• Missouri clobbers the Huskers 52-17
• Penalties and mental mistakes doom the Huskers
• Huskers and Hokies are ready to face off
• Former Husker Thunder Collins arrested for murder?
• Nebsports.Com is back online!
• Nebraska - Virginia Tech game to be shown on ABC
• Huskers have no problems with New Mexico State
• Nebraska lines up future games with Miami and Fresno State
• Huskers are ready for New Mexico State
• Andy Christensen re-instated by Coach Pelini
• Vote for Cornhusker cheerleader Katie Rockwell
• Huskers stuggled against San Jose State but win 35-12
• Huskers are ready for San Jose State
• Nebraska Football Tickets available
• Andy Christensen found not guilty

Well I am finally back at home after the dissapointing lose to Virginia Tech on Saturday night. The Hokies played “Beamer Ball” to the fullest as they scored on special teams and did a lot of little things to beat the Nebraska Cornhuskers 35-30.

Things got off to a rough start as the Hokies blocked Nebraska’s first punt of the game out of the endzone to give the Hokies the 2-0 lead. They never looked back as they quickly scored a touchdown off a Joe Ganz interception to take a 9-0 lead.

Ganz finished the night 17-of-26 for 281 yards and two touchdowns but did have the costly interception. Ganz made a few bad reads at the line of scrimmage and didn’t get rid of the ball when he needed to a couple of times that really hurt the team. What really hurt the team on the offensive side of the ball however was the lack of push from the offensive line and the lack of a running game.

Once again the line did not open up any holes for the running backs as Marlon Lucky only had 17 yards on eight carries. Roy Helu Jr. once again led the running backs with yards as he finished with 21 yards on four touches and one touchdown. You just can’t sit back and expect to beat a stingy defense like the Hokies had when you can’t run the ball.

On the defensive side, it was a very poor game by the linebackers and secondary. We all knew it would be a tough year for the secondary but I didn’t expect it to be this bad to be honest. Larry Asante was out of position and gave up big plays way to often. The linbackers missed tackles like crazy and always seemed to be out of position. (After the game, Coach Ekeler took the blame for having his players out of position) The defensive line played very good I though. Zach Potter led the team with six tackles, three of which were for a loss and also half a sack.

The biggest play of the game for the Huskers came in the fourth quarter when punt returner Nate Swift took back a 88 yard punt for a touchdown that got the Huskers back in position to win the game. However, with less then a minute left in the game after forcing the Hokies to punt, Ganz hit Todd Peterson in the middle of the field and was stripped of the ball and Virignia Tech recovered.  Even had Peterson held onto the ball, I think the clock would have ran out before Ganz would have been able to spike the ball.

Congrats to Virginia Tech as they won a tough game on the road. Nebraska just made to many stupid penalties and to many mental mistakes on defense. Things sure don’t get any easier either as the Missouri Tigers will be coming into Lincoln for another night game on Saturday.

The secondary and offensive line better have a great week of practice or things are going to ugly pretty fast against the Tigers.

It was another struggle for the Nebraska Cornhuskers as they had plenty of troubles with San Jose State on Saturday afternoon. The Huskers had a small lead in the second half until they scored 21 un-answered points to beat the Sparans 35-12. A win is a win but this was sure an ugly one.

The game turned around with 12:07 left in the game and the Huskers only up 14-12. Niles Paul returned a 85 yard kickoff back for a touchdown to extend the Huskers lead to nine points. After Paul’s huge kickoff return, the Huskers got a 14 yard touchdown by Roy Helu Jr, and a two yard touchdown by running back Marlon Lucky. The cornhuskers poured it on in the fourth quarter to make it looks a little better on the scoreboard but they sure can’t be to happy with the win.

All three Nebraska running backs scored in the game. Quentin Castille scored the Huskers first td with a three yard run in the first quarter. I’m still not happy with how the running backs performed, or the offensive line for that matter. There just wasn’t very many holes and the o-line should have been domination the smaller spartans d-line.

On the defensive side of the ball, Ndamukong Suh intercepted a bal and ran it back for a 49 yard touchdown. The d-line of the Huskers played pretty good but will be without Barry Turner who broke his leg early in the first quarter. Pierre Allen will now need to step up and take Turner’s starting spot. Look for Turner to apply for a medical redshit and be back next year.

Joe Ganz had a decent game as he was 17-25 for 216 yards. He went without a touchdown pass for the first time in his five career starts, and he did throw one interception. Nebraska senior wide receivers Nate Swift (6 rec., 70 yards) and Todd Peterson (4 rec., 59 yards) combined for 10 catches in the game.

The secondary of the Huskers still scares me a little bit. Larry Asante is going for the big hit everytime out there it seems like and he is making way to many mistakes. He needs to settle and down and get back to fundamentals and learn how to tackle correctly. You don’t have to light someone up on every play to have a good game.

