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Iowa running back Kaleb Johnson is tackled by Nebraska's Isaac Gifford during the third quarter. Jeffrey Becker-Imagn Images

Dave Feit: Giving the Game Away

Originally posted on Nebraska Cornhuskers on SI
By Dave Feit | Last updated Dec 2, 2024 9:42 AM ET

The sense of impending doom hit before the third quarter started.

NBC flashed a statistic on the screen touting the sheer dominance of the defense. I forget exactly what the stat was about (rush yards or first downs, probably), but they showed the last time Nebraska had a half so dominating: at Michigan State, 2021.

Cue the mental flashbacks of an epic defensive effort wasted by a horrible special teams play and an offense that failed to show up in the clutch.

For what feels like the millionth time, Nebraska lost a game it had no business losing. Heck, I'd argue that the Huskers didn't "lose" this game, they gave it away like a birthday present. Like they always do.

Six of the last seven games in this series have been one-score losses with Nebraska finding exotic new ways to lose. Give credit to the wicked witches and evil wizards overseeing Nebraska's eternal torture: shutting down Iowa's running game only to give up a long receiving touchdown to - you guessed it! - their running back provided the creative and ironic groin kick this series is known for.

The defense is amazing all night long, except for a single Red Rover play that accounts for 44% of Iowa's offensive yards.

Meanwhile, the offense strayed too far from what was working. Ill-timed gadget plays derailed drives and put the game on the shoulders of a quarterback whose accuracy (and protection) were not at their peak.

And not surprisingly, the duct tape and baling wire holding the special teams together for the last month finally failed.

And like that, all of the positive momentum from the Wisconsin game is gone. All of the snuggles are back to struggles as we spend the next 3-4 weeks stewing on an utterly stupid loss. Plus, we get to have a ridiculous discourse about handshakes, sportsmanship, and how many law enforcement officers are needed to protect a swath of spray-painted turf from an out-of-state prayer group.

All things that could have been avoided by just staying out of your own way long enough to win the dadgum game.

Things I believe

Nebraska absolutely, positively MUST fix its special teams. First, let's look at the many, many ways Nebraska's special teams lost this game:

A bad snap on a field goal attempt leads to a poor hold, which leads to a missed field goal. Three points were lost.
Miscommunication on an aborted punt return gives Iowa the ball at the 7-yard line. Thankfully the defense held them to a field goal, but we're at a six-point swing in a game Nebraska lost by three.
Iowa returned a punt for 25 yards. Nebraska has 73 punt return yards on the season, which is a 52% improvement on 2023.

For the most part, we've reached the acceptance stage on Nebraska having subpar special teams. The defense forces a punt, NU fair catches it wherever they can (even if it's inside the five) and the offense does its best to drive it 80-90 yards. Somebody may try to return the occasional kickoff, but the odds are good they're not getting past the 25.

Sure, the Huskers have not had a punt return touchdown since 2019 (J.D. Spielman) and a kickoff return touchdown since 2017 (also Spielman), but that's really hard. It's not like the award for best returner is named after a former Husker. Ask Iowa, one of their players is a finalist.

Playing against teams like Iowa - where special teams are truly emphasized, not just given lip service - illustrates just how many yards and points Nebraska is missing out on by half-assing special teams for the better part of a decade.

At the midway point of the season, I described NU's special teams as "a problem that has cost NU a win, and likely will hurt them again." With a competent field goal unit, it's very easy to look back and see how NU could be 8-4.

I'm not going to say Ed Foley should be fired. That's not my role. But it is easy to see the status quo is not working - as easy as it was to see with Marcus Satterfield a month ago.

Therefore, I'll stick with what I wrote back in October: "I truly respect Foley’s work (re)building relationships with high schools across the state. It matters. Maybe that could become a full-time role in 2025."

Nebraska's margin for error remains razor thin. Nebraska's defense absolutely dominated this game. Iowa gained five first downs. Kaleb Johnson - a very good back - was held to 45 yards rushing. With one notable play excluded, quarterback Jackson Stratton was 7-14 passing for 43 yards. The Blackshirts had nine tackles for loss.

It was a defensive performance worthy of a shutout - or at the bare minimum, a win.

But that was not the case.

Due to an inconsistent offense and an absolute tire fire of a special teams unit, the defense had no margin for error. They had to be perfect - even against Iowa's chronically incompetent offense - to offset failures in the other two phases.

