Norm Peterson

So, I'm thinking forcing turnovers on D and stopping turnovers on O are going to be priorities for Frost and Co this year. https://www.omaha.com/huskers/plus/chatelain-this-bizarre-husker-stat-is-so-insane-scott-frost/article_c9eadecd-a2e4-5ccc-9226-ecfaf59d38cc.html

Really like him better if he commits.

And, still for comparison, here's Michigan State's highest-graded returning players:

For the sake of comparison, here are Purdue's highest-graded returning players:

Journal-Star's projected depth chart has Kanawai Noa as the starter at one of the WR spots with Jaron Woodyard as his backup. Both seniors. Those are the ONLY two seniors projected as starters/reserves on the 2-deep depth chart on offense. If they're right, that means, if Spielman doesn't turn pro and no one transfers, we'll return 20 of 22 players on the 2-deep for offense? From an offense we expect to be pretty good this year? Unreal.

I hope they didn't spend my donation on Bon Jovi 2.0

Youth Movement: Here's what our presumable starting lineup looks like on the offensive side of the ball, from an eligibility perspective: QB - Soph RB - Jr/Soph X - Soph? Y - Frosh? Z - Jr TE - Jr OL - Jr OL - Jr C - RFr OL - Soph OL - Jr Are. You. Kidding. Me.

The internet is sometimes wrong, but I read on the internet today that Trent Hixson, a walk-on offensive lineman from Omaha Skutt, was awarded a scholarship and has earned the starting nod for the season opener. I also read on the internet that Cam Jurgens is healthy and appears to have won the nod to start at center over the younger Farniok brother. What does it say about Mike Riley's actual recruiting when, in year 2 of Scott Frost, a sophomore walk-on and a redshirt freshman recruited as a TE are going to make up 40% of your starting offensive line? Holy schmick.

The following is a complete, exhaustive list of every senior wide receiver on the Nebraska football team this year: Jaron Woodyard Kanawai Noa Mike Williams Total combined career receptions in a Husker uniform for senior wideouts: 13 The following is a complete, exhaustive list of every junior wide receiver on the Nebraska football team this year: JD Spielman Ty Chaffin Todd Honas Total combined career receptions in a Husker uniform for junior wideouts not named JD Spielman: 0 The following is a complete, exhaustive list of every senior tight end on the Nebraska football team this year: No one The following is a complete, exhaustive list of every junior tight end on the Nebraska football team this year: Brian Perez Travis Vokolek Jack Stoll I think there will very likely be a breakout wideout for the Huskers this year besides Wan'Dale Robinson. That guy could be Noa, who had 96 career catches at Cal. But it's probably more likely to be a freshman or sophomore and probably someone recruited by Frost. It's kind of amazing to me that, of those two position groups that basically compose the receiving targets for our passing game, there are hardly any seniors who are likely to get very many touches, and very few juniors. And that's true even if you add in the running backs. The only senior RB likely to see any touches at all in the passing department is Wyatt Mazour. And the ONLY junior RB is Dedrick Mills. So, other than juniors Dedrick Mills, JD Spielman and Jack Stoll, it's entirely possible that the rest of the juniors and seniors on this football team will account for 30 or fewer receptions on the season. Combined. Considering there were 257 completed passes last year, that would be mind-blowing.

Merde.

To build recruiting momentum for the 2021 class, we need to be better this year than people expect.

"There are a lot of reasons to be hopeful; there are also a lot of reasons to pump the brakes, not just in the near but in the middle and long-terms as well." Pretty sure we're talking about Nebraska basketball. And our prospects this season and into the future.

I saw Donovan jogging the other day (to his car.) No discernable limp or limitation. But he wasn't making v-cuts, either, so take that for what it's worth.

