The utility is "We're not going to let it ride for your benefit if you keep breaking the rules." That's a message to send to the rest of the team. It's not a soft message meant to try to keep the peace, but I think it is appropriately firm.
It's pretty bummy for a player to not be able to finish his Husker career on his own terms, or to get to partake in the bowl trip with all its swag, etc, along with his teammates.
But the guy apparently messed up twice already this season, and they're not going to just give it to him to be nice, considering the circumstances. I don't know if that's harsh or not, since we all have no idea what sort of teams rules violation this was. Maybe there wasn't much of a judgment call to this.