10 things we learned from Nebraska’s win over Rutgers

Here are 10 of our biggest takeaways from Nebraska’s 28-21 win over Rutgers on Friday night in Piscataway, NJ.

The first 20 minutes of Nebraska’s win over Rutgers looked all too familiar in all the wrong ways.

Ridiculous turnovers, costly penalties, protection breakdowns, errant throws, and negative plays on offense. A defensive bust that led to a long touchdown. Numerous special teams gaffs that led to an RU touchdown and a severe disadvantage in field position.

But, for the first time all season, things finally clicked in the second half.

The Huskers stopped giving the ball away and only committed two penalties after halftime, and the offense – by no coincidence – started absolutely rolling as the game went on. The Blackshirts didn’t give up any more big plays and stifled a bad Scarlet Knight offense.

Rather than let issues compound and lead to even more problems as it’s done so often this season, NU found a way to lock in and play close to its full potential in all phases in the second half.

It was just two quarters of good football in a relatively meaningless game against an struggling opponent, but it still showed what Scott Frost’s program could potentially look like if things finally ever come together.

No player embodied Nebraska’s halftime flip more than Adrian Martinez.

The senior quarterback lost two fumbles and threw two interceptions in the first two-and-a-half quarters against Rutgers. He was also sacked three times in the first half and looked uncomfortable from the start while operating in the pocket.

But, like the rest of NU’s offense, Martinez settled down after his final third-quarter interception and went on to post one of the best performances of his career.

Martinez ended up completing 24-of-28 passes for a season-high 255 yards and a touchdown while rushing 23 times for a career-high 157 yards and two scores.

Not only did his 412 yards of total offense mark his school-record fifth career 400-yard game, but he also became the first FBS player to have 250 yards passing and 150 yards rushing in a game this season.

Nebraska has spent the past three years riding the Martinez roller coaster, and no game better encapsulated the full experience of No. 2 than Friday night.

A group that has been much maligned over the years, mostly for good reason, Nebraska’s defense played like true Blackshirts at Rutgers.

Yes, the Huskers were facing a Scarlet Knight offense with two backup quarterbacks, but they dominated the game how a good defense should against such an opponent.

Nebraska gave up 50 yards on RU’s first offensive play and then just 202 the rest of the night. The Blackshirts allowed just 4.8 yards per play and held Rutgers to just 2-for-13 on third downs.

They had a bad bust on a fourth-and-one in the second quarter that turned into a 33-yard touchdown run, but the Huskers made up for it with a critical interception by Cam Taylor-Britt with under eight minutes left to play.

For the first half of this season, NU was one of the country’s worst third-down defenses. Over the last four games, it’s held opponents to 13-of-53 (25.5%) on third-down conversions. As a result, it’s only allowed 24.5 points over the last four contests.

Going into the season, Dedrick Mills was called “the bell cow” of Nebraska’s running game by his coaches and teammates alike.

After his impressive showing over the final five games of 2019, it was expected that the senior running back would be NU’s next 1,000-yard rusher, even in a shortened schedule.

Until Friday night, though, Mills was hardly a blip of the offense’s radar. A big reason for that was a lingering injury he suffered in the win over Penn State that forced him to miss multiple games.

Mills finally looked healthy against Rutgers, and he gave the Huskers an element of power and physicality they had lacked for far too long.

Mills ended up rushing 25 times for a career-high 191 yards against the Scarlet Knights, with 115 of those yards coming in the second half. In the previous five games he played this season, Mills had totaled 205 yards.

Had the defense not played as well as it did and Rutgers not been as bad offensively as it was, Nebraska would have been blown out after turning the ball over four times in three quarters.

Ball security was one of the major keys to the game coming in, as the Huskers had struggled with turnovers all season with 14 giveaways in seven games. On the other side, the Scarlet Knights had 15 takeaways in their eight games this year.

Nebraska was sloppy from the start, fumbling three times on its opening drive and then again on the first play of its third series. Martinez’s interception came on a poorly thrown ball to Wan’Dale Robinson that sailed over the receiver’s head and right to a defender.

The good news was that NU still found a way to overcome all of those costly mistakes and win the game. That has definitely been the exception to the rule, as Nebraska came in 1-13 when losing the turnover battle under Frost.

In eight games this season, the Huskers are minus-11 in turnover margin.

Whether they play a bowl game or move on to 2021, they have to clean up their ball security if they’re ever going to take the next step as a program.

