Football Video & Report: Nov. 21

Nebraska head coach Matt Rhule met with members of the media following the team’s practice on Thursday. He spoke on the challenges that Wisconsin’s defense presents. 

“They’re an excellent defense,” he said. “They’ve got guys who can cover. They are going to play man and they have a great safety. They have linebackers who can run, an excellent pass rush, they stop the run, great edge guys. As you said, they played a really tough schedule, but they held Oregon to 16 points. They were really good in the red-zone against Oregon, had a takeaway in the red-zone. Probably as good a defense we will see all year.” 

He discussed the secondary’s response to last week and what the Badgers’ offense will look like. 

“Wisconsin has great wideout production,” he said. “I think (Will) Pauling is a First-Team All-Big Ten player. I know he got banged up in the last game, so I don’t know his status. Knowing the competitor he is, he’ll play wideout, then he’s a gunner on punt. He’s one of my favorite players to watch. They’ve got a ton of other production, so they’ve got a good passing game. A tough, hard nose, physical run game. We have to play better in the secondary than we did last week. A lot of that comes down to communication, making sure we’re on the same page. We’ll probably have to play some young guys at this point, based on the practice week and the reps. We’ll see how the game flow goes. I think the biggest thing is that we have very capable defenders. Last week was a week where we gave up some big plays on confusion and mixed coverages. When we almost had a pick, it was busted coverage, unfortunately. We play better in the back end, hopefully it’ll give us a chance.”

Rhule touched on Dana Holgorsen having an extra week of preparation.

“It’s been great – the verbiage, working with the staff,” he said. “Also, kind of he’s just out there at practice. He’s putting a lot of pressure on the guys to make the plays. He’s a guy that’s never not scored. I don’t know what his lowest points per game is – when I looked at it, it was like 34 points per game in one season. He scores a lot of points. He was very direct in his press conference. I’m not quite as direct because I’m the head coach, but he was very direct and he’s been very direct with them. If they want to win, they are going to have to go make plays. They are going to have to catch balls, break tackles, make long runs, make big blocks against an excellent defense. It’s not the plays that do it, it’s the players that do it. I think he’s imprinting that to them. For all year, it was Satt (Marcus Satterfield) saying it to them. All the noise was, well, it’s Satt’s fault. The players can sometimes be like ‘Well, I wish Satt did a better job.’ Now, Dana comes in and says the same thing – ‘Hey, go make that play. We are not kicking field goals on third down in the red-zone. Go make the play on third down.’ I think that’s good. That’s the way we want to empower our players. We want our players to believe that players win games. So I think Dana’s juice, energy and intensity and the fact that guys have nowhere to turn except to turn to themselves. I want us to go in the game and I want players to walk off proud, knowing they won the game. Coach Rhule didn’t win the game, Dana didn’t win the game, Tony (White) didn’t win the game. I want the players to go win the game. I think he’s helping get that message across.” 

The Huskers will face the Wisconsin Badgers on Saturday, Nov. 23 at 2:30 p.m. (CT) at Memorial Stadium. The game will be televised on the Big Ten Network with audio coverage from the Huskers Radio Network.