That approach is clearly unsustainable. It is unrealistic to expect perfection from one phase, and madness to need it to win. Because when the defense fails - as it did on a pass that Johnson caught seven yards behind the line of scrimmage and turned into a 72-yard touchdown, breaking numerous tackles along the way - it can sink the entire game.

A key priority for 2025 needs to be doing more across all three phases to allow some cushion when things don't go as planned.

Nebraska should have shaken hands, but Iowa doesn't get to be the Good Sportsmanship Police. As I'm sure you know, Nebraska's pregame captains (Elliott Brown, Emmett Johnson, MJ Sherman, and Deshon Singleton) did not shake hands with their Iowa counterparts before the coin toss. This has blown up into a big deal since one of Iowa's captains took exception to it in a postgame interview. As you would expect, he took the opportunity to criticize NU for a lack of class.

I have two opinions on this:

NU should have shaken hands. Set aside the rivalry, the cops surrounding the spot where NU likes to pray before games, and all of the other disrespect NU has felt in this series. Tune out the virtue signaling, culture war stuff that is already overshadowing this conversation.

Answer this simple question: Do you believe captains representing the Nebraska program should shake hands - even if they despise the person across from them? I do, and I doubt I'm alone in that.

Not shaking is something a program like Colorado does. And if you're going to make that move, you damn sure better back it up on the field. Instead of being the bigger man in the face of Iowa's disrespect, NU sank to their level. And since history is written by the winners, Nebraska lost the ability to control the narrative.
I have no desire to hear a sportsmanship lecture from the University of Iowa. A quick sampling of classy, sportsmanlike moments from our neighbors to the east: A kicker taunting and blowing kisses after making a kick, women's basketball coach Lisa Bluder interrupting an NU player's answer with an expletive to whine about "Big Ten protocol", men's basketball coach Fran McCaffrey staring down officials, Caitlyn Clark whining for a foul moments before knocking a player to the ground.

To be clear: I'm not suggesting that Nebraska is a bastion of sportsmanship and class. Unfortunately, examples exist on this side of the river too. But Iowa's holier-than-thou hypocrisy was too much to take. Enjoy your gift-wrapped win and move on

Things I don't know

Who will - and will not - be available for the bowl game? The transfer portal window opens Monday, Dec. 9 and closes Dec. 28. Rhule estimated "30-50" players will enter the portal before the 2025 season (and the new 105-man roster limit) starts.

Not all 50 will leave before the bowl (the portal will also be open for 10 days in April), but I wouldn't be surprised if some guys who have played this year try to get a jump start on their future.

In addition, I expect a few players who are healthy enough to play in the bowl will opt out to prepare for the NFL Draft or other reasons. The last time Nebraska played in a bowl game (2016), opting out was a brand new phenomenon as Christian McCaffrey and Leonard Fournette pioneered it. In 2023, it was estimated that eight players per bowl team opted out for various reasons.

Maybe Nebraska will be the exception, because the majority of the roster has never been to a bowl game. Maybe NU players have clauses in their NIL deals that prevent it. But if I had to guess, I suspect at least three players will opt out. There are some draft-eligible players who have nothing left to prove on the field, and a lot to lose if they get hurt.

Nebraska's coaching ranks could also be thin as guys take other jobs (Tony White's name is circulating for a few openings), get fired (I bet you can think of a couple names), or are otherwise reassigned.

Finally, a piece of good news: bowl games no longer count against redshirt eligibility, so pretty much anybody on the roster could play, including guys like Riley Van Poppel, Amare Sanders, Turner Corcoran, and others who are at or near the four-game limit.

What if Riley Van Poppel had played all season? After a promising freshman campaign, defensive tackle Riley Van Poppel redshirted in 2024. He used his four free games against UTEP, Colorado, Rutgers and Iowa - three wins and a one-score loss.

In the big picture, I think redshirting RVP was the right call. Linemen benefit from maturity. Physical development, mental development, and quantity of reps matter more for the big guys than running backs and wide receivers. Rhule is right to point to Ty Robinson's dominating senior season as a roadmap for where Van Poppel can go in 2025 and beyond.

But the reality is that in 2024 Nebraska often had a noticeable drop-off between Ty and Nash Hutmacher and the reserves. Part of the reason the 2023 defense was so successful was that Tony White and Terrance Knighton could rotate defensive linemen in waves, keeping guys fresh and able to give 100% on every snap, with minimal depreciation. I'm not sure if that was the case in 2024.

