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A giant red "N" popped out of Bo Pelini's head when asked about the Cover 2 defense called near the end of the game against Virginia Tech. Perhaps it struck him that it wasn't the right defense.

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BTW, Cobby is supposed to be doing these things, but he's off drunk on kool-aid again. He'd damned well better sober up for this week's "300" celebration, otherwise I'm going to have to find a new mascot. 

It was easy for us last week to make fun of our Big 12 counterparts. In fact, there were so many choices for Cobs that it was somewhat difficult to weed them out. This week, not so much. In fact, most of the Big 12 (well, at least the part that we tend to target with derision) did pretty decent. Iowa State won at Kent State, breaking a decades-long road losing streak. Colorado drove themselves to the edge of the precipice, then took a big step back as they blanked Wyoming.  

Missouri challenged themselves by playing the Furman Long John Silver Impersonators. Baylor lost a game they really needed against UConn. Still, they did not merit a cob nomination. 

Texas might have merited a nomination - a 10-3 halftime lead is a pretty wimpy measure of revenge - but again, they did not. Oklahoma State, on the other hand.... 

Husker Mike: 

I'm going to go off the board here and nominate Texas A&M's defense for giving up 521 yards and 30 points to Utah State.  Utah State recovered an onside kick and had a chance to tie the game up late in the 4th quarter before they finally fumbled.  Yes, Mike Sherman has found an offense with Jerrod Johnson, but the results won't be any better if they can't figure out a way to play a little bit of defense.    

Corn Blight: 

I have always been of the attitude that if you're going to run a site like this and take shots at others that you should be willing to handle it when others fire back. In this case, I'm going to make a slight stretch and turn the gun on myself. In this week's Corn Nation Pick 'Em game, I managed a 6-10 record and finished tied for 80th (or basically 111th out of 112th). That's a whole lot of suck. I don't know how I did on the weekly prediction we do here - I'm afraid to look, but I'm sure that's a lot of suck too. Good thing I don't spend real money on any of this. 

As a backup nomination (I can do that, I run the place, dammit), I'm going to nominate Oklahoma State's defense, particularly their pass defense as they gave up just over 300 yards in the air to Rice. Not only that, but the Owls came back from being down 28-3, gaining 281 yards in the second half compared to 139 yards for the oh-so-powerful Cowboy offense. Oklahoma State was fifth in the nation.... a couple weeks ago? What? Their pass defense is 108th nationally.

After all the money given by T. Boone Pickens and high expectations, Oklahoma State is on the brink of a disastrous season. 

Jlew: 

My cob of the week goes to the defensive Cover 2 call that Nebraska used at the end of the Virginia Tech game. Now there were a lot of chances for Nebraska to win the game, but this call really stands out in my mind. What defense would you call with one minute remaining and the other teams has no time outs.

A) The advantage of this defense is that it provides great versatility to the defense as the corners can play run, short pass, and deep pass with the confidence that they have support from two deep safeties. 

B)The main advantage of this defense is that it is extremely difficult for even the best quarterbacks to complete long passes against it. Therefore, this coverage is generally used as a prevent defense to be used near the end of a game or half, meaning that the defense sacrifices the run and short pass to avoid giving up the big play with the confidence that the clock will soon expire. 

A) was what was called, the cover 2 B) is a cover 4.

Now the execution could have been better, but the coaching staff has to put players in position to succeed. So take that cob and shove it the rest of the B12.