Regression? WE STARTED OUR FREAKING WALK ON BACKUP QB AND HE THREW 4 PICKS. WE GOT BEAT BY A NORTHWESTERN TEAM THAT BEAT A DARNED GOOD STANFORD TEAM TWO WEEKS AGO. HOW DID WE REGRESS?
Wow! How can anyone still be happy with Riley?
- Thread starter WestCoastCornhusker
- Start date
Our running backs averaged over 8 yards a carry on the first 3 series and finished with over 5. This was a bad run defense that we were throwing picks to.
The run was there, especially on the first drive, because Ryker was hitting the passes. I believe we have to pass to open up the running game, cuz the Oline is not good enough to sustain any long drives pounding the football. And everyone knows that, so they stack the line of scrimmage and dare us to throw. Until we can execute better on the line or at QB, we won't win. Of course, then there's the issue of the defense . . . .
Fyfe threw picks to the worst run D in the B1G. That's game planning issues. We were able to run on Northwestern from the power sets all day. We just didn't stay with it. Our best running backs struggle with pass blocking in our pass first offense so they sit.
dingle, are we playing better football in game 9 or worse football? Who has improved since last year. Who is playing better now than they were in game 1? Where is the player development? Other than Brown, I can't see any.
Agreed....we have the worst group of linebackers and DBs in ALL of college football and that is not an overstaement by any means. You cannot defend anything without a single linebacker making plays. Collins repeatedly sprints last our linebackers 25 yards downfield to make plays. It is pitiful when your 325 lb DT is signifantly faster than all of your linebackers.
Not a Boliever but Riley was a horrible hire and I said that from day one. Next year I bet we lose the sellout streak and we'll miss a bowl game for the second year in a row. I think it's time for SE to be fired as well as this staff. This needs fixed now or this program is toast.
Not one of our linebackers, defensive ends or defensive backs would make the two deep at Iowa Western Community College.
Yes, because Ryker was completing his passes. I still believe with our Oline, we have to pass to open up the running game. They may be a bad run defense, but our Oline blocking is even worse.
Carriker generally stated this some weeks ago on his blog. Said our identity was basically air raid with a complimentary running game
2 years ago Nebraska had more depth to withstand those injuries.
Can't argue your point about the Purdue QB. That was embarrassing.
Riley doesn't 'deserve' anything. He's getting paid to produce and it isn't happening.
This is the EXACT same argument that was being used to make excuses for Cosgrove. "He doesn't have talent. We have some of the worst defensive talent in the nation. The back 7 is so slow, we need speed. Our corners are too short." Bull f*cking shit...It's AMAZING how piss poor coaching makes players look much worse than they are.
Is our defense composed of top 10 talent? Nope. Are there a multitude of injuries that have occurred? Yes. But if you think for one second, this defense now has literally the worst players in FBS, you're lying to yourself in such a manner, that you should seek counseling.
You people literally ignore decades worth of information and stats showing exactly what we were going to get with this hire and instead, make up every conceivable lie imaginable to try to protect the coaching staff. It's nothing short of pathetic.
The key point though is that Cosgrove got more than one year to prove he was going to continue to be Cos or not. More specifically Cally had multiple chances to make corrections.
No one has made a particularly strong argument about why this set of coaches don't deserve at least one off season to right the ship especially considering that no level of administration would be on board firing everyone before June 30
Yes, I am still happy with Riley. Sometimes you have to look past the wins and loses to see the long term plan. Things will get better in the future but most are too impatient to see it through.
So at what point do we keep ignoring someones entire lifelong body of work?! This isn't Riley or Bankers first coaching job!! Why do so many people want to give someone time, when they've already had 18 years of showing what they can do?!?!
It really does no good to answer that question because you have been shown again and again the success stories of .500 coaches and their vast improvement when they changed to a new location.
This is precisely why you give them time. Someone brought up temple from 2 years ago or so... 2-10, now 7-1 with the lone loss to Notre Dame. Time determines how good coaches are, not fans on message boards.
Because hiring a coach is basically hiring someone else's retread. There are very few new faces in a given year. Even coaches we have fired have gone into work well in other locations. It's kind of the unwritten rule of sport that location is everything.
If folks hired on records at other schools alone then fully half of coaches each year would be forced out of the workforce. This is not something that we see in football
I'm not happy with the results and I'm not happy with what's happened on the field, but hitting the reset button now isn't the answer.
There has been a lot out of coaches hands.
