What I learned, today and continue to learn tonight is that compared to other teams, were not that good. Watching Iowa and Penn St, now thats Defense, on both sides!
Barkley will just shred us when we play Penn St. Great back! Its hard not to be Negative Nancy when you see how other teams play football! For those above posters who think we have talent on defense, watch Penn ST and Iowa. For those who want to see speed on the field, watch OU and Baylor. Were light years away from being like any of those teams right now.
So, a couple things here:
1. Penn State had 579 yards against Iowa. Yes, the Hawkeye D is generally stout, but that's a ton of yards. If anything, it lends some credibility to Diaco's style of defense - forget about yards given up and worry only about points. The Penn State defense was definitely impressive.
2. Barkley is a great back. He's probably going to win the Heisman, which goes to the best player in college football, which, in general, means he shreds whomever he's playing. If he goes off for 180 against Nebraska, that's no different than any other game for him. Point being, if he shreds Nebraska, it won't be the only team he shreds.
3. I think it's obvious the Husker D has improved from game 1 to game 4. Notable is the amount of youth on the field. The only seniors I can think of who played big snaps today are Weber and Kieron Williams. Otherwise it was underclassmen - Davis twins, Stoltenberg, Alex Davis, Deontre Thomas, Stille, Freedom, Gifford, Young, Aaron Williams, Eric Lee, Lamar Jackson, Mo Barry, Antonio Reed, King, Dismuke, etc. - guys who all have a chance to grow and develop in the system over multiple years (if the defensive staff is still around next year, I guess). The opportunity is there for the defense to be pretty salty next year, but it's also possible they will continue to make strides throughout this season. OSU and PSU will be obviously be tough games, but I think the D is constructed well to hold up against the rest of the BIG West, which is probably more important at this exact time.