I think @Huskerpapa mentioned the other day that he used to be a perpetual sunshine pumper and, for whatever reason, he's now more cautious. I can relate. There are a lot of reasons to be hopeful; there are also a lot of reasons to pump the brakes, not just in the near but in the middle and long-terms as well. A lot we don't yet know, so it'll be interesting to see how things pan out. Let's start out with the good stuff: Gravitas. Recruiting is important. Hoiberg coached in the NBA. Recently. That matters to some recruits and should catch their attention. The immediate turn-around at Iowa State shows he can pull it off. And it was definitely a turn-around. He immediately filled his staff here with some high-powered basketball folks, including a couple former D1 head coaches who had produced successful teams of their own. He re-inked his top recruiter from ISU who also had some success getting players to St. John's after Hoiberg left ISU for the Bulls. He nearly instantaneously filled up a roster with recruits and transfers and kept the most important players we had a shot at keeping in the fold. This would include keeping Jervay Green committed as well as Donovan Williams and Dre Davis, the latter two of whom, of course, are 2020 recruits. His style fits. We historically haven't always been able to land big men; his offense doesn't really rely on them. He's reputed to be an offensive genius and he's hedged any potential defensive weakness by bringing in Doc Sadler as a sort of defensive coordinator. It seems likely they'll be able to coach the talent that we have. He was a "home run" hire who puts a great face on the program and looks to be a fantastic ambassador for the school. Dachon Burke. And Haanif Cheatham. Appear to be the real deal. Now the "pump the brakes" stuff: Brought in a lot of bodies but it's still questionable how much star power they possess and you need some dudes to compete in this league. Do we have any? The bodies he brought in, if not possessed of star power, nevertheless are poised to hold spots for 2 or more years before you can replace them, putting him in a position of not being able to upgrade talent as quickly as you might hope. The counter argument to the above is that people transfer anyway. But we had a discussion about the window of opportunity not to renew kids and how the B1G says scholarships are for 4 years not 1, and if a kid decides to stick around who maybe isn't a B1G caliber player, there might not be much the coach can do about it (see Fuller, Nick, for example.) AND, you see how we're already pinched for spots to offer for 2020. We have no current open spots for 2020 and, for every additional 2020 recruit we want to sign, someone with further eligibility on the current roster would have to say "sayonara." I personally would have liked to have seen another grad transfer on the roster, giving us for sure one more spot to offer for 2020. How long can you sell recruits on "I coached in the NBA and we're building something here like what we did at ISU" before results on the floor have to support that you can pull it off again? If recruiting momentum fades, it's hard to get it going again (see Sadler, Doc and Miles, Tim.) It's hard to catch lightning in a bottle twice and, while there are examples of coaches who've returned to college from the NBA and been successful, there are also coaches who returned from the NBA and weren't able to reproduce the success they previously had in college that made an NBA team take a chance on them in the first place. Is our recruiting honcho overrated? They brought in some dudes to ISU, and Shamorie Ponds was pretty good at St. John's, as was LJ Figueroa, but who else panned out? That might be partly on Chris Mullin's coaching, but still. We don't know. I'm concerned by the apparent dropping of the ball getting Akol Arop over to Italy. Or rather NOT getting him over to Italy. It also concerns me that Yvan isn't here yet and might not arrive until after classes start. Been down this road (see Diaz, Brian and Sallie, Roburt.) If I'm honest, I'm also a little distressed that Yvan chose to play limited action for France U18 rather than getting over here and getting familiar with his new team and his new program. And, finally, I am a bit concerned that our penciled-in starter at point guard (whom some had written down in pen) was a no-show for Italy and the practices leading up thereto. The graduation thing might or might not have been his fault; the getting sick was certainly not his fault. But best case scenario is he's behind everyone else in picking up the system and getting reps. Worst case, we have no idea what kind of PG he really is at this level and Dalano Banton isn't eligible this year in the event Cam Mack doesn't cut it. My HOPE is that Cam Mack is everything we were hoping he'd be. But there's really nothing solid to go on at this point to assure us that he is. So, I think there are a lot of reasons to be excited about our future prospects. But there's also a lot of reasons to keep the expectations in check. Probably a lot more on both sides of the ledger than I've listed above. Thoughts?

He would just have to pass an English test. If compliance people drop the ball on this a second time, I don't even know what to say.

So it looks like Duke arguably made the better hire.

You said “exactly.”

Yes. I know. And I can tell you with 100% certainty this is NOT *exactly* what the new PBA floor will be. The floor in PBA will NOT have Bus Whitehead's signature.

I think our O-line should still be fine without him. I don't think anyone was projecting him as a starter. Sad for the kid, but the show must go on.

Third-highest-graded returning B1G receiver in the red zone ...

Feel free to dump anything here that relates to our outlook for the upcoming season.

Speed and athleticism to run. My neck is sore already.

Well, since Matt A is an ace recruiter, you have to have him named as an assistant coach so he can get out on the road. But, since he's not really a hoops guy, you bring in a guy like Lutz to do the coaching that the recruiting assistant would be doing if he was more of a coach and less of a recruiter. It's weird but I think that's what the rules require. You can have a non-coach doing coaching, but you can't have a non-coach doing recruiting on the road.