Matt Rhule didn’t spend Monday soft-selling Nebraska’s season opener.
With Ohio waiting on Sept. 5, the Huskers’ coach made it clear there’s no warm-up phase for his fourth Nebraska team. The first test is real, the roster is still taking shape in a few spots, and Rhule wants to see who handles the pressure when it starts for keeps.
At quarterback, though, Rhule sounded as settled as he’s been on anyone. Anthony Colandrea, a senior who has already appeared in 33 games with 31 starts, got a direct message from his coach: keep being himself.
“Do you,” Rhule said. “Be the best version of you.
Anthony’s earned my respect and trust; go play… Anthony’s a lion… He’s a winner. He wants to play.
He wants to win every play, and I love it. It’s exactly what, if I could draw it up, it’s supposed to look like.
A fiery quarterback who plays with passion on his sleeve, and backs it up.”
Rhule was just as complimentary about center Justin Evans, who was one of three Nebraska players chosen to represent the program at Big Ten Media Days in late July. The fifth-year senior picked up enough teammate support to earn single-digit jersey honors in 2026, even though offensive linemen have to wear numbers in the 50s, 60s or 70s.
Rhule didn’t spell out the full list of single-digit players, but he did hint at a reveal coming Saturday.
“Those guys know who it is,” he said. “But we’ll probably keep it internal this week. So, it’ll kind of be a fun thing on Saturday… I will say this, Justin Evans got the most votes of any offensive lineman I’ve ever seen… This will probably be the first year that I have a couple dual guys; one guy on offense, one guy on defense.”
Evans’ value to the group, Rhule said, goes beyond the jersey number. He pointed to the lineman’s flexibility and the way teammates respond to him.
“He’s an alpha that cares about everybody,” Rhule said. “On a lot of teams you have alphas that walk around and think that they’re better than everybody else.
He’s been through it… Justin’s just the ultimate team guy; he’s just going to do whatever you ask him to do. He played guard, he played center, now, this year should be his best football.”
Nebraska is also changing how it handles leadership this fall. After Henry Lutovsky served as one of six year-long captains in 2025, Rhule said the Huskers are going back to game captains in 2026.
“We’re not doing captains,” he said. “That might change, but we’re going to go with game captains and give guys multiple chances to lead… The guys we brought in are so mature and so seasoned and really bought into the culture, but I want to see what they do when things get really hard.”
That theme runs through a roster that still has some jobs up for grabs, especially at running back. Rhule said Nebraska has three backs in the top tier of the room, but no starter has been named yet. And with Ohio coming off a nine-win season in 2025, he’s not interested in easing anyone in.
“Everything we do, we play to win,” Rhule said. “This is a fantastic football program that we are going against. So, we have three backs that we feel like are in that upper realm of playing and so we’ll play all of them.”
“There’s no easing into it,” he continued. “I won’t say to them, ‘Hey, here’s our plan’, because I want to hold that to us.
But our plan is not even established. I mean, we have a great feel for it, but I’m going to go through this week and see who practices the best, who prepares the best, and who takes the best notes.”
On defense, Rhule said first-year coordinator Rob Aurich’s group is already matching what he expected when fall camp began.
“Feels right, looks right,” said Rhule. “I believe defense is connected.
You’ll hear coaches say, sometimes, do your 1/11th. I’ve never believed in that.
I believe in Metcalfe's Law; when three people connect, it produces many more connections… The power of a group is exponentially greater than the amount of people that are in it when we are all connected to each other.”
For Nebraska, that idea of playing as one has become a major talking point. Rhule’s message Monday suggested he believes the brotherhood angle is more than offseason noise, and that the defense’s next step will come from that connectedness.
The good news for the Huskers is that they’re heading into Week 1 mostly healthy. As of Aug. 31, no player with a previously undisclosed injury is expected to miss Saturday’s opener against Ohio.
“Just the usual suspects,” said Rhule. “Khamir Prescott, Jacob Bower, those are the guys that are out for the season.
Everyone else is either healthy or battling back… Gabe Moore did re-injure himself. He’s got a chronic knee injury from when he was a freshman… Gabe’s done a great job getting himself in elite shape and battling back, but it will remain to be seen exactly where he’s at.”
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