Tad Stryker: Special Teams Sweeten Season

Ekeler already has more than compensated the university for his salary after replacing Ed Foley. Along the way, he has carved out a prominent role for Williams, a 5-foot-9, 190-pound walk-on from Lincoln High, who was awarded a scholarship two weeks ago after a big kickoff return at Maryland. Against Northwestern, he earned every dollar of that scholarship with a beautiful 95-yard touchdown on a tight-roping thunderbolt down the west sideline.

After a flat performance at Minnesota last week, Matt Rhule and his staff had their team ready to fight and scrap on misty, overcast afternoon. And they’ll need to continue to scrap every minute of November to add even one more win to their victory total.

Nobody’s saying this ballclub has the look of a 10-2 team. The Huskers don’t have enough talent yet to play downhill even against a midlevel Big Ten team like Northwestern. With the exception of Emmett Johnson, who rushed 27 times for 124 yards and two touchdowns, they struggled to give their skill players room to operate against a stout Wildcat defense, and failed to record a single tackle for loss against the exceedingly ordinary Purple offense, but they sandwiched a couple of fourth-quarter stops around a clutch scoring drive to clinch bowl eligibility for a second year in a row.

No apologies needed for that, especially when you look at conference foes like Illinois (5-3), and Wisconsin, who is scuffling along well below .500. The Huskers chiseled out some much-needed momentum going into next Saturday night when Southern Cal, which lost at Notre Dame last week to fall out of the national ratings, comes to Lincoln. That’s a game where Nebraska will need every last advantage it can grab.

The Huskers seized momentum when, just minutes after Williams gave them a 14-6 lead, redshirt freshman cornerback Donovan Jones made a diving interception of a Preston Stone pass that glanced off the Wildcat receiver’s fingertips and popped high in the air. Taking over at the Northwestern 32-yard line, the Huskers played downhill just long enough to take full advantage, getting a first down on a facemask penalty and a couple of Johnson runs, and scored on a beautiful 12-yard pass from Dylan Raiola to a diving, toe-tapping Nyziah Hunter that gave them a 21-6 lead midway through the third quarter. Hunter, who has five touchdown catches this year, continues to make big plays when presented the opportunity.

Then the hard-nosed Wildcats (5-3, 3-2) came fighting back, mainly using the legs of all-conference candidate running back Caleb Komolafe, a 5-11, 210-pound sophomore who scored on runs of 4 and 56 yards on his way to a game-high 125 yards on 17 carries, impressing Murray and siphoning the energy out of the stadium.

Northwestern coach David Braun and his staff did their doggondest to take away the talents of Jacory Barney, both as a pass receiver and punt returner, and were largely successful. Nebraska generally found most of its success using Johnson, who had nearly 40 yards rushing on Nebraska’s opening series. His 9-yard TD on a sweep gave the Huskers an early 7-0 lead, but Northwestern controlled the second quarter, pulling to within 7-6 at halftime on two Jack Olsen field goals. Through three quarters, the Cats were far more efficient than Nebraska on third down, and finished 7 of 14.

The Huskers were a pathetic 2 of 8 third downs when linebacker Javin Wright picked off a Stone pass and returned it to the Husker 36 with just over nine minutes remaining. They came alive when it mattered, though, converting four consecutive third downs on their game-winning 13-play, 64-yard touchdown drive, on four Raiola passes to Johnson, Hunter, Dane Key and Barney. The drive consumed 6 minutes, 27 seconds and culminated with a 4-yard touchdown run by Johnson with 2:44 remaining. The junior running back now has four 100-yard games this season and increased his total to 837 as he tries to become the first Husker to rush for 1,000 yards since Devine Ozigbo in 2016,

Nebraska’s freshman punter, Archie Wilson, had an effective game, averaging 55.5 net yards per punt, and helped offset the work of Komolafe and Stone, and the Big Red allowed no punt returns and only 40 kickoff return yards. That, along with running the ball 39 times for 4.0 yards per attempt, is the sort of thing that makes a big difference in Big Ten rock fights. The Huskers, now 7-3 against Northwestern in Lincoln, are slowly learning how to win them.

“We’re not perfect, but we are 6-2,” Rhule said after the game. And likely, a head-to-head advantage with Northwestern may be a valuable chip to hold in the congested midsection of the conference standings by year’s end.

If the Huskers split their four November contests, Nebraska would have a winning record in the Big Ten for the first time in nine years. For a team that struggles like crazy just to make par lately, that would be a significant step.