No Tank For This Team! Five Keys to Ball State, Recovery

Nebraska hopes to avoid the abyss with a combination of passion and precision against the Cardinals

Whether or not Nebraska's football team had figuratively committed any sins in its preparation for and collapse against Southern California, the week following the 49-31 loss sure felt like a confession.

Was it forced or coerced? Oh, ever gently so.

As if to exact a small (deserved?) amount of professional revenge for last week's guarded, lethargic comments from Head Coach Bill Callahan, his staff, the players, assorted waterboys and the little kids who hand out the baggies of sweet treats after practice ("the brownie is the brownie, mister") the media has dutifully scraped the Cornhuskers' mustard jar clean in the last five days.

Empty yet? Not if there's still yellow 'round our eye. Wield the knife until the glass squeaks, somebody tweaks, and the storyline for The Boys From Muncie isn't "rout," but "redemption." Or "recovery."

Provided the opportunity by USC's win, and buffeted by the measured-yet-sincere remorse of Callahan and his crew, the newspapers, sports talk shows and evening newscasts have presented a detailed, excellent montage of spectacular failure. Check out Huskerpedia for links aplenty and a lesson in strife as covered by The Fourth Estate in the midst of The Good Life.

It was a great week of stuff, but, taken as a whole, it is an account of the fall after the fact. A rubbery, Hungry-Man dinner of hindsight. As close to an inquisition as it usually gets around here if it's not the 1995 season. And to this critique, expect a chapter following. Beginning with Ball State Saturday, and progressing through Iowa State next week, the pen, the recorder and the microphone will be pressed to a resurrected pulse.

Few stories sell better than the men who stare into the abyss - football players call it "the tank" - only to see their reflected flaws in it. The better to keep out of Tartarus, the home of Sisyphus, a level of hell below Hades. The absolute pit of the mythological cosmos.

In 2 Peter 2:4, it says this: "God did not hold back from punishing the angels that sinned, but, by throwing them into Tartarus, delivered them into pits of dense darkness to be reserved for judgment."

It is where the greatest threats to both the dominion and very idea of the heavenly kingdom are kept.

A college athlete can do no worse than go in the tank. It means he's shut off the pilot light or he's about to "get his" at the expense of the team. In the rarest, vilest cases, it's a player who becomes for sale to certain bookies, or a willing confit on whom boosters dote. It's like an original sin against the spirit of the game, a lobotomy on athletic competition; after the tank, anything's game.  

Nebraska's football players were so instinctively aware of the tank after that loss to USC that nearly all of them referenced it in post-game interviews. There's a healthy fear of it, like a boy resists the urge to cry after scraping his knee. They reiterated their resolve again Tuesday.

Maybe to guard against it, Callahan had his team banging around in pads this week. Jobs were open. Souls were in the process of being searched. Truths were being unearthed.

And thus, everybody gathered around the campfire on this subject of wearing full pads. Why has Nebraska been practicing in half-pads since the close of fall camp? Is that why the Huskers look slow, because they don't carry the extra weight until Saturday?

"You can get just as much done," Callahan said after practice Wednesday. "Every pro team in the NFL practices with half a pad. Very seldom are they in full pads."

Why did Callahan put pads on his team last year at the beginning of the season, but not this year? Was it depth? Injuries? Foolishness?

"We've done it both ways," he said. "We've had success both ways. It's a long season. It's a long season. It's 14 weeks."

And with that, Callahan was done with the topic. He turned his back from the reporter asking a question and indicated to another he could proceed.

It's been that kind of tense week, one in which the intellect of a coach and the combined smarts of the "media pool" danced around each other before ending in minor frustration. It's progress from the lethargy of USC week. The tank's still out in the backyard. But it's out of view for now.

So what's that mean for Ball State? You know - the football team Nebraska's playing Saturday morning?

You didn't think we'd forget our five keys?

Pray for the chance to prove it:   Nebraska can do all the hitting it wants in practice. It must translate that regimen to the game, against the fourth different offense in as many weeks. The Cardinals will punch the clock from the shotgun, but they're not running gimmicks like Wake Forest or Nevada. Nor are they as straightforward as USC; such pro-style offenses would make it hard for BSU to compete against teams with better athletes. Ball State's defense was trampled by Navy, a performance Callahan brushed off because, these days, option offenses are exotic and difficult to prepare for. Imagine that.

At any rate, if some of the teams in the Western Division of the MAC Conference (the directional Michigans, Marshall) are any indication, the Cardinals could very well give up 500 to 600 total yards against Huskers.

Know what? You should hope not.

Exhibit A is Nevada. It's hard to say what, exactly, the Wolfpack planned to do in that 52-10 season-opening loss, but they checked out at halftime. Unlike Nebraska, which kept competing with USC in the fourth quarter, Nevada packed it in, wilted under the sun, took punch after punch on the chin, then pointed its collective finger at the offense after the game. Real classy.

Here's to Ball State battling, so the Huskers get an honest look. A 38-17 win would probably be better than 63-0 for Nebraska's development. We know now that if NU wins by a huge margin, something is amiss with the foe.