While Nebraska’s defense played well all night and the offense was able to kick it into gear in the second half, the special teams were awful from start to finish.

The lowlight was a 98-yard kickoff return for a touchdown by Aron Cruickshank that gave Rutgers a 21-14 lead moments after NU had just tied the game.

But the problems went well beyond inexplicably kicking the ball to the 2020 Rodgers-Dwight Big Ten Return Specialist of the Year.

The Huskers also allowed secondary kick return man Bo Melton to average 24.0 yards per return on short pooch kicks designed to keep the ball away from Cruickshank. Nebraska only fielded two kickoffs of its own but failed to make it past its 25-yard line on either try.

Punter Adam Korsak was arguably the Scarlet Knights’ best player, as he averaged 43.4 yards on five punts and pinned four of them at NU’s 3, 4, 8, and 10-yard line. He also added a 17-yard rush on a fake punt in the second quarter.

All of that plus Nebraska’s turnovers led to Rutgers having an average starting field position of its 39-yard line, where the Huskers was at their own 19.

When asked for his evaluation of true freshman Turner Corcoran’s first career start at left tackle, Frost admitted that he didn’t really notice him during the game.

Considering the situation, that was just about a best-case scenario.

The former four-star out of Lawrence (Kan.) Free State got the nod this week after the unexpected departure of senior Nick Gates, who decided to opt out for the NFL Draft after making 40 career starts.

He became just the sixth true freshman offensive lineman to start a game in program history and the first to start at left tackle.

With Corcoran in his place, the Huskers trotted out an offensive line that featured a true freshman at left tackle, redshirt freshman Ethan Piper at left guard, redshirt sophomore Cam Jurgens at center, and redshirt freshman Bryce Benhart at right tackle.

That marked the first time Nebraska has started three freshmen offensive linemen.

Nebraska put up 600 yards and ran for more than 350 behind that young o-line, which bodes very well for the unit’s long-term potential.

Nebraska was without two inside linebackers with starting experience in senior Collin Miller (spine injury) and Luke Reimer (head injury) for its trip to Rutgers.

That left redshirt freshman Nick Henrich in line to make his first start as a Husker, and boy, did he make the most of his opportunity.

The former Omaha (Neb.) Burke standout racked up a team-high 12 tackles in the win. After filling in for Reimer in the loss to Minnesota, Henrich now has 21 tackles over the past two games and ranks eighth on the team with 27 for the season.

A player who was working at both inside and outside linebacker this season, Henrich seems to have found a home in the middle of NU’s defense.

With Miller moving on and depending on what senior Will Honas decides to do next season, Henrich could be a mainstay for the Blackshirts for four more years.

One of the most intriguing storylines about this matchup never got a chance to play out, as Rutgers quarterback and former Nebraska transfer Noah Vedral was sidelined with an ankle injury he suffered last week vs. Maryland.

But even though the Wahoo, Neb., native didn’t play in the game, he still had an impact.

Vedral played two seasons at Nebraska from 2018-19 and was also with Frost at Central Florida as a freshman in 2017. In all, he played in 15 total games and made two starts as Frost’s quarterback.

In other words, no player in the country outside of Lincoln has a better understanding of the Huskers’ offense than him.

Frost was well aware of that fact, and he changed some things up to counter any advantage Vedral might provide to Rutgers’ defense.

Redshirt freshman quarterback Luke McCaffrey did not suit up on Friday night. However, he still made NU’s travel roster because Frost wanted as many people on the sideline signaling in plays as possible to throw off the Scarlet Knights.

Nebraska won just three games this season, but because of the issues other teams are having with COVID-19 and the likelihood of several ending their seasons after this weekend, the Huskers could vault up the Big Ten bowl pecking order.

Listening to Frost and some of the players who spoke after the game, there is a desire to play another game if they get the chance to further build on the momentum they gained at Rutgers.

However, there also seemed to be some hesitation from a team that had just played eight games in nine weeks and had been together in Lincoln since last spring. Martinez, for example, said he hadn’t seen his immediate family since March.

Frost said NU would discuss their options when the team got back to campus and decide as a whole whether they’d want to pursue a bowl game.

He said part of the decision would come down to when the hypothetical bowl would be played. Frost didn’t seem too keen on the idea of having to gear back up and play again in a week.

More importantly, it would depend on how much gas the players had left in the tank, both physically and mentally. Friday night was a nice end to the regular season, and it might be good enough for the Huskers to want to turn the page and move on to 2021.

We should know much more by the end of the weekend.