Banker = Cosgrove

[Elf]

OSU fans begged for years from Banker to be fired. Instead, we gave him a chance of scenery and a hefty payraise. I knew this was going to be an issue when we first hired him. I'm sure Riley talked to him and said, "OK Mark, I'm giving you a chance -- don't make me look bad" and Banker pretty much assured him that he wouldn't. However, you can't make a bad coach a good coach overnight, and his lack of coaching skills are apparent. It was chivalrous and loyal of Riley to give his buddy an opportunity, but the experiment has failed and must be remedied at the end of the season, no excuses.

Four games into the season and already a coach "has to go" at the end of the season.

I understood from the start that this was probably going to be a work in progress and that this season could get ugly.

If you want a top team, then you have to have top recruits. We haven't had that in a while. Past poor recruiting classes are not the fault of this staff.

 

[Blackshirt96]

Bankers D is also Narduzzis D. You know. Ghe one we all drool over.

And Cosgroves D wasnt half this bad his first 4 games. The defense carried the team to their wins that first year.

Where is the disconnect coming from Narduzzi's results and ours? Is it just a talent issue or is there something we are doing differently than what Narduzzi coaches at a fundamental level? Asking in general as I am not well versed in the X and O strategy of a defense. If it is not just talent what things need to be tweaked so we can generate more pressure and start defending the pass at least moderately well?

They put out an article about how Banker & Narduzzi met up & discussed their defenses. I believe the difference was Banker uses a Quarters coverage with the DB's & Narduzzi's DB's play straight man coverage. When you play Quarters your DB's can help stop the run, but are susceptible to the play fake. When they play man the WR's can run off the DB's and they are of little help in the run game.

 

[teachercd]

He's the (disappointing/sad/maddening) part for me:

There is a lot of talk about "we're built to stop the run", "we won't see so many passing offenses in the B1G", etc. Banker was a DC in probably the most pass-happy conference for the previous 12 years. It's not like he's never seen teams that throw the ball before. The fact that he is unwilling/unable to make any scheme adjustments doesn't speak highly for his ability as a DC. And it kind of shoots down all the "these coaches have experience" and "these coaches make adjustments" arguments that we've been sold for the last 9 months. At least as far as the defense is concerned.

This is a very interesting point(s)

 

[StPaulHusker]

I posted this in another thread, but it fully explains why our defense is as putrid as it is.. Another of 408's recruits that Banker has to work with.

https://vine.co/v/exwiiQtWYEd

Speed kills, molasses is well, just molasses!

This is excellent. I didn't see this play, but I saw two were Malik stunted 3 yards to the outside of the DE. This basically took him out of the play and completely renders him useless in a quick drop.

They new guys had him bulk up. Terrible idea.

Not sure this is true,, link???

The media talked about it week 1 of fall practice. He came in around the 300 mark at the start of fall, vs the 270-280 he was last year. Specifically, I remember Sean Callahan and the HOL crew discussing it in one of their podcasts.

I have to imagine that Greg McMullen playing very uninspired football on the same side of the line as Collins is affecting his play as much or more than his weight.

 

[MichiganDad3]

Does he deserve time or does he just need to go ASAP?

Right now. Not even another game.

 

[VectorVictor]

Does he deserve time or does he just need to go ASAP?

Right now. Not even another game.

This wouldn't bother me a bit, to be honest. Rather we rip off the band-aid now than suffer the indignity of a coulda/woulda season due to inaction.

Plus, if this did happen, it would show Riley is willing to bring in new blood and isn't loyal to his coordinators to a fault. Something that Callahan was unfortunately guilty of.

 

[RADAR]

Nuts & Bizaro world all rolled into one

 

[Joe_5700]

This thread makes me chuckle cuz Cosgrove really wasnt that bad prior to '07. It's so revisionist. Hell our defense in '06 is very good. NC quality. Yeah, the train went of the rails in '07, but the problems were well beyond Cosgrove.

