Each year their losses were to similar teams. Physical tough teams. Disciplined defense and tough running. 

Hence why frost said that was a weakness in that scheme and why he wants to combine Oregon speed with husker power. 

The kelly system was continued by Helfrich and I bet for those few years Oregon’s losses were mostly to strong physical teams as well 

You can have the best and most perfect and lacking in weaknesses scheme in the world it's still really hard to win every single game especially ones against top 5 teams. All I'm curious about is your use of 'flame out'. What does that mean? Because losing rare, hard fought, close games to elite teams doesn't seem like it would match that term very well imo.

Were 2010 Auburn, 2011 USC and 2009 Ohio State known for being physical and tough teams especially? I don't remember them as such. Stanford and LSU, sure.

 

[Huskers93-97]

You can have the best and most perfect and lacking in weaknesses scheme in the world it's still really hard to win every single game especially ones against top 5 teams. All I'm curious about is your use of 'flame out'. What does that mean? Because losing rare, hard fought, close games to elite teams doesn't seem like it would match that term very well imo.

Were 2010 Auburn, 2011 USC and 2009 Ohio State known for being physical and tough teams especially? I don't remember them as such. Stanford and LSU, sure.

2010 auburn yes. Cam was the power back. That was the peak of sec defense those years. 2009 Ohio state - under Tressel always tough physical teams. 2011 usc not sure. But from 2000 till just a few years ago usc was a bully in the pac12. 

The knock on Oregon nationally was they could not beat a tough physical team. Not sure why your fighting that. That has been the Oregon narrative for the last 10 years 

 

[Huskers93-97]

So last year they beat #10 Miami in a bowl.  In 2016, they beat LSU in a regular season game.

This success against good teams in other conferences is because they play in the West?  :dunno

Beating Miami 2 years in a row in a bowl is pretty amazing considering Miami has 34 four and five star recruits on the roster and Wisconsin has Seven.  Their success?  It's not just because they play in the West.

I think it just goes to show how important the coach is. You can have elite talent and an average coach and be average. But if you notice most teams that have an elite coach may not start out with elite talent in the early years but are still very good teams, then the elite talent comes and pairs with the elite coach and you end up with Nebraska of old, USC early 2000's, Alabama and Clemson today. 

So in my opinion the head coach is the building block you MUST get right. I think we have that building block in Frost.

 

[Enhance]

Wisconsin just pushed Miami up and down the field, winning 35-3. Miami is loaded with 4 stars and a few 5s. I don't know if Wisconsin has any 4 stars, much less any 5s. 

The Badgers' consistency, lack of mistakes, and solid coaching gets them a fair amount of wins every year, but one could argue the one thing keeping them from the top is their lack of 4 and 5 star talent. 

Hard to say, but it was nice to see the canes get bullied and wilt in a northern cold bowl game. 

Their lack of 4-5 star talent is without question the reason they can't get over the truly elite teams in the country. People (for the record, not referring to you, Jeremy  :thumbs ) love to wax poetic about how Wisconsin reminds them so much of the old Nebraska. The biggest difference is Nebraska hauled in elite talent, particularly at the skill positions and defense. Wisconsin is trying to do the same thing but with an average five year recruiting ranking of 40. The deck is stacked against them.

 

[Huskers93-97]

Their lack of 4-5 star talent is without question the reason they can't get over the truly elite teams in the country. People (for the record, not referring to you, Jeremy  :thumbs ) love to wax poetic about how Wisconsin reminds them so much of the old Nebraska. The biggest difference is Nebraska hauled in elite talent, particularly at the skill positions and defense. Wisconsin is trying to do the same thing but with an average five year recruiting ranking of 40. The deck is stacked against them.

Yes. After the bowl loss. Lets not forget this is an 8-6 Miami team. 5 of those losses were in the second half of the season so this was a down trending team.

 

[Enhance]

Beating Miami 2 years in a row in a bowl is pretty amazing considering Miami has 34 four and five star recruits on the roster and Wisconsin has Seven.  Their success?  It's not just because they play in the West.

I agree last year was a solid win for Wisconsin but this year's Miami team, despite their recruiting success, is pretty average. I think last night's game was a microcosm of the bowl game conundrum - we often take too much away from the results whether they're good or bad.

I can't take much away from Wisconsin smacking them because that's a team that looked like crap for much of the second half of the season. 

 

[Enhance]

Yes. After the bowl loss. Lets not forget this is an 8-6 Miami team. 5 of those losses were in the second half of the season so this was a down trending team.

I would go so far to say that both these teams were on the downward trend. Wisconsin looked like a pretty average team most of the second half of their season. I think last night's result is really just an example of Wisconsin being 'on' that night and Miami not looking like they really gave a damn.

Sort of reminds me a bit of the '09 Holiday Bowl in some aspects. Nebraska probably shouldn't have beat Arizona 33-0 even with that stout defense. Nebraska's offense was bad that year.

 

[McGuillotine]

Top 15 and 20 quality walk-ons and we will be good

 

[LumberJackSker]

So last year they beat #10 Miami in a bowl.  In 2016, they beat LSU in a regular season game.

This success against good teams in other conferences is because they play in the West?  :dunno

Beating Miami 2 years in a row in a bowl is pretty amazing considering Miami has 34 four and five star recruits on the roster and Wisconsin has Seven.  Their success?  It's not just because they play in the West.

I said a lot of their success is from playing in the west not all of it. As for those Miami wins, Miami wasn't very good this year and lost like 4 out of 5 to end last year they've been trending down for a year and a half.

They have a good coach and a system that works for them that they've had in place for a long time. But when they go up against the best in the east like osu they haven't done to well. 

 

[Landlord]

The knock on Oregon nationally was they could not beat a tough physical team. Not sure why your fighting that. That has been the Oregon narrative for the last 10 years 

I'm fighting that because just because that knock or narrative is there doesn't mean it's actually true. For instance, that narrative generally forgets that Oregon beat Stanford by 21 in 2010 and by 23 in 2011. So they obviously beat at least some tough physical teams. And they also played some other physical tough elite teams very, very close. So the narrative doesn't hold too much water imo.

 

[DefenderAO]

Outside of winning I’m curious to see how sending some more guys to the NFL will play towards future recruits. Maybe not as significantly for Nebraska given Frost’s focus on character, but it certainly doesn’t hurt the narrative that we will make you better and a possible Sunday player. 

 

[Undone]

There's literally no argument that Frost is a better coach than Chip Kelly right now. There might be in the future, but as it currently stands it's not close.

Totally correct.

If Frost winds up being as good of a coach as Chip Kelly, this program will be competing for national titles. But there is currently no actual data points that show that Frost is even on Chip's level. 

Again, this is just being objective and reasonable in the assessment. If Frost somehow is a better coach than Chip this program will do incredible things. Here's to hoping that's the case!    :cheers

 

[lo country]

Only 4 teams since 1998 played in the national championship or college football playoff and had a 4 year average recruiting ranking below 15 leading into the year they were in the NCG or CFP.

Oregon twice

Michigan St

Washington

None of them won a national championship

Watching OU vs Bama, we need a top 10 D to win the MNC.  IIRC, Auburn was the only one the past 18 years that won with a non top 10 D (with Cam). Hoping Frost and Co put a HUGE premium in getting our D much better.  Interesting to see if OU's uptempo O can get them back in the game 21 down in the 1st....If so, I'll come back on and eat crow.