COLUMBUS, Ohio — In this pandemic world, we tend to cling to parts of life that feel somewhat normal.
However, Nebraska football fans don’t necessarily want to cling to what happened Saturday at Ohio Stadium.
What happened on the field of play felt far too normal for the visiting team and its loyal fan base.
‘Self-inflicted’ problems, powerful Buckeyes far too much for Huskers to overcome in 2020 opener
The grades: Ohio State 52, Nebraska 17
Against the prohibitive favorites to capture the Big Ten championship, Nebraska showed signs of progress as a program. Unlike last season’s game in Lincoln, Ohio State at least had to break a sweat. So, there’s that. However, by early in the third quarter, the Buckeyes had full control of the season opener for both teams. They cruised to a 52-17 triumph before an announced crowd of 1,344 and afterward, it seemed like Husker coach Scott Frost mostly just wanted to move on quickly.
“I thought we did a lot of good things,” he said. “Unfortunately, some of the things that led to the game getting out of hand were self-inflicted things that we can fix. We had too many penalties. They didn’t have hardly any. We turned the ball over a couple times with the quarterback running. We got them in a couple second-and-really longs and gave up first downs.
“We can fix a lot of those things as a group.”
Yes, no doubt, Nebraska showed progress in some areas. It kept fighting to the end, Frost said. That’s true. The Huskers have two playmaking quarterbacks who were incorporated into the overall plan in a way that didn’t feel awkward. The special teams weren’t anything close to the disaster they often were in 2019. But many Husker fans will come away from this one feeling empty. Many of those folks will never get used to highlighting positives in a 35-point loss. I don’t blame them.
I don’t think Frost would blame them, either. It’s probably why he seemingly wanted to get on the first bus out of town.
Wisconsin is up next on Nebraska’s meat grinder schedule. The Badgers are the standard-bearers in the Big Ten West Division. And don’t look now, but they may have an upgrade at quarterback in Graham Mertz. Paul Chryst’s crew was sharp Friday night in hammering Illinois 45-7. We know this about UW if we know anything: It seldom beats itself with mistakes.
In other words, Frost better call in the cleanup crew. Because if it plays next week like it did against Ohio State, Nebraska will be carting an 0-2 record to Northwestern in Week 3.
But let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves. And let’s also point out that Mertz — even though he was an otherworldly 20-for-21 for 248 yards and five touchdowns — is not a certain NFL first-round draft pick, as is the case with Ohio State junior Justin Fields. The 6-foot-3, 228-pound Georgia native, who recently went vegan, made mincemeat of Nebraska’s defense.
Notes: A ‘normal’ Saturday in empty stadium; rotation on the OL; progress against the run
Fields was 20-for-21 for 276 yards and two touchdowns, with no turnovers. Sure, he was sacked three times. That was a sign of progress for Nebraska. A small sign, though, because Fields often had plenty of time to survey the field and find speedsters Chris Olave (six catches for 104 yards) and Garrett Wilson (seven for 129).
That part of the day felt incredibly predictable.
“He was making throws that guys on Sundays make,” said Nebraska inside linebacker and co-captain Collin Miller.
Ohio State finished with 498 yards of total offense, averaging 7.2 per play. Nebraska finished with 377 yards, averaging 6.7. So, yeah, that’s making the big dogs of the Big Ten sweat a bit.
But, oh, those penalties. Nebraska finished with eight of them for 90 yards, while Ohio State had just three for 14.
“Penalties are what killed the game for us,” Miller said.
That does explain a lot of it. In that regard, Frost took the blame for a delay-of-game call levied against Nebraska on the first play following a kickoff late in the first half. The Buckeyes had just booted a field goal to lead 17-14. The Huskers needed to respond. Here we go. Luke McCaffrey, the Colorado kid and up-and-coming quarterback, lined up behind the Huskers’ starting quarterback, Adrian Martinez. The game still felt interesting. Our minds were focused on something other than the pandemic, even though the mostly empty stadium felt predictably eerie.
But, then, reality hit. Nebraska’s drive went backward. Then, senior safety Marquel Dismuke was called for a face mask penalty on the Huskers’ punt. Fields quickly found Wilson for a big gain before Cam Taylor-Britt was called for interference. Here we go, all right. The Buckeyes pushed the lead to 24-14 with 70 seconds left in the first half. Then they stormed out of halftime with an eight-play, 75-yard touchdown drive to push the lead to 31-14.
Game over. Yeah, it was all-too-predictable, especially if you’re a Nebraska fan waiting for something that resembles championship-level play.
Some Husker fans were blaming the zebras after the game. Guess that’s predictable, too.
Oh, you see NU’s progress spurts. Martinez and McCaffrey are indeed two of the team’s best players, as Frost noted, but the coach also pointed out their lost fumbles. Nebraska lost the turnover battle. The Huskers had to be clean in order to beat a team that had a gigantic advantage in overall talent. The fact NU made so many mistakes is a bit disheartening.
On the other hand, it was an opener following an 11-month layoff. We’ll cut Nebraska some slack in that regard. But it was the same circumstance for Ohio State. The difference is, the Buckeyes are regarded as a threat to win all the marbles. Bottom line, this was the mismatch we expected, the result many expected. But Nebraska didn’t get embarrassed. It should be OK mentally for next week.
It’s probably best to just load up the bus and get out of Dodge quickly. Another tough test awaits.