The Huskers will need to have a good week of practice and and practice running the ball more in my opinion to have a good game on Saturday. I’d love to see a good game out the offense, defense, and special teams against New Mexico State. Kickoff will be at 5 p.m. central time.

GO BIG RED!

It’s almost that time of the week again Husker fans! Nebraska will be taking on San Jose State Saturday morning from Memorial Stadium and the Huskers say they are ready for the Spartans.

San Jose State struggled in their first game of the season as they had to come back in the final seconds to beat UC Davis 13-10. I expect this game to be a blowout for the Huskers as they win by atleat 24-27 points. I predict that the Huskers will get a lot of reserves into the game in the fourth quarter which will be some valuable playing time for those players.

One thing we will want to pay attention to in the game however is if the Huskers can run the ball against the Spartans defense. I think they will be able to because San Jose State isn’t just going to stack the box against the Huskers like Western Michigan did. The Spartans just aren’t the taem that Western Michigan is to be able to stack the box and shut down the run.

I expect Joe Ganz to have another great day and throw for atleast a couple of td’s. Hopefully he doesnt’ make any mistakes with the ball and makes good decisions out there. I really think he will have a good day and we will see Patrick Witt in the game in the fourth quarter with the Huskers up big.

Will the defense show up and control the game is one question a lot of people have been asking. The secondary needs to fix some communication problems, but I think they will get those things figured out and and have a good day. I’m not worried about the d-line or linebackers in Saturday’s game, I will be watching how the secondary plays. They should step their game up that’s for sure.

Lydon Murtha and Ricky Thenarse will not be playing in the game as both players are still rehabbing injuries. Saturday’s game captains will be Nate Swift, Todd Peterson, Ty Steinkuhler and Alex Henery.

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First off, I’d like to say I’m sorry for just now getting the game recap up. It was a long weekend with a lot of friends and family members over for the game. (Isn’t it always like that when you have the pay per view games on?!)

My first thoughts as the game was ending was “Wow that was a sloppy win” but now looking back it wasn’t as bad as I had originally thought. Sure there were mistakes in the secondary which we all figured was going to happen. But overall I thought they played pretty well and hopefully the mistakes that happened Saturday night will be fixed and we will see better play out of the secondary against San Jose State.

One thing I love seeing was the pressure being applied to the Western Michigan quarterback during the game. The Huskers finished with four sacks and caused three tournovers in the game. It seemed like they didn’t have three tournovers all last season lol. Cody Glenn was a beast in his first game at the linebacker position. Glenn was flying around all over the field and led the team with 12 total tackles.

As for the offense, they put some huge numbers as Joe Ganz had a pretty good game. Ganz completed 20-36 passes for 345 yards and four touchdowns. Ganz put the ball in the hands of seven different husker receivers in the game. Joe did make a couple of mistakes as he threw a couple of interceptions.

Nate Swift had a huge night as he caught five balls for 121 yards and two touchdowns. Mike McNeill and Marlon Lucky caught the other two touchdowns from Ganz. Menelik Holt added five catches for 59 yards, while Quentin Castille and Todd Peterson each added three receptions.

The running game was quite a letdown I thought. With the husker offensive line out-weighing the Western Michigan line by average of 40 lbs per player, I thought the Huskers would run all over the Broncos but I was mistaken. The Broncos stacked the box and the Huskers had problems running as they only finished with 159 yards on 31 attempts. Lucky had the only rushing touchdown which came in the first quarter to put the huskers up 6-0. Roy Helu Jr. lead the team with 54 yards and 7 carries. Lucky then followed with 52 yards on 12 carries.

The specials teams part of the game was awesome. Field goal kicker Alex Henery was 4-4 with all four field goals being from 44 yards. The sophomore place-kicker from Omaha also tied the Memorial Stadium record with four field goals by a Husker, most recently accomplished by Jordan Congdon against Maine in 2005.

Now the Huskers will be watching film and have a hard week of practice to get ready for Saturday’s game against San Jose State. Hopefully the Huskers secondary plays better and shuts down the San Jose passing attack and we see another Huskers victory. I expect a blowout and the defense playing a lot better in the secondary.

What are your opinions on the game? What needs to be worked on? What did you like about the game? Leave us a comment and let us know!

GO BIG RED!

The much anticipated depth chart has been released for the game against Western Michigan this Saturday. There are a couple of suprises on there that is for sure. Also, it shows how thin the defense is at key positions when you have so many freshman/sophomore’s in the twp deep. Did we not have a junior class on the d-line?

Anyways here it is and let us know what you think and what really suprised you about it.