Riley can't control the current culture but can keep working to change it. No question bo ruled with fear. Riley prefers positive reinforcement and allowing kids to make decisions, guiding them to do the right thing. Giving someone freedom, who is used to being ruled by fear, can be tough. Sometimes people thrive, sometimes they don't know what to do and wish someone would just tell them. There will likely be 40-45 new faces on the team next fall (30 scholarships and 10-15 walk-ons). Changing the culture didn't happen over night, but could happen soon.
The roster isn't Riley's fault. Granted, I thought (and still think) this team was talented enough to win 10 games. No qbs fit the system, despite good talent no rbs were developed behind Abdullah, the top 8 wrs include 2 walk-ons and 3 high school qbs, there were 17 scholarship linemen and apparently only 1 can play tackle. On defense, the top 4 ends include 2 walk-ons and a tight end (and probably a d tackle), only 4 returning scholarship lbs and only 1 who played at all last year.
Injuries aren't his fault either, they happen and because of terrible roster management by the previous staff, they're barely able to field a full defense. There is no depth at end, lb, and they were almost down to 3 corners this week (fortunately jones and Joseph were able to play). On offense the starting qb, rb, and best wr were all out the second half of the game. Moore has missed time, westercamp is dinged up, the only tackle has missed the last 2 games, tight ends have missed time and I think Tommy has been dinged up most of the year. Injuries happen, but that is quite a string of bad luck.
The other side is that there have been some baffling things in the coach's hands too.
I don't like the offenses philosophy. They say balance, balance, balance, but that's not what we see on Saturday. I'm not looking for power I triple option, but a commitment to the run game, even when it's tough sledding. Back to back 48 pass games is silly. This is a worry.
Defensive plan hasn't been great either. Seems like they don't have the horses to run the scheme, and even if they did, it seems like they struggle disguising and mixing coverages, and getting pressure.
Special teams frustrate the heck out of me. A coordinator that relies on gurus for recruiting, and hasn't gotten much done in the third phase seems like dead weight. When you only get 9 coaches, having a guy that doesn't recruit is a total waste (to me, anyway).
Penalties, game management, and player management (specifically rb and oline) have all left a lot to be desired.
I don't know, it seems like all of the issues are "fixable" and I'd like to see if Riley and co can do it. I was excited when he was hired, despite his recent trouble at OSU. I've always felt like the guy could coach.
Learn, recruit, adjust, adapt.
If they don't fix it they'll be gone soon enough.
There has been a lot out of coaches hands.
Riley can't control the current culture but can keep working to change it. No question bo ruled with fear. Riley prefers positive reinforcement and allowing kids to make decisions, guiding them to do the right thing. Giving someone freedom, who is used to being ruled by fear, can be tough. Sometimes people thrive, sometimes they don't know what to do and wish someone would just tell them. There will likely be 40-45 new faces on the team next fall (30 scholarships and 10-15 walk-ons). Changing the culture didn't happen over night, but could happen soon.
The roster isn't Riley's fault. Granted, I thought (and still think) this team was talented enough to win 10 games. No qbs fit the system, despite good talent no rbs were developed behind Abdullah, the top 8 wrs include 2 walk-ons and 3 high school qbs, there were 17 scholarship linemen and apparently only 1 can play tackle. On defense, the top 4 ends include 2 walk-ons and a tight end (and probably a d tackle), only 4 returning scholarship lbs and only 1 who played at all last year.
Injuries aren't his fault either, they happen and because of terrible roster management by the previous staff, they're barely able to field a full defense. There is no depth at end, lb, and they were almost down to 3 corners this week (fortunately jones and Joseph were able to play). On offense the starting qb, rb, and best wr were all out the second half of the game. Moore has missed time, westercamp is dinged up, the only tackle has missed the last 2 games, tight ends have missed time and I think Tommy has been dinged up most of the year. Injuries happen, but that is quite a string of bad luck.
The other side is that there have been some baffling things in the coach's hands too.
I don't like the offenses philosophy. They say balance, balance, balance, but that's not what we see on Saturday. I'm not looking for power I triple option, but a commitment to the run game, even when it's tough sledding. Back to back 48 pass games is silly. This is a worry.
Defensive plan hasn't been great either. Seems like they don't have the horses to run the scheme, and even if they did, it seems like they struggle disguising and mixing coverages, and getting pressure.
Special teams frustrate the heck out of me. A coordinator that relies on gurus for recruiting, and hasn't gotten much done in the third phase seems like dead weight. When you only get 9 coaches, having a guy that doesn't recruit is a total waste (to me, anyway).
Penalties, game management, and player management (specifically rb and oline) have all left a lot to be desired.
