Rhule Talks Offensive Performance, Spring Practice Overall

Nebraska football coach Matt Rhule met with members of the media following the team’s spring scrimmage on Saturday. 

He highlighted the offense’s performance during the scrimmage. 

“This was the most dominant day we’ve had on offense ever. There might have been eight, 10, 12 touchdowns out there today. Explosive plays, big plays. I think we had one fumble late with the threes, but I thought the ball was protected. In all fairness, we aren’t hitting the quarterback and a lot of plays extend so I’m going to go back and say, ‘Well, that would have been a sack.’ I don’t want to sound the alarm. The ability to throw and catch the ball and guys making catches and plays after the catches has been good. We didn’t run the ball, we had one long explosive run, but on offense by far the best day we’ve ever had since I’ve been here.”

He spoke to the quarterbacks and the addition of the headset. 

“I thought all three quarterbacks played really well. I’d like to watch the tape to be able to talk about specifics, but we started with the ball on the minus-one and had a 99-yard drive. We had some long drives. Quarterbacks excelled at taking what was there. The headset is transformational. It’s transformational what you can do. We’ve got guys who are used to doing that, Sat (Marcus Satterfield) and Glenn (Glenn Thomas) and Garret (Garret McGuire) so I thought the quarterbacks all played really well. But again, with young quarterbacks I’ve got to go back and watch the tape. Are we running around in the pocket with one hand on the ball and we get in the game late in the season and all of the sudden those are going to be fumbles. We talk about limiting the low lights. When you can’t hit the quarterback, it’s hard to tell, but a lot of really good things.”

Rhule discussed the scrimmage overall and the performance of the defense. 

“I yelled at everyone in the middle of the scrimmage last week because I felt like you know when you walk out in the stadium there is no one in the stands and it’s dead, no energy. Great teams, to quote Andy Reid, have to create their own energy. I just didn’t feel the energy from the whole team. So I didn’t yell at the defense. The defense dominated the offense last week. The offense had a couple good things, but when I watched the tape I challenged the defensive staff, ‘Are we playing hard enough or are we satisfied with the result?’... And then I challenged the offense, ‘Hey, are we playing hard enough?’ So I just went back to the guys ‘What caused us to lose last year?’ ‘Thirty-one turnovers and we only took the ball away 14 times.’ ‘What caused us to lose last year?’ ‘Big plays.’ Don’t because we are winning the scrimmage, get caught up in the result. Look at the effort. That being said, today the offense got after the defense it looked like. I’ll probably go back in and say on Tuesday, ‘That was closer than I realized.’ Again, there is a lot of good players not playing, but as I said to them, I don’t think that way. I think if you’re out there playing you’re a Husker and it better be competitive and physical. Before John Bullock was a starter, he was a three, so I’m looking for other guys to make that ascension. I can’t wait to watch this film to see where guys truly are, but we are really hard to play against on defense…”

The Huskers will continue with spring practice on Tuesday. The annual Red-White Spring game presented by FNBO is scheduled for Saturday, April 27 at 11 a.m. (CT). Tickets can be purchased on huskers.com or by calling the ticket office at 800-8-BIG RED.