Some losses don’t just sting - they stick. That was the case for Fred Hoiberg and his Nebraska squad after Tuesday night’s overtime heartbreaker against No.
13 Purdue at Pinnacle Bank Arena. It wasn’t just another L in the box score - it was the kind of loss that replays itself in your mind long after the final whistle.
And for Hoiberg, it meant a sleepless night and a long look in the mirror.
Speaking on Sports Nightly the following evening, Hoiberg admitted he’d mentally walked through the end-of-game sequence more times than he could count. The pain was real - but so was the pivot.
After reliving the final minutes, Hoiberg was ready to move forward. And he made it clear his players needed to do the same.
“I told them after the game last night, ‘We’ve done a really good job of putting big emotional wins behind us. Now here’s the flip side - you have to put the tough, emotional loss behind you now,’” Hoiberg said. “Really, what will determine if you have success at the end of the year is how you handle those situations.”
That’s the challenge now for Nebraska: take the punch, shake it off, and keep swinging. Because while the Huskers have shown they can ride the highs, this is a moment that will test their ability to weather the lows.
Let’s be clear - this team has already shown flashes of something special. A 20-0 start doesn’t happen by accident.
But the last four games have been a gut check. Since that trip to Ann Arbor for Game No.
21, Nebraska has dropped three of four, falling to Michigan, Illinois, and most recently, Purdue. And the fact that both the Illinois and Purdue losses came at home?
That’s a tough pill to swallow.
But there’s a silver lining here, and it starts with the schedule. The Huskers have just endured a brutal stretch against three top-15 opponents.
Now, they’re staring down a more manageable path. Northwestern comes next - and beyond that, there isn’t another ranked team currently left on Nebraska’s regular-season slate.
That could shift if Iowa climbs into the AP Top 25 - the Hawkeyes were just outside the rankings last week - and Nebraska will see them twice before the season ends, including a potentially high-stakes finale on March 8.
The dream of earning a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament? That’s likely off the table now.
And sure, critics will point to those recent losses and question whether this Nebraska team can hang with the big boys when it matters most. But here’s the thing - March is about momentum, not perfection.
If the Huskers can regroup, reset, and take care of business down the stretch, they’ll still be in the thick of the Big Ten title race and in position to make some real noise in the tournament.
This is where the season gets real. The spotlight’s still there - but now it’s about how Nebraska responds.
If Hoiberg’s group can turn the page and play with the same edge that got them to 20-0, don’t count them out just yet. The Big Ten is still up for grabs, and so is a shot at rewriting the program’s March history.