I don't know, it seems like all of the issues are "fixable" and I'd like to see if Riley and co can do it. I was excited when he was hired, despite his recent trouble at OSU. I've always felt like the guy could coach.
Learn, recruit, adjust, adapt.
If they don't fix it they'll be gone soon enough.
So he couldn't play to the strength of his roster? Or at least to the weakness of his opponent?
On this issue, I don't know what I or other people might have been expecting. Coaches don't come in and change systems dramatically. They do what they do. They might add elements of this, or wrinkles of that, but I certainly didn't expect Riley to look like an Osborne or even Solich clone. Its just not done in major college football. No one would expect Saban to run the option if he went to GT for example.
We have seen "elements" of things, at one point someone noted that TA got about 7 designed runs again on average, vs 10 or 11 last year. That's probably within an acceptable range when you consider wholesale system change.
40+ passes on the regular is not though. For as many backs as we have, i thought Davis and Langs would make better use. Although I can kinda see their point of view, even Carriker has noted we seem to operate best when alot of the chips in the air raid passing game fall our way. The receivers have made (and screwed up) more big plays than the backs on average.
We're not terribly efficient on the ground or in the air, but we've scored alot of points chucking the ball in crunch time.
Or at the very least, even if I thought Riley might go full Osborne in Year 1, by Year 2 and 3, I figured the passing based offense would be the order of the day.
What is the strength of our roster? We have an inaccurate QB and an O-line that gets zero push.
I struggle with this as well. One minute we look all world throwing/running the football, the next minute we barely look like we're barely capable of snapping the damn thing.
It bothers me that we throw so much, but I almost shudder to think of where we'd be without alot of those big plays that the WR come up with, either for conversions or scores or whatever.
Fullback as the lead blocker has actually done very well in the last couple of games. Northwestern planed to stop Armstrong rolling right. He did very well rolling left, we just didn't stay with it.
They are almost all delusional. We are 3-6 in a terrible division. We have lost arguably the worst game in our program's history (Purdue) and hired a coach that was about to be fired at OSU. Instead of assembling a good group of assistants, he brought his buddies. Those same buddies were terrible at OSU in almost all phases. What are you people talking about? This will not get better.
Haven't charted it, but it seems like we go to playmakers in sets. Like, shot down the field to DPE, jet sweep DPE, intermediate route DPE.
Then we'll run Newby outside. Newby inside. Newby screen or Westerkamp intermediate route.
Then Westerkamp down the sideline, Reilly deep, Carter screen.
Well, he could. Probably should have.
There's also a heck of an argument to could be made for just running your own stuff. Especially, if you feel like you have roster holes and need to recruit your type of players immediately. Show the recruits what you do and tell them you need them right now.
If you read the entire post you would have seen that I'm confused by a number of things the coaching staff has done so far.
Doesn't mean they all have to go right now. It does mean they're off to a bad start and they need to do better.
I'm not going to sit here and say they deserve 7 years, not even saying they deserve 4 years. But he's coach for the rest of this year and next year. And he should be. If they go 3-9 next year, he's not going to make it to year 3. If he's recruiting well, and the culture is changing and they go 6-6 he'll be back for year 3.
This season sucks. It sucks so very, very bad. I'm not bailing. I still care. I'll still watch every minute of every game.
My hope is the team, and the coaches keep working their butts off, get better, get a few good breaks and win some games. I hope they get 30 great recruits who want to be in Lincoln and can help bring change. I hope next year is a lot better.
If it's not, changes will be made.
I don't think it gets any more concise than this. Riley may not be the answer, but for a host of reasons, fate has conspired to give him at least a Year 2. If we're still crap we won't have any issue getting rid of the guy.
If Riley gets fired in 1-2 years, it will be very difficult for a program like Nebraska to bring in another quality head coach.
Just finished readin all of that... gimmered was very vocal in this thread... where is he now? Haven't seen him since, well, I can't recall...
Edit: just decided to do a little search... last time gimmered posted anything was December 1, 2015. Last time he viewed anything? Today, 1:15 pm, and it happened to be this thread. If gimmered is looking at this, I sure wouldn't mind hearing what you think now...
Edit: just decided to do a little search... last time gimmered posted anything was December 1, 2015. Last time he viewed anything? Today, 1:15 pm, and it happened to be this thread. If gimmered is looking at this, I sure wouldn't mind hearing what you think now...
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I noticed several of the most negative people in this thread haven't posted in awhile. Typical-things go bad, they can't stop talking, but when things start going well, they are strangely silent.
