kick in the teeth at the right time

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Husker head coach Bo Pelini said Monday that this past Saturday's kick in the teeth "came at the perfect time for our football team."
"It was a wake-up call," Pelini said. "I think, to a certain extent, our guys bought into the hype. They bought into all the things that were being said about them, they started believing that instead of taking a good, hard look about what we talk about each and every day. You got to respect the game or you get humbled."

Pelini later called the sleepy 17-3 win against South Dakota State "a reality check."

It certainly was a rough night for quarterback Taylor Martinez. Interestingly, if you don't mind a little Husker history, Tommie Frazier's fourth start as a freshman also was one to forget -- a 19-10 loss to a bad Iowa State team.

Pelini agreed with offensive coordinator Shawn Watson that at times the redshirt freshman quarterback was trying to do too much against the Jackrabbits.

"There's no question," Pelini said. "I think that was across the board. Our guys didn't play team football. They didn't apply their roles. They didn't do the things they've been taught to do. And when you do that, that's what we talked about going in, you have to control you, you have to do what you have to do within the scheme and let plays come to you. And that didn't happen."

Pelini expects a strong response from Martinez. "I think he's going to get better from what happened," he said.

There's been some murmurs about Martinez having some sort of hand injury. Pelini said Monday the quarterback did not hurt his hand.

As for those Huskers who got dinged on Saturday? Mike McNeill, Eric Martin, Rickey Thenarse, P.J. Smith?

"They're all ready to go," Pelini said. "They'll all be practicing."
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http://my.journalstar.com/post/Husker_Extra_Group/Husker_Extra/blog/pelini_saturday_was_a_reality_check.html

 
"It was a wake-up call," Pelini said. "I think, to a certain extent, our guys bought into the hype. They bought into all the things that were being said about them, they started believing that instead of taking a good, hard look about what we talk about each and every day. You got to respect the game or you get humbled."
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This is what I think happened to the entire team, coaches included. I think they took SDSU for granted and assumed they would throttle em and when SDSU fought back, it thru them for a loop.

 
Pefect storm, a lot of reasons this happened, but lack of respect was the key and total respect from the other side did the job.

This was needed, it opened a lot of eyes and not just the kids.

 
I'm not ready to say if Martinez is going to be great, but I did find the comment about Tommie Frazier interesting.

 
HuskerfaninOkieland said:
"It was a wake-up call," Pelini said. "I think, to a certain extent, our guys bought into the hype. They bought into all the things that were being said about them, they started believing that instead of taking a good, hard look about what we talk about each and every day. You got to respect the game or you get humbled."
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This is what I think happened to the entire team, coaches included. I think they took SDSU for granted and assumed they would throttle em and when SDSU fought back, it thru them for a loop.
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I said this in another thread as well, but I think this was just the perfect storm. Coming off that UW win, the players were buying the hype, I'm certain that they worked on the ksu gameplan last week, if not in practice, you can bet that the coaches were watching as much or more film of the mildcats than they were of the jackrabbits. They put in a "gameplan" of about 6 plays on offense and nothing but the base D on defense and figured they would just over power SDSU. However, when you fumble on your first play and SDSU found a way to chew the clock, they started to press and get out of their element, trying to do too much INDIVIDUALLY!!! You can't do that, period!

Anyway, I agree, perfect time for this type of game, at least our L column still reads 0.

 
The coaching staff also helped in this. Making comments about this level of team not belonging on the schedule did nothing but tell the team they were inferior and boost the emotions of the opponent. Many are to blame for Saturday night. The key is they learn from it.

 
skersfan said:
Pefect storm, a lot of reasons this happened, but lack of respect was the key and total respect from the other side did the job.

This was needed, it opened a lot of eyes and not just the kids.
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:yeah SDSU got no respect from NU and when push came to shove the boys in blue stepped up and played a hell of a game. Not very often does a team hang their heads in victory...

 
Yeah, Nebraska didn't show up and looked horrible.

That being said, it's interesting that Nebraska played some of their worst football of the year while SDSU played their heads off and they still lost by 14. It just shows the difference between talent among FBS & FCS teams.

 
I think the team will be better in the long run because of this game.

Now that doesn't mean that we should be blindly confident going forward . . . I just mean that the guys will realize that they have to keep their noses to the grindstone.

 
skersfan said:
The coaching staff also helped in this. Making comments about this level of team not belonging on the schedule did nothing but tell the team they were inferior and boost the emotions of the opponent. Many are to blame for Saturday night. The key is they learn from it.
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I've said it more than once, I put A LOT of blame on the coaches for this one, A LOT! If they saying publicly that they shouldn't play this game, you can damn well bet they aren't portraying SDSU as a quality team in the preparation. It honestly looked like the coaches spent more time watching KSU game tape last week and not SDSU. They simply ran out 6 of their favorite plays on offense and their base D and said, go score 50 and don't get hurt. Combine that with overconfident kids and an upcoming bye week and you get what you saw Saturday.

 
Good stuff to hear. I think Minett was a tough RB. He earned everything he got. Dude def can play Div 1.

Someone said that if SDSU had a slightly better QB playing the game it would have been even closer, and I agree with that. I'm glad to hear Pelini is going to get to make some points to the team based off this past game. Sucks we didnt win by 70, but in the end it may have been a blessing in disguise.

 
OK, i am in agreement, about Martinez getting better, i think he can and he will, but he needs to show steady improvement beginning next game, as long as he can improve on some of what he does, we can't complain, he didn't come into the season as a proven or finished product, he just needs to be sure not to beat himself.

 
I'm a little confused. Against UW Wats ran up the middle alot. Against SDSU we started to wear them down later on up front and were gaining 6-8 yds up the middle but then he would go back to that slow developing zone sweep and SDSU just stretched the field and clogged up the gaps.

I understand mixing it up and not developing tendencies but make the "D" stop you.

 
MCAT800 said:
I'm a little confused. Against UW Wats ran up the middle alot. Against SDSU we started to wear them down later on up front and were gaining 6-8 yds up the middle but then he would go back to that slow developing zone sweep and SDSU just stretched the field and clogged up the gaps.

I understand mixing it up and not developing tendencies but make the "D" stop you.
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wats doesn't think like that, that would be too easy..... :facepalm:

 
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