I'm not sure if one defensive tackle is the difference between victory and defeat in the Illinois, Ohio State, UCLA, and/or USC games - especially since the defense was largely not the biggest issue in those games. But it is worth noting that those four teams averaged 4.2 yards per carry against NU, which is more than double the 1.9 YPC the Huskers allowed when Van Poppel played.

Did Dana Holgorsen get impatient? Nebraska went into halftime up 10-0. They got the ball to start the third quarter and began marching down the field. With a touchdown, Nebraska would likely ensure victory. Heck, even a field goal would mean Iowa would need two touchdowns to win.

After gaining 41 yards in five plays, NU had first down from the Iowa 40. Heinrich Haarberg sneaked into the game and took the snap. Under immediate pressure right up the middle, Haarberg launched a deep ball toward Jacory Barney Jr. near the goal line. The Hawkeyes had Barney double covered and easily knocked the ball away. The Huskers managed only one more first down on the drive (via a pass interference penalty) before John Hohl missed a 34-yard field goal.

In the moment, I hated the deep ball gadget play. I understand going for the throat - especially considering the down and location on the field. But Nebraska was in a rhythm and was moving the ball consistently. That deep ball seemed to snap whatever flow Holgorsen had, and the offense never recovered.

After the missed field goal, the Blackshirts forced a punt… which was muffed at the seven-yard line. The Blackshirts held Iowa to a field goal, but the momentum had shifted. NU punted on its next possession, and Iowa scored a long touchdown to tie the game.

Huskerigami Update

A “Huskerigami” is a final score combination (win or lose) that has never happened in the 130+ year history of Nebraska football.

Final score: 13-10

Is that a Huskerigami? No. It has happened seven times before. The first time was a home loss to Missouri in 1938. The most recent was the 2013 game against Iowa. Of Matt Rhule's 24 games as Nebraska's head coach, four (17%) have ended in a 13-10 loss.

5 Things I loved

Run Defense. On the first play of the game, Nebraska had a tackle for loss. The Blackshirts swarmed Kaleb Johnson all night long. Iowa was held to 1.9 yards per carry. Making teams one-dimensional by taking away the run is a recipe for success in the Big Ten. I'm bummed this performance was not rewarded with a win.
Running backs. Remember that very first depth chart that had four "ORs" on it? An underrated influence of Dana Holgorsen has been replacing the "Four ORs-men of the Backfield" with clearly defined roles. Emmett Johnson is the primary back and a reliable receiving option out of the backfield. Dante Dowdell is the short-yardage and goal-line back. Rahmir Johnson - back from injury - is there to share some of EJ's reps. The backs have responded with three of their best games of the season.
Ty Robinson. Another game of blowing up plays, pressuring quarterbacks, and absorbing double teams (and uncalled holds). The big guy is so much fun to watch.
Riley Van Poppel. Robinson's protégé showed little rust despite not playing since the Rutgers game. He had only one tackle (a two-yard tackle for loss), but you can see the potential. Buy stock now.
NU's receivers. Even with that painfully brutal drop by Neyor, the receivers deserve recognition. On a wickedly cold night, they turned a lot of high and/or outside throws into completions - when they easily could have been incompletions or turnovers. One quibble: can we get Jaylen Lloyd involved before the final drive of the game?

Honorable mention: Blackshirts, Dylan Parrott, Nate Boerkircher, John Bullock, James Williams, Jahmal Banks, run blocking, being able to listen to the NU radio broadcast instead of Colt McCoy, Iowa's Wave, and the kiddos (and parents) waving back.

5 Areas for improvement

Punt returns. After it looked like Barney was going to muff several punts, Isaiah Garcia-Fair-Catchaneda was brought into secure the ball. Obviously, this was the time where miscommunication led to a muffed punt.
Kickoff returns. If you do absolutely nothing, you'll get the ball at the 25. Obviously, this means Nebraska returns kicks only to be tackled at the 19 and 20. Repeatedly, for several seasons.
Pass blocking. Raiola was sacked four times, including the strip sack that sealed Nebraska's fate. NU quarterbacks were hurried five other times.
Isaiah Neyor. You've got to make that catch.
NBC. Colt McCoy was dreadful as an analyst, (seriously, doesn't Cris Collinsworth have any other family members available?), but the Peacock is here for their poor production values. Did Brian Buschini get roughed on a punt, or was a Hawkeye blocked into him? We never saw a replay. Their rules analyst never gave a good answer on why that kickoff before halftime wasn't a safety. And they didn't have a great angle on the final field goal. Give me BTN.