What do you do with this? What do you do with a game in which the Huskers commit more turnovers than points? When the opposing offense is missing their two most important players, starts a true freshman quarterback and running back on the road and picks up their first win in Lincoln in 32 years?
Eight turnovers, include two freak plays in the first half. If either of those don't end up being the freaks they are, Nebraska scores at least a field goal and at least comes out with a win. That's as useless a statement as you spending your time wondering what would have happened in your life had you not made a mistake. it's bloody (insert other non-prime time words here, but I'm trying to stay reasonable, which is difficult) useless, that's what it is!
More than half the season is over and there are still so many questions yet to be answered, none of them on defense. All of this team's problems are on the offensive side of the ball - the side of which Bo Pelini had better start paying attention to before his seat gets much hotter than it already is.
Since humanity (Husker fans included) is big on boiling things down to a single item that'll fit on a bumper sticker, I'm going to boil this down to Shawn Watson. If you can name one thing that Watson has not done is establish offensive consistency. Think about this for a minute - name one play that Nebraska runs well on offense, the one play that can keep the offense going when things are going against them - like maybe win a game for them when they've given up seven turnovers and are only down by two points and the game is on the line.
You can't. That's a huge problem. There isn't a single thing this offense does really really well. It isn't just the Iowa state game, it's been all season. Recall the red zone conversations for touchdowns against Virginia Tech, the lack of any offense for the first three quarters against Missouri and Texas Tech, and today, when the Huskers ended up with more turnovers than points.
We're a great team - defensively. As has been pointed out in the postgame thread - the Huskers are the anti-Bill Callahan. Bo Pelini is a great coach defensively, but he's left the offense up to a guy who doesn't appear to be up to the challenge.
At the beginning of this season, Husker fans were worrying about whether or not Shawn Watson would leave for another team. That should end today. With all of Bo Pelini's talk about positions being up for grab after the Texas Tech game, today we saw the same ol', same ol'.
No Cody Green today. No one but Niles Paul fielding punts. Dontrayevous Robinson did well running the ball until a fumble, then Roy Helu gets back on the field to fumble again. If Helu is hurt, and you call his shoulder problem "chronic", then you stick him back for what reason - so he can fail?
The questions aren't much different than when Bill Callahan was running this team, they're just from the other side of the ball. It doesn't take a genius to figure out what the most common denominator is. It isn't Niles Paul, Zac Lee, Cody Green, or rest of the guys on the field.
I like Bo Pelini. I want him to be successful. He's continued to profess confidence in Watson. It sounds great, but after this half a season - what's next?