Nagging Nate:  BSU quarterback Nate Davis is a NFL draft pick by his senior year. He's got the size, the arm and the toughness. He'll hunker down in the pocket and fire from that position. If ever there was a guy you could sack, and want to for fear of the damage he can do if you don't, it's Davis.

We'll see how much NU Defensive Coordinator Kevin Cosgrove, Defensive Line Coach Buddy Wyatt and the Huskers' front seven learned during their "hell week." We'll see if Barry Turner and Zach Potter (if he plays) can use their skillset to shed blockers and hunt down Davis. We'll see if Cosgrove keeps his typical blitz package, or changes it up a little. If Potter is out, we'll see how he adjusts.

This seems remarkable to say, but Ball State will be a greater challenge to Nebraska's secondary than USC was, if only because the Cardinals will have the throw the ball to gain yards. Watch for NU's tackling to be tested, as Davis will attempt his share of stop, flare and out routes. If senior cornerback Zack Bowman's hurt, check to see how well Andre Jones steps up in a nickel defense. And it's officially time to watch safety Tierre Green on any number of plays, because it's not always clear he's going to line up in the right spot. Callahan did say he liked what he saw of the safeties in practice this week.

Davis has only completed 53 percent of passes, but it doesn’t mean he can't get hot. And he can get hot against blitzing teams; he played very well last year against Michigan, a team that has the word "blitz" grafted into the skin of its defenders.

So yes, tackling matters. Again. The Huskers have to wrap up.

The Pups:   If Callahan was serious about some jobs being up for grabs, we'll find out in the first half of Saturday's game. Oh, NU might trot out the same starting lineup, inserting guard Mike Huff in the place of the injured Andy Christensen, but if somebody legitimately made a move this week in practice we'll see him when the score is still in doubt. How else can you tell who's better on game day?

Maybe it'll be guard Keith Williams, the giant redshirt freshman guard.

"He's really intrigued me. He's really practiced well. He's really made a move, so to speak," Callahan said. "I like his explosiveness and he's getting more confidence in his play. Usually, for a lineman, once they see the big picture, and they can put it to their performance, that's an encouraging sign."

Maybe it'll be offensive guard Jacob Hickman. Or tackle D.J. Jones. On defense, maybe one of the young linebackers will get a chance to show something. Or safety Ricky Thenarse gets more of a look.

Sam's Town:  If nothing else good came out of that USC game, Sam Keller finally and comfortably fell into the role so many fans ascribed to him before the season. He passed the Zac Taylor test of toughness: He took some giant shots from Trojan defenders, got up, and kept dishing out the passes.

"I love those kinds of games where you might be jawing back and forth or you get in a really competitive atmosphere," Keller said Tuesday.

Yes he made two costly errors, and, sometimes, they just might be the cost of doing business with Keller in this West Coast Offense.

If you put him out of the shotgun and had him fire away like he did in the fourth quarter, well, you saw what you'd get, albeit against a defense that knew it had the game won. That said, a lazy USC defense is probably equal to a unit playing well in the Big 12 North.

Keller could pick the North apart if given 50 passes and a shotgun formation every game. He's got a innate sense of how to distribute across a wide-open field.

But the WCO is so rarely like that. Its passing game is infinitely more intricate, and is really designed to keep a defense off balance for ten consecutive plays, not four big ones. Because it emphasizes eating the clock - something Callahan's teams do pretty well, by the way - it doesn't have room for the incompletions that are bound to happen in, say, the Texas Tech offense.

So Keller has to stay within the system and, to some extent, keep some of his talents locked up. Through three games, it's already pretty clear that most of his errant throws and big mistakes are on the tiny slants and stops required in this offense.

Says here Callahan needs to spread it out a bit. Stop keeping so much bunched inside the hash marks. And open it up, too. Nebraska's not going to win the Big 12 with these sumo sets of two tight ends, a fullback, and a stretch play to the boundary. Match the design to the personnel. If Keller's a gunner who gets hotter the more swings he has, goodness, dial him up. Get receivers vertical and throw to them. If that means trusting Frantz Hardy because no one else has the jets, so be it. What about Marlon Lucky on the old wheel route Reggie Bush used to run in college?

Unless Nebraska's offensive line has been hiding talent on the sideline (maybe) or just wasn't with it for two straight games, Lucky should be happy to average 75-80 yards per contest during Big 12 season. That means it'll fall on Keller.

Now, NU could spend Saturday bowling over an inferior team with three plays, or it could build toward the team it'll have to be in October.

Which would you prefer?

The Juice:  Not, no O.J. Simpson. Although he had a banner week, huh?

We're talking about the Huskers' passion. Will it be there? Will padded practices be just what the media hopes for - a grand justification to the USC debacle - or will it just be some practices in pads?

Do the Blackshirts take their failure personally, and punish the Cardinals?

Do they take it personally and try too hard?

Does Callahan figure he has to test his team's manhood, and thus has the Huskers run the ball all day?

And what's the crowd do? Are the fans ready to pounce on the first sign of error? What happens in Ball State busts a few in the first half?

In essence, what will be the emotional quotient of that whole Memorial Stadium scene on Saturday.

Callahan seems eager to find out. Not sure he actually knows how his team will respond. He said as much today, and has all this week sounded like a man who feels his team has proving to do.

He certainly spent the week explaining himself.

 

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