Hows about we compare Banker to Pelini. Bo had a hell of a lot worse defensive performances than Cosgrove did. Or is Suh still to big in the mirror for such a thing?

Exactly. Cosgrove did a great job with Michigan and all of the starting linebackers seemed to be injured.

 

[AFhusker]

In 2013, 4 games into the season like we are now, Nebraska was ranked 106th in Overall defense. That was against Wyoming, South Miss, UCLA and South Dakota State.

Against Wyoming Brett Smith put up 383 yards passing and was 29/44 with 4 TD's and 1 interception. He also ran for another 92 yards his running backs ran for 128. They lost that game in the final minutes unable to score but put up 602 yards of offense to our 530. They finished that season with 5 wins.

South Miss was a horrible team that year and only put up 280 yards offense. 220 in the air. They finished that year with 1 win.

UCLA Game Hundley threw for 294 yards on 24 passes. They also ran for another 220 yards for a total of 504 yards. We got smoked in the second half of that game and it wasn't even close. So no need to air it out anymore. UCLA finished 10-3.

South Dakota State game was won we won fairly easy after the first quarter. Yet South Dakota State still managed 465 yards offense with 238 in the air and 227 yards on the ground.

So after 4 games we were ranked 106th in total defense averaging 463.8 yards of offense per game. Our rushing defense was 83 averaging 179.5 yards on the ground. Our pass efficiency defense was 86 averaging 139.93. Passing yards allowed was 106th averaging 284.3 yards per game. Scoring defense was 72 allowing 27 points per game.

Right now our total defense is 102 averaging 450 yards a game. That's 10 yards less per game against teams that I'd argue are much tougher overall than 2013. Rushing defense we are 7th only allowing 73 yards per game. And we are dead last obviously for passing yards allowed with 373 yard per game. Scoring defense though we are 76th averaging 26.3 points. Still .7 points less per game than 2013.

So my point in all this is not that we are good defense, but that this sh#t is not uncharted territory for us. We've done this crap and worse just two years ago under worse competition. Not to mention we were equally bad on both stopping the run and pass. It wasn't 127th passing in the country like it is this year because teams could just as easily line up and rip off 180 yards of rushing to compliment their 280 yards passing. 2013 we walked away 3-1 from that abysmal showing. This year we are 2-2. But two of those teams had a combined 6 wins for the entire season and the other was an FCS school. The only good team we played embarrassed us. So let's quit pretending like we just dropped off the earth defensively. We've been a sh#t defense milking an easy schedule to 9 wins for several years now. We're still a sh#t defense with a little tougher schedule up front, but we still might be able to milk this schedule into 9 wins too. Nobody on this schedule is unbeatable including Mich State.

 

[zoogs]

Exactly right, AF.

Saw Sam McKewon video short where he discussed some of the breakdowns in trust, etc. Seems to fit what we are seeing on defense. He makes the great point that it is nothing new; it's carryover and the same kind of breakdowns we saw. It's just the scheme asks different things and the breakdowns on happening vs the pass instead of the run. But even that, it's not like we clamped down on passing games recently -- even if the overall stats were good.

There's probably a good deal of opponent quality and, "If you can run like this, why pass", etc, going on. Huskers have not fielded top notch defense in years; they aren't about to start now. A defense with weaknesses somewhere, opposing teams are going to pick at those weaknesses and that's where their stats will be.

 

[RADAR]

Here are our weaknesses', Many still want to throw Banker under the bus and yet look what 408 gave him to work with. I love the kids and they are doing the best that they can,but for the most part, nobody of any substance wanted most of these kids. Its TALENT!!! Banker is working with 408's grocery's to make his meals. Wait until he makes a couple of trips to HyVee and fills his own shopping cart before we judge.

