OWH: Diaco Must Fix Huskers' Big-Play Problems

[BigRedBuster]

Theres a difference between a Pelini defense and a Papuchis/Pelini defense. Mismanagement? perhaps, but Pelinis ability to coach a defense should not be questioned.

Melvin Gordon has questions.

Wisconsin just scored again.

A nightmare relived over and over again.

Within a four hour period.

 

[Saunders]

Nebraska has been awful at preventing the big play since joining the Big Ten. NU wasn't bad in 2011, when it gave up 21. That was ninth in the Big Ten and tied for 44th nationally. But the year after that, yeah, it got pretty ugly. Since 2012, here's how many plays of 30 yards or more that the Blackshirts have given up:

2012: 29 (12th in the Big Ten/T-94th nationally)

2013: 26 (9th/T-75th)

2014: 27 (9th/T-68th)

2015: 37 (13th/T-111th)

2016: 26 (9th/T-49th)

That's Bo Pelini's last three defenses and Mark Banker's two defenses. NU gave up an average, in that stretch, of 29 plays per season of 30 yards or more.

Now let's compare that to some of the other key teams in the Big Ten over that same stretch. Here are those per-season averages:

Michigan: 18.2

Penn State: 18.2

Iowa: 19.8

Wisconsin 20.2

Ohio State: 22

Michigan State: 26

Only MSU is close to Nebraska's average. (Which is kind of interesting, right, since the Spartans had a terrific run of football 2013-2015 before falling flat on their face in 2016. I'm predicting more struggles in 2017 and 2018 for Mark Dantonio.) But NU's two key West Division rivals — Iowa and Wisconsin — are far better, year after year after year, at preventing the big play.

OWH

This is why I thought it was funny that people thought our Defense was good/improved last year. We played (mostly) trash offenses, and got torched by good (and sometimes bad) ones. And the only reason it looked better than 2015, is because it was a historically bad defense.