Tommi Hill’s rise, Nebraska’s offseason work, recruiting future out West

“Growing up I played (the game), I think 2014 was the last one, so it’s pretty cool to see your name up there,” Gifford said. “The Tunnel Walk’s in there and the stadium is super cool.”

The senior defensive back and many of his teammates have been heavily engrossed with “EA Sports NCAA College Football 25” during the offseason. That’s all good and fun, but the business-like Gifford knows that the real work begins soon for Nebraska with the start of its fall camp on Wednesday.

Let’s drop into coverage:

The stage is set for Nebraska’s Tommi Hill to star as one of the Big Ten’s best cornerbacks this season.

Just two years ago, or even prior to the 2023 season, such heights seemed far away for the defensive back — but the progress Hill has made since is a credit to his attitude adjustment. In the latest episode of Nebraska’s “Chasing 3” documentary series, teammates and coaches alike recounted how Hill overcame his initial struggles to become one of the team’s most consistent performers.

“He came in, I think he was about 15 pounds overweight, didn’t want to listen to anybody, out of shape, folks called him lazy and all kinds of stuff,” Marques Buford said of Hill.

A 2022 season in which Hill began the year at cornerback, then moved to wide receiver and rarely featured the rest of the season did not help. He deputized at wide receiver again last fall, eventually slotting into a full-time starting role at cornerback which coincided with major growth behind the scenes.

As Hill briefly considered transferring away and returning home, strength coach Corey Campbell and several veteran teammates had a message for Hill — he needed to buy in and work hard or make up his mind and move on.

“It was kind of shaky, kind of rocky, but once coach Rhule came it changed my whole mindset,” Hill said on “Chasing 3.”

Hill chose to stay, putting together a stellar 2023 campaign where he was graded as the Big Ten’s sixth-best cornerback according to ProFootballFocus.

“I’m proud of the way he took that, he didn’t take that and say, ‘Screw you guys I’m out of here,’” Isaac Gifford said Wednesday at Big Ten Media Days. “He took it as, ‘Okay, these guys care about me,’ and he changed his ways and you can tell.”

Those struggles are long in the past because Hill’s role on this year’s team is a key one — he’ll be the Huskers’ lockdown cornerback tasked with dominating in one-on-one coverage. NFL Draft scouts will be watching, too, as a professional career may await.

“Tommi’s a great athlete and an even better dude,” Gifford said. “I’ve seen him grow a lot as a person in his time here at Nebraska and it’s exciting to see where he’s at right now. He’s worked his butt off all summer, and I think it’s going to be a big year for him.”

It’s no secret that on-field gains in the fall are powered by what players do over the summer.

Nebraska players see plenty of the weight room and their strength and conditioning coaches during the offseason, participating in group lifts and individual work which shapes their physical conditioning. The extreme attention to detail that the NU strength staff applies to every workout and lift quickly rubs off on players, Gifford said, including the new Huskers going through the process for the first time.

“They’ve responded in a great way and bought in right away,” Gifford said. “It’s not an easy thing to do, to come here to Nebraska and go through what we go through in the offseason; we make it hard for a reason. We make it so guys see that this is what kind of work we’re going to put in for the type of season that we want to have.”

Offseason training has also been vital for the Nebraska offensive line, which continues to work on agility drills that will help them move well and stay injury-free during the season. Senior Ben Scott’s weight hasn’t changed drastically during his time at Nebraska — he entered the program at 305 pounds and is listed at 310 this season — but the type of weight he carries has.

Scott said Wednesday that he feels “a lot faster” after going through multiple offseasons with the Nebraska strength staff.

“We’ve been working really hard this offseason on explosiveness, quickness and explosive lifts, and now we’ve been doing more elite lifts,” he said. “I really think it’s important for me to get stronger, bigger and faster, and I think I really did that over this offseason.”

Nebraska returns several starters to its offensive line, but it’s not yet clear who will line up next to Scott as the team’s starting guards. Turner Corcoran may return to his starting spot at left tackle, but if Nebraska prefers to play Teddy Prochazka on the outside, he’d be a natural fit for one of the guard spots.

That leaves Justin Evans, Henry Lutovsky and Florida transfer Micah Mazzccua as Nebraska’s other top options for a starting role — and Evans is a key player to watch. The sophomore, who also works as the team’s backup center, is coming off a season in which he started five games and made a big impact as a run-blocker down the stretch.

“He’s been great, he’s real strong and sturdy and he really understands leverage coming from that wrestling background,” Scott said of Evans. “He’s just a tough guy who goes out there and attacks every day. He’s a great guy to have next to you; you’ll be blocking a guy and he’ll come out of nowhere and clean him out for you and it’s awesome.”

Could the addition of four new West Coast teams to the Big Ten Conference ultimately shift Nebraska’s recruiting focus westward? Head coach Matt Rhule believes it could.

“You look back at Nebraska’s heyday (when) George Darlington would go to the West Coast and bring back great players from California,” Rhule said. “I think knowing that we’re going to have games played where guys can go back home and play, that should help us.”

The key recruiters for Nebraska in that region of the country are offensive line coach Donovan Raiola and defensive coordinator Tony White, who mainly focuses on California. Raiola, whose Polynesian heritage is a major factor for many recruits, has furthered Nebraska’s efforts within Hawaii, Nevada, Utah and the Pacific Northwest.

Nebraska will still recruit nationally, but the changing landscape of the Big Ten may also impact where the Husker coaching staff goes to find future talent.

“The changes in recruiting has affected it a little bit more (about) the areas that we can go,” Rhule said. “We love Texas and we’re still doing well in Texas, but our kids are never going to play a game in the state of Texas. California, they will, so we take that into account.”

Nebraska’s defensive player representatives at Big Ten Media Days each offered a key goal their units will be focusing upon this fall.

For Gifford and NU’s defensive backs, forcing more turnovers is what they’ve been practicing heavily. Ty Robinson and the Nebraska defensive line were hardly pass-rushing slouches a year ago — their 32 team sacks ranked 23rd nationally — but the senior wants more individually and as a group this time around.

“One of our biggest things was getting off (the field) on third down and pass-rushing; we had a goal of about 40 sacks and I think we got only 35, so we didn’t reach our goal,” Robinson said. “Now we have to up the goal even more and reach that.”