What NU used to be

Coaching change won''t happen this season, but reality is if Riley can't do better next season and Scott Frost keeps winning at a school like UCF, the choice is there to make. It is going to take a homegrown talent to bring back some success and prideful moments. I wasn't a huge SF fan two years ago, but he is doing well at UCF with not much to work with. I think Frost could recruit in state beef eaters for lineman, and find those skill players to compete in Big 10 football. We are recruiting California players to play in Big 10 football.........I don't see it working out. Find those players in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, or other places that play Big 10 football. Were going to bring in Pac 12 talent to play Big 10 football.............?

Wisconsin is finding in state lineman who care and play with heart and smash mouth style. This was what made Nebraska so tough for decades and of national respect. This is what is missing, no matter who coaches. This was destroyed by Callahan and Pelini. This is the element that needs corrected. Pride sometimes can overcome talent. This is what made this such a special place in the Osborne era and Devaney years.

 
Look at Iowa...

All their players look big, mean, home grown. That's because they are. Iowa takes the best players right off the farm. The entire team looks home grown.

Then you have Nebraska. Where they come from, home grown is playing like 20 different Cotton family members and having Pelini's nephew at center.

Come on! Scout the talent here. They're has to be some better players around. Other teams do it. Iowa does it. Nebraska needs to get they're recruiting back in a state where Husker football is life.

 
The Real T-Magic said:
Look at Iowa...

All their players look big, mean, home grown. That's because they are. Iowa takes the best players right off the farm. The entire team looks home grown.

Then you have Nebraska. Where they come from, home grown is playing like 20 different Cotton family members and having Pelini's nephew at center.

Come on! Scout the talent here. They're has to be some better players around. Other teams do it. Iowa does it. Nebraska needs to get they're recruiting back in a state where Husker football is life.
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Maybe we should only recruit players that pan out.

 
The states are similar in many ways but Nebraska is still by far the smallest state in the B1G. Wisconsin has nearly 6 million people in it and one D-1 football program. Iowa is closer at just over 3 million but that is still over a million more than Nebraska's 1.88. There are 3.3 million people in the Twin Cities alone, and that isn't even getting into the big states East of Chicago. It is not a small obstacle to play in a conference where most schools are in states that have 3-5 times the population of Nebraska.

 
Elf said:
JJHusker1 said:
I agree with the OP. I would also like to see us get back to controlling the LOS and having a power run game and speedy nasty D. There hasn't been a time ever that I didn't want that. Unfortunately, Pederson, Osborne, Eichorst, Callahan, Pelini and Riley haven't had the same desires. I haven't much enjoyed Nebraska football for quite awhile because of the alternate bs they've tried to go with instead. It is what it is at this point. When they make the next coaching change, maybe we'll get what we want. These should be the criteria for any coach that is selected. I could care less about getting the next "hot" coach if those aren't his priorities. Tired of getting prison raped in the trenches and not knowing how to get a first down when it's 3rd and 2 or 3 or 4. The pink lockerroom Iowa has for visiting teams has been way too fitting for us.
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With a quality offensive line we can run whatever offense we want. It all starts in the trenches, on both sides of the ball. I'm sure our coaches are aware of that.

Still, we are 9-3 in our regular season and going back to MSU last year we are 12-4 in our last 16 games. And we still have the opporunity to go 10-3 this year after the bowl game. Heck, even if we lost the bowl game, 9-4 is a far sight better than the 6-7 we did last year
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I thought maybe we were making 'progress' but what it appears to me is that for our first couple seasons we've driven around in the parking lot and have not actually left on our long road trip across the country. All too familiar as the last several bus drivers have been making U turns and searching for the on ramp as well.

Somebody needs to reset the gps and let it recalibrate. We are driving in circles and find ourselves right back where we began (yet again).

Feel like the Griswald family Christmas and Groundhog day all mixed up together?