OFFENSE:

Quarterback: Joe Ganz, Patrick Witt, Zack Lee
Running Back: Marlon Lucky or Roy Helu or Quentin Castille
Fullback: Thomas Lawson, Justin Makovicka
Tight End: Mike McNeill, Dreu Young, Ryan Hill, Ben Cotton
Wide Receiver: Nate Swift, Menelik Holt, Will Henry, Chris Brooks
Wide Receiver: Todd Peterson, Niles Paul or Curenski Gilleylen
Left Tackle: Mike Smith, Jaivario Burkes
Right Tackle: Lydon Murtha, Marcel Jones
Left Guard: Mike Huff, Keith Williams
Right Guard: Matt Slauson, D.J. Jones
Center: Jacob Hickman, Mike Caputo

DEFENSE:

Open End: Barry Turner, Pierre Allen
Base End: Zach Potter, Clayton Sievers
Nose Tackle: Ndamukong Suh, Shukree Barfield, Terrence Moore
Tackle: Ty Steinkuhler, Jared Crick
WILL Linebacker: Cody Glenn, Blake Lawrence
MIKE Linebacker: Phillip Dillard, Will Compton, Colton Koehler
BUCK Linebacker: Tyler Wortman, Sean Fisher
Right Corner: Anthony West, Prince Amukamara
Left Corner: Armando Murillo, Eric Hagg
Strong Safety: Larry Asante, Major Culbert
Free Safety: Ricky Thenarse, Matt O’Hanlon

SPECIAL TEAMS:

Place Kicker: Alex Henery or Adi Kunalic
Punter: Dan Titchener, Jake Wesch
Long Snapper: T.J. O’Leary, Justin Baumgartner

The punt and kick returners have not been announced but word is that Nate Swift and Niles Paul will be returning punts.

So what does everyone think? I think the defense looks very thin with a lot of young players going to see action. I think the lines are going to have to play very good for the team to have success. Hopefully players can step up and make the plays they are capable of making.

We will have our writeup about the Western Michigan game later today or on Wednesday so stay tuned for that! GO HUSKERS!

In a game where most Huskers fans were left asking, “Where has this team been all year?”, the Nebraska Cornhuskers played their best overall game of the season as they lost to Texas 28-25.  The Huskers had a lead heading into the 4th quarter, but that is when Jamaal Charles took over the game.

Charles ran for a career high 290 yards in the game.  216 of the 290 yards came in the 4th quarter on long runs of 25, 40, and 86 yards.  With the Nebraska defense blitzing almost every play, all it took was Charles getting past the line and he was gone.

I liked how the defense went out and played balls out the entire game.  Sure they were getting tired at the end, but it was nice to see pressure on the quarterback, and players flying around all over the field.  They coaching staff told the players, go out there and play for yourself and make some plays and that is exactly what they did.

Marlon Lucky rushed for 111 yards on 24 carries to lead the rushing attack for the Huskers.  Sam Keller finished the day 23 for 35 and 298 yards along with two touchdowns to Nate Swift.  Keller was injured late in the 4th quarter however with a possibly broken collarbone.  Joe Ganz came in and passed for a touchdown and 2 point conversion to bring the Huskers within three points, but the onside kick was recovered by the Lonhorns to secure the victory.

I think we are all suprised with how well the Huskers played on Saturday.  Will the same type of team show up when the Huskers take on the Kansas Jayhawks on Saturday.  Can the Huskers give the Jayhawks their first loss on the season?  Lets hope so!

GO BIG RED

Things didn’t go as planned on Saturday night in Lincoln when the Huskers and Trojans met at Memorial Stadium.  It was awesome seeing all the fans jacked up at the beginning of the game and through the first quarter.  It was electric and the Huskers were on top 10-7 but that was about as good as it got as the Trojans went on for a 49-31 victory.

USC quickly came back and put up 14 points to close out the first half and take a 21-10 lead at halftime.  A lot of Husker fans were mad about the USC player being left on the field for 12 minutes and taking a lot of the momentum away from the team and fans but you have to come back out on the field with the same emotion.  If you can’t get up for playing USC after sitting for 12 minutes something is wrong.

The second half of the ballgame was pretty much how the first half ended with USC running ball right down the throats of the blackshirt defense.  Our defensive line was getting manhandled the entire game.  USC had a game plan going in that they were going to double team Suh and make Potter, Steinkuhler, and Turner beat them.  Well that didn’t happen as they forced 0 tournovers and never sacked Booty the entire game.

The Husker offense got things going late in the second half when USC had their second team defense in but it wasn’t enough.  Sam Keller had a good game overall (minus the two interceptions) but it was the offensive line and running backs that performed poorly.  Well I will put most of that blame on the line because a running back can’t run the ball if the line is getting pushed back into him everytime.

The widereceivers played a really good game.  It was awesome to see Maurice Purify and Nate Swift get into things early in the ball game and then Todd Peterson making some grabs and even two touchdowns.

