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Special Teams Need to Get Special-er · Husker Buzz

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Shano, we're up to seven of the 30 Memorial Stadium
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: urinals sold for $ 3, 000 each.
• 0:05
  Speaker 2: Are you one of the latest purchasers?
• 0:08
  Speaker 3: No, I figured we'd see them down at the lake
• 0:10
  Speaker 3: out there in Valley, Jim. You guys might put them
• 0:14
  Speaker 3: all around the lake somewhere.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, there's a covenant against large stadium restroom facilities.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: No chance that's allowed out there.
• 0:23
  Speaker 3: Well, have you seen, I mean, you can buy the
• 0:24
  Speaker 3: chairs and the stadium signs. I mean, a lot of
• 0:27
  Speaker 3: the stadium section signs have already sold. I mean, you can,
• 0:31
  Speaker 3: you know, like section 16, section 12, whatever the section
• 0:34
  Speaker 3: you can buy. And you can buy your seats. I mean,
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: and they turn it into like a nice bench you
• 0:40
  Speaker 3: can put in your garage or wherever you want to
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: put it.
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: See, I'm into that. I'll do that.
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: And since I'm probably going to get kicked out of
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: the stadium after 103 years this next year, I'll see
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: if I can buy my two seats in the East Balcony,
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: because that'll be as close as I get to going
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: to the games and sitting in them.
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: All right, enough of that tomfoolery. We'll save that for
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: the bye week.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about special teams, because they looked like 10
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: miles of bad road against the Maryland Terrapins, which is
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: not a great team.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: What happened? We had... Let's see, shanked extra points. We
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: had false starts.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: We had kickoff returns allowed to Maryland to the 50-yard line.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: Kick out of bounds.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: We had kicked the ball out of bounds. Do we
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: miss Mike Eckler that much?
• 1:26
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I think it was, like you said,
• 1:28
  Speaker 3: a number of different things. The game, though, was tightly officiated.
• 1:32
  Speaker 3: I mean, his crew was heavily scrutinized for the Big
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: Ten to come out, even with a statement. I mean,
• 1:37
  Speaker 3: they misofficiated the missed extra points. They roughed the snapper.
• 1:41
  Speaker 3: It should have been a re-kick, and they didn't play
• 1:44
  Speaker 3: that right, how they explained it to Matt Rule on
• 1:46
  Speaker 3: the sideline. I think it was a lot of things.
• 1:50
  Speaker 3: The missed field goal for Nebraska, he has had three
• 1:55
  Speaker 3: misses this year, 52, 54, and 55 yards. I'm not
• 1:59
  Speaker 3: as critical of those misses because those are really long kicks.
• 2:04
  Speaker 3: And the snap and the hold was bad on that
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: kick that he missed on Saturday. But the offsides and
• 2:12
  Speaker 3: procedural stuff that you're getting, that is a concern. We
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: don't really see that very often on kickoffs, especially where
• 2:18
  Speaker 3: you kick it out of bounds. Then on that same
• 2:20
  Speaker 3: kickoff out of bounds, you're off sides as well. So
• 2:22
  Speaker 3: they get the ball on the 40-yard line. In a
• 2:24
  Speaker 3: big game, that's a huge deal.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: The other thing that concerned me is that three times
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Nebraska's kick returners did not even reach the 25-yard line.
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and I don't know if they're telling him to
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: take those out. They were kicking those into the south wind,
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: if I remember. So they hung up, and they hung
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: up in the air for a while. They were shorter
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: kicks because of the wind. But the coverage for Maryland
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: got down there, and there wasn't much of a return
• 2:51
  Speaker 3: lane for the guy to take them back. That's what
• 2:55
  Speaker 3: I'm seeing from my seat in the press box. There
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: really is no wedge or setup for a return when
• 3:00
  Speaker 3: he's fielding those balls.
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: You've just got to kind of swallow your pride and
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: take it on the 25-yard line at that point because, again,
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: the bowl game against Utah, if you remember, there were
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: three that they did that to, and they started those
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: drives on the 12-yard line, 14-yard line, and you just
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: can't do that to your offense.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: Certainly can't do it against Indiana, which is leading the
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: Big Ten Conference in total defense, but again, they haven't
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: played anybody really good. Nebraska's played an average team in Michigan.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: They've played an athletic team that was poorly coached in Maryland.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: Indiana has played Northwestern, which is a very well-coached team
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: with not a lot of athletes, but they play well.
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: So we really don't know much about either of these teams,
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: but we're going to probably know a lot at about
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: 4 o'clock in the afternoon on Saturday.
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: And special teams will be an indicator to me.
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it is a big part for Nebraska. They've been
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: very aggressive trying to block punts this year, too. They've
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: gotten a couple blocked punts, but they missed the one
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: Saturday and were penalized for it. Matt Rule has not
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: held back on that end of it. He's trying to
• 4:08
  Speaker 3: set up punt returns. He's trying to block punts, and
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: that aggression at times has cost Nebraska early this season.
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: Okay. Jamal Rule is back.
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: The kid from North Carolina who looked really good in
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: the early season, running the ball, seven touchdowns, 333 yards
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: so far, was held out of the game against Maryland.
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: He probably could have played in that one, but they
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: didn't need him.
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: They thought they didn't need him for that one.
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: Yeah, he did not practice last week. And then he
• 4:41
  Speaker 3: went through pregame warm-ups and was fine. And Dana Holgerson said, yes,
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: he could have played. It was their decision not to
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: play him in that game based on him not practicing.
• 4:51
  Speaker 3: There are big believers that, hey, to play you've got
• 4:53
  Speaker 3: to practice. Makai Nelson at least went through. multiple days
• 4:57
  Speaker 3: of practice, missed one day, then played in the game Saturday.
• 5:01
  Speaker 3: And Jamal has practiced all week. He will play, as
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: Dana Holgerson said, this week, minus the setback that we
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: don't know about in practice. He will play, and that
• 5:10
  Speaker 3: first injury report will come out later tonight.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and by the way, they said Ja'Cory Barney was
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: questionable for the Maryland game he played. So I'm not
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: sure how much veracity we can put into these injury reports,
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: but who might surprise you if they're on that injury
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: list today?
• 5:26
  Speaker 3: Oh, again, I think they're going to be fairly healthy.
• 5:30
  Speaker 3: I mean, Carter Nelson, as we know, has been out,
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: but that's the main one. I mean, I think Jamal Rule,
• 5:37
  Speaker 3: Makai Nelson are fine. Corey Vardy's going to be fine.
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: Brennan Black played last week. He should be good to go.
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: There's nothing, nobody from the game was carried off. That's
• 5:49
  Speaker 3: one thing I noticed in these games. The opponents Nebraska's played,
• 5:52
  Speaker 3: they're getting guys carried off left and right. Nebraska's not
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: been that way. So I do give Nebraska's strength and
• 5:59
  Speaker 3: conditioning and training staff a lot of credit. The opponents
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: are the ones that are being carried off the field, though,
• 6:05
  Speaker 3: in a lot of situations where Nebraska has stayed fairly
• 6:08
  Speaker 3: healthy this year on the All right.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: Big guy, thanks.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: We'll talk to you tomorrow. That's KFB Husker Info Strongman
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: Sean Callahan. He's here with the Husker Buzz at 647
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: every Monday through Friday and the On 3 Husker online
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: pregame show, 6 o'clock Friday night exclusively on 1110 KFB.