 
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Iowa doesn't recruit well from the perspective of getting 4 star players and we never have. We develop middling recruits very well and many will go on to utility positions in the NFL. That's it. Not sexy. Wiscy is similar though their talent level is higher as of late. You have enough resources to recruit local kids from the tri-state area who would be thrilled to play for Nebby but most weren't alive in 95 or believe the Huskers are a blue blood program because those days are over. Build a solid line through development, hook a decent QB that is ok with screen passes or TE patterns rather than a 4 star heaver who only throws 40 yard bombs like BYU used to do. You got owned by us I believe because of our consistency and we max out our middling recruits on both sides of the ball. I think Nebraska builds it's program focusing around its higher end recruits. Ohio state trains for teams like that and imho, it's why you got destroyed. Maxing out motivated kids talents works. Iowa gets too predictable however and it leads to losses like ndsu. You have a good coach, some solid players and an opportunity to develop what you have. If he uses a program akin to Iowa and Wiscy and the balls to mix in pass patterns which we don't, that's a good recipe for dominance. Pining for what was and hurrying to make it happen is a recipe for disaster.

 
What we used to be was a premier program, with cutting edge strength conditioning and facilities. In an era when we were on TV a LOT when there were fewer TV outlets and options. What we are is a program with terrific fans and excellent facilities and game day atmosphere...the problem is many other programs have caught up in the facilities arms race. Every game is on TV now. We lost our inherent "edge." I really think it is that simple. We need to find that again. I agree that power football is who we should be.

Who we are is a middle of the pack program in the national perspective. That's probably wrong. Top 20-35 program consistently.

 
The resources are there. There's no quick fix in the big 10. Humility, patience and hard work but also a coach who a potential recruit believes will still be there the end of his senior year. You fire this development oriented coach and you can count on being rivals with Purdue and Indiana, not Iowa and never Ohio state.

 
I guess I'm through with the running QB who is injured half way through every season. Yeah, I want a good running game that includes the wingback type guys in it, even if it consists of screens and shovel passes. But without it, what do you do? Like it or not, with the QB's we have lined up we'll be mostly a passing team with fairly good scrambling QB's. We've been talking road graders for a long time but haven't been able to develop that.

​Don't think we'll see the dominant teams of the Osborne era because we're in a league with many mega-donor schools and they won't allow it.

​Still watching Craig Bohl at Wyoming who went 4-8,2-10, and now 8-4 and in the conference championship game ....previously he turned NDSU into a powerhouse. The next phase for him is also to beef up the defense that keeps giving up basketball scores.

​Next year for us looks like an 8 win season right now....that could go either way depending on how fast the underclassmen get going. THIS was the senior year and next year will be a lot of rebuilding......not necessarily a bad thing.

 
Bigdsrip said:
The states are similar in many ways but Nebraska is still by far the smallest state in the B1G. Wisconsin has nearly 6 million people in it and one D-1 football program. Iowa is closer at just over 3 million but that is still over a million more than Nebraska's 1.88. There are 3.3 million people in the Twin Cities alone, and that isn't even getting into the big states East of Chicago. It is not a small obstacle to play in a conference where most schools are in states that have 3-5 times the population of Nebraska.
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Yep, it's a numbers game. I'm not too proud to acknowledge that the success of my high school wasn't the result of our school having one of the largest student bodies in the state. As soon as new schools opened up after I was long gone the wins were cut in half the very next season.

I WISH I could remember who it was, but this was years ago, still during the Pelini days. It was a national radio show, people would call in and give a school and some guy would take into consideration a schools demographics, resources, facilities, conference, history...etc and provide an expectation of wins. When someone called and asked about Nebraska, he hesitated because he knew his answer would irk Nebraska fans but said honestly Nebraska on average could expect to win about 8 games a year regardless of who the coach was. Of course that's the average, their can be outliers in both directions, it was a bummer but it made a lot of sense. We were still in the 12 at the time too, not sure if that would have mattered.

All that being said you can win in a low pop. state but it takes a legend and those don't come around very often, a Devaney, Snyder, an Osborne. But like someone else said I can remember Osborne being ripped pretty hard "Why don't we pass more?! Why can't we win the big game?!"

 
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