Husker Nation Blog

It was a close game against San Jose State over the weekend, but a fourth quarter kickoff return by Niles Paul pretty much broke the game open for Nebraska. The final was 35 - 12 after a twenty-one point outburst late in the game by the Cornhuskers.

Joe Ganz couldn’t quite match his performance from last week. He threw for 216 yards with no TDs and one interception. He’s going to need to do much better in the future when Nebraska begins playing their Big 12 rivals or it’s going to be a long, long season.

It’s early in the season so there’s probably no real reason to raise any flags of concern quite yet. But if Nebraska plays this poorly next week there’s going to be a lot of nervous fans in Lincoln.

As I’m pretty sure everyone in Husker Nation predicted, Nebraska steamrolled the Broncos of Western Michigan this weekend. The final was 47 - 24 thanks to four touchdown passes by Joe Ganz.

Fun fact: This was Nebraska’s 23rd consecutive win in a season opener. That streak is the longest in the country and it’s nice to see Bo Pelini getting started in Nebraska off on the right foot. It would’ve been a terrible tragedy to break that record in his first big game.

Western Michigan, a MAC school, is better known for their hockey program than their football team so I’m not going to get too worked up over this win. It’s in the weeks and months to come that we’ll see what kind of a football team Bo has put together.

Kirk Herbstreit, one of the more popular and well-known college football analysts for ESPN, picked Nebraska as his sleeper team for the upcoming season. I was watching one of the many pre-season football shows ESPN has been running over the weekend when I heard Kirk make this prediction for the Cornhuskers.

Predictions should normally be taking with a grain of salt, but with Nebraska coming off only its second losing season since 1961 there are a lot of fans who will take any good news they can get. Prediction or otherwise.

Even though this blog is predominantly about Cornhusker football it’s only fair to give some attention to other sports going on in Nebraska this year.

The women’s volleyball team was just ranked #7 in the CBS College Sports-AVCA preseason coaches poll yesterday. The team received one first place vote from the 60 coaches who participate. Nebraska isn’t the only Big 12 school represented: Texas came in at #3, Kansas State at #14 and Iowa State at #18.

Last year Nebraska posted a 30 - 2 record and reached the regional final.

Today is an All-ESPN edition of Huskers In The Headlines as the worldwide leader in sports takes several looks at the Big 12.

Big 12 quarterdeck crowded with talented signal callers - Ivan Maisel breaks down the quarterback position for each team and has kind words to say about Nebraska’s Joe Ganz.

Running games take a backseat to pass-happy offenses in Big 12 - Tim Griffin has an extra long piece about the emphasis on throwing the ball over running it in the quarterback-rich Big 12. Only one Big 12 school is returning a 1,000-yard rusher and that would be Nebraska with Marlon Lucky.