Eight wins? More? What’s the bar for Nebraska Cornhuskers coach Mike Riley in Year 2?

Saunders

Saunders

Heisman Trophy Winner
The Vegas touts say 8.5 victories, but Vegas cares not one Big Red patootie about your feelings. Or sweat. Or tears. Vegas just wants your wallet, and the rest is offal.

Seven wins?

Eight?

More?

What constitutes a successful season for Year 2 of the Mike Riley era at Nebraska?

“The outlook this year is hopefully to get back to a winning record,” Wayne Dolezal offered. “I don’t think there’s any real expectation that this team is going to win the Big Ten. There’s always hope that you’re going to be competitive in the division.”

1996: Certainty.

2016: Hope.

https://www.landof10.com/nebraska/eight-wins-more-whats-the-bar-for-nebraska-cornhuskers-coach-mike-riley-in-year-2
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I say 8-4 or 9-3 is where I think we are.

Losses: Oregon, Ohio State and then maybe 1 or 2 of the following 3; Northwestern, Wisconsin, Iowa.

If we are 9-3 and win a bowl game then I think that is a great 2nd season.

9-3 lose bowl game, OK.

8-4 win bowl game, OK.

8-4 lose bowl game- better have a great 3rd year.

I'm not passing judgement on Riley era until after 3 seasons.

Recruiting will play into how I view this season as well.

 
As long as the kids have fun and they come away with a participation ribbon at the end of the season, all will be good.

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Absent injuries or other absences of vital starters (QB, OL, DL, S, P, PK are all critical in my view), I put our odds of winning for the schedule as follows ( think of these 'odds' as the number of times NU wins if we played them ten times):

Fresno 9 to 1

Wyo 8 to 2

ORE 3 to 7 (more likely than not a LOSS)

NW 6 to 4

ILL 8 to 2

IND 8 to 2

PUR 9 to 1

WIS 4 to 6

OSU 1 to 9 (loss very likely)

MN 8 to 2

MAR 8 to 2

IA 5 to 5 (a toss up - but odds favor NU if we have won 8 or more previously IMO)

Best Guess - to this point 10-2 as I think we have lady luck on our side for once.

Conference Championship game participation - 3 to 7. Win - 3 to 7.

Bowl game - unknown opponent but chances of a win at least 6 out of 10.

 
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8 wins buys Riley time. 7 wins he will be on hot seat and better win division next season. 6 wins or less I think both he and Eichorst are out the door.

 
The Huskers need to win the division to show progress. Short of that, coaches may have some 'splainin' to do (barring injuries mostly - even a horrible turnover margin has to be owned).

 
Vegas is usually pretty good at this stuff, so 8.5 isn't a bad guess. Personally I'm more at 9.5 with my prediction based on talent, schedule and optimism in our coaches.

As to "expectations" I think 6 wins gets him fired, 7 is the basement. Depends a lot on the details. Going forward a breakthrough season will probably buy Riley an occasional 7-win season, but not a losing one. Recruiting plays into it as well. Bo's last three classes were sub-par, and were a factor IMO.

 
It's funny because talking about a W-L record is pretty dependent on how the teams on our schedule are, and we have no idea how they will all play out.

Given an average year in the general sense of injuries and schedule strength, I think we'll end up within 2 plays of either 8-4 or 10-2, and depending on how those games go, those results won't be viewed very differently at least in my eyes.

 
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