Nebraska still isn’t ready for bigtime football.  They have weaknesses and USC exposed them all night on Saturday.  The good news is that Nebraska plays Ball State on Saturday and will hopefully get things back on track before Big 12 games start up.

Scoring (USC 49, NU 31)

First Quarter (Nebraska 7, USC 7)
USC - Stanley Havili 5 pass from John David Booty (David Buehler kick), 10:49, USC 7-0
NU - Cody Glenn 1 run (Alex Henery kick), 1:03, 7-7

Second Quarter (USC 21, NU 10)
NU - Alex Henery 37 field goal, 9:04, NU 10-7
USC - Havili 2 run (Buehler kick), 6:50, USC 14-10
USC - Stafon Johnson 7 run (Buehler kick), 3:52, USC 21-10

Third Quarter (USC 42, NU 10)
USC - Anthony McCoy 2 pass from Booty (Buehler kick), 11:29, USC 28-10
USC - Chauncey Washington 1 run (Buehler kick), 9:14, USC 35-10
USC - Chauncey Washington 1 run (Buehler kick), 5:03, USC 42-10

Fourth Quarter (USC 49, NU 31)
NU - Glenn 1 run (Henery kick), 12:09, USC 42-17
USC - Allen Bradford 6 run (Buehler kick), 6:45, USC 49-17
NU - Todd Peterson 20 pass from Sam Keller (Keller to Sean Hill 2PAT pass), 4:32, USC 49-25
NU - Todd Peterson 18 pass from Keller (Keller 2PAT pass failed), 0:51, USC 49-31

Coach Callahan fresh off signing a new contract extension, released the depth chart for the Wake Forest game this Saturday.  Most notably is Maurice Purify back in the rotation.  Purify is listed behind Nate Swift and Callahan said that Purify has to earn his starting position back as nothing will be handed to him.  I still expect to see Purify get plenty of reps so I wouldn’t worry about it.

Cody Glenn has also moved up to #3 at running back behind Marlon Lucky and Quentin Castille.

The 2007 season is almost here and we can hardly wait the last 48 hours to see the Nebraska Cornhuskers take the field against the Nevada Wolfpack.  Husker fans have been waiting a long time for the season to start and well here it is!  Get your tailgating stuff ready, make sure your beer is cold, and lets start off the season with a win over Nevada!

First off I’ll start out with what I expect out of the Nebraka offense against the WolfPack.  I look for Marlon Lucky and Quentin Castille to get around 35 carries together.  I’d also expect Roy Helu and possibly Cody Glenn to get 5 or so handoffs in the game.  Coach Callahan hasn’t said if Glenn will play or not so between Helu and Gleen I’d expect 5 carries.

Sam Keller will have plenty of time in this game to get his feet wet with the Husker offense during a real game.  Look for him to to throw for 2-3 touchdowns atleast.  I see a big day for Keller and and the receivers on Saturday.  With Maurice Purify sitting out the first game of his suspension, Terrance Nunn, Nate Swift, Todd Peterson, and Frantz Hardy should all catch a few balls each I would imagine.  Who will score the td’s?  I’ll go ahead and predict that Nunn, Swift, and Lucky will each have a receiving touchdown in the game.

On the defensive side of the ball for the Huskers, lets pay close attention on how the new d-line plays together.  Nevada will be down to their third string center for this game so I expect Ndamukong Suh to have a huge game up the middle.  Look for him to blow through the line ateast a few times and either sack the QB or stop the running back behind the line of scrimmage.  I also think that Barry Turner and Zach Potter will combine for atleast two sacks in the game.

The linebackers are the strength of the “Blackshirt” defense this year.  Corey McKeon, Steve Octavian, Bo Rudd, Phillip Dilliard, and Lance Brandenburgh will have huge days for the Huskers.  Expect them to be very good at gang tackling and possibly causing a few tournovers.

I’m really excited to watch the defensive backs in this game as well.  Since Nevada runs the pistol offense and is always in a shotgun, expect them to really mix up the run and pass quite a bit.  I’d expect some safty blitzes in this game with Larry Asante who is really licking his chops to get to the quarterback in his first Husker game.  Cortney Grixby and Armando Murillo will start at the cornerback positions while Tierre Green and Asante will be the safties.  Expect too see a lot of Andre Jones as well as Nevada loves to run atleast 3-wide most of the game.

Special teams will be a big deal for the Huskers this season.  They haven’t had a punt returner that really put a scare into opposing teams since Groce graduated.  Grixby, Nunn, Jones, and Swift will be called upon to help out on punt and kick returns.

Freshman Alex Henery and Ali Kunalic are still battling it out for the kicking job.  No one will probably know who the starter will be until gametime.  Dan Titchener will be back to handle the punting job for the Huskers.

I’ll go ahead and throw this score out there just as a guess.  Nebraska 45 Nevada 17