Two Signees Nominated For McDonald’s AA Game, More Schedule Updates

McDonald’s All-American Nominees

Two of the Nebraska Cornhuskers 2021 signing class have been named 2021 as McDonald’s All-American nominees. The game will not be played this year, but Bryce McGowens and Wilhelm Breidenbach were among those to make the list of nominees to be considered for the honorary All-American title that will still be given out.

McGowens, a five-star guard and brother of current guard Trey McGowens, and Wilhelm Breidenbach, a four-star forward, will be considered by organizers now as candidates for the final 24 players that will be selected for All-Americans status. The game and almost-week long practice and evaluation period by NBA and collegiate personnel leading up to the game will not occur due to COVID-19, but the title still carries enormous weight.

At this time no player from the state of Nebraska or who has wound up playing basketball for a college in the state has ever been selected. However, these are not the first players to either be from the state of Nebraska or to choose the Cornhuskers (neither McGowens or Breidenbach live in Nebraska) for college that have been nominated.

MgGowens is listed as the No. 21 overall player in the country per 247Sports Composite and Breidenbach is listed No. 93 overall. Together with fellow junior college signee guard Jeisei Tominanga the 2021 class ranks No. 24 nationally and third in the Big Ten.

Schedule Updates

Will this be the final schedule update for the Nebraska Cornhuskers 2020-2021 regular season? If we are being honest, I think we all generally would hope so despite the Big Ten slate now having dates set for 19 of the originally planned 20 league games.

Friday evening the Big Ten issued schedule updates focused on the three programs still needing the most games rescheduled following extended COVID-19 related pauses by each: Nebraska, Michigan State, and Michigan. With the changes, Nebraska has dates set for 19 games, though still lacks a make-up date for a road game at Purdue.

Michigan State has all 20 games on the schedule now. The Michigan Wolverines, leading the conference in the standings currently and lacking games against most of the top teams in the league to date, has just 17 games on its schedule with little time to make them all up. It also seems unlikely the league will force them to cram in more of them. Apparently six games over the next 17 days is asking too much for the great Juwan Howard and his crew.

Okay, now that I got that off my chest (for now), let’s take a look at the new games added to the schedule. You can also always go back and see how wrong or how close I was on some of these if you need something to do while stuck at home during ongoing winter weather across the country. Of note is the Illinois road game was moved up a week from previous changes

Nebraska Men’s Basketball Updated Schedule (Feb. 23-March 7)

• Tues. (Feb. 23): Penn State, 7 p.m. (BTN)
• Thurs. (Feb. 25): at Illinois, 6 p.m. (BTN)
• Sat. (Feb. 27): Minnesota, 6 p.m. (BTN)
• Mon. (March 1): Rutgers, 6 p.m. (BTN)
• Thurs. (March 4): at Iowa, TBD (BTN)
• Sun. (March 7): at Northwestern, TBD (BTN)

*All times in central, and new game dates added in bold