Cockrell: MTSU, Northern Colorado, Southern Miss (garbage offers)
Davie: KU, North Dakota St., Ohio (garbage offers)
Gerry: ASU, Iowa, ISU, Michigan St., Minnesota (legit offers)
Chris Jones: Florida A&M, Florida International, Indiana, UMass, Middle Tennessee St., Presbyterian, South Florida, Western Kentucky, Western Michigan.
Kalu: Arkansas St., CU, Duke, Houston, Louisiana Lafayette, SMU, Texas St., Texas-San Antonio, Wake, Washington St.
Mosley: Baylor, Oklahoma, SMU, Texas St. (2 good offers)
K. Williams: BYU, California, Colorado, Iowa, Indiana, Louisiana-Monroe, Tulsa.

 

[soup]

Here are our weaknesses', Many still want to throw Banker under the bus and yet look what 408 gave him to work with. I love the kids and they are doing the best that they can,but for the most part, nobody of any substance wanted most of these kids. Its TALENT!!! Banker is working with 408's grocery's to make his meals. Wait until he makes a couple of trips to HyVee and fills his own shopping cart before we judge.

Cockrell: MTSU, Northern Colorado, Southern Miss (garbage offers)

Davie: KU, North Dakota St., Ohio (garbage offers)

Gerry: ASU, Iowa, ISU, Michigan St., Minnesota (legit offers)

Chris Jones: Florida A&M, Florida International, Indiana, UMass, Middle Tennessee St., Presbyterian, South Florida, Western Kentucky, Western Michigan.

Kalu: Arkansas St., CU, Duke, Houston, Louisiana Lafayette, SMU, Texas St., Texas-San Antonio, Wake, Washington St.

Mosley: Baylor, Oklahoma, SMU, Texas St. (2 good offers)

K. Williams: BYU, California, Colorado, Iowa, Indiana, Louisiana-Monroe, Tulsa.

So we have at best a MAC level secondary, and with injuries a MAC level linebacking crew. no wonder we are getting smoked by teams that would be considered above MAC level competition.

 

[RADAR]

There is a reason the leading tackler was a walkon last week and a third of our travel squad is made up of walkons. They ARE as good many of the scholarship players. Thank God for the walkon program, where would we be without it.

 

[Saunders]

Here are our weaknesses', Many still want to throw Banker under the bus and yet look what 408 gave him to work with. I love the kids and they are doing the best that they can,but for the most part, nobody of any substance wanted most of these kids. Its TALENT!!! Banker is working with 408's grocery's to make his meals. Wait until he makes a couple of trips to HyVee and fills his own shopping cart before we judge.

Cockrell: MTSU, Northern Colorado, Southern Miss (garbage offers)

Davie: KU, North Dakota St., Ohio (garbage offers)

Gerry: ASU, Iowa, ISU, Michigan St., Minnesota (legit offers)

Chris Jones: Florida A&M, Florida International, Indiana, UMass, Middle Tennessee St., Presbyterian, South Florida, Western Kentucky, Western Michigan.

Kalu: Arkansas St., CU, Duke, Houston, Louisiana Lafayette, SMU, Texas St., Texas-San Antonio, Wake, Washington St.

Mosley: Baylor, Oklahoma, SMU, Texas St. (2 good offers)

K. Williams: BYU, California, Colorado, Iowa, Indiana, Louisiana-Monroe, Tulsa.

The problem with this argument, is that there are 107 teams in front of us in total Defense, and every single FBS team in the country, in pass defense. If you're blaming it on the players, do you really think our talent level is in the 100's? Because the recruiting data does not support that whatsoever.

 

[wanderful]

I have no idea whether Banker can fix the problems even if he does get all 5* from here on out. But whatever the problem, we're just going to have to hold on tight and see what the rest of the season holds. Firing a coach mid-season, especially just four games into his tenure, is how you end up in the dumpster-fire arena.

I will say, at least from a PR standpoint, it's nice to hear that the coaching staff is at least exploring the scheme as a way to fix problems. With the previous staff, it seemed like anytime something went wrong, all we heard was "our guys didn't execute" without any mention of tweaking the scheme to fit the players.