Nebraska spent Friday night looking like a team that still hasn’t learned its lesson.
In a game that was supposed to show the Huskers had cleaned up the mess that has followed them for the last month, Matt Rhule’s group kept stepping on the same rakes. The mistakes came early, came often and never really stopped. Illinois pulled away, Nebraska never found a response, and the night turned into another ugly reminder that the fixes haven’t arrived.
The opening minutes set the tone. Nebraska was hit with two illegal formation penalties in its first five snaps, and the first one erased a big gain that could have changed the feel of the game right away. The second came on special teams, an area that has been a disaster all season.
That phase of the game only got worse when kicker Jason Hohl, elevated to the starting job this week after season starter Kyle Cunanan missed another kick last week and dropped to 4-for-9 on the season, missed two field goals. One came from 54 yards, which at least has some explanation. The other was a chip shot.
The special teams breakdowns weren’t the only self-inflicted damage. Nebraska’s wide receiver blocking penalties kept showing up at the worst possible times, and on Friday they delivered again with a holding penalty and an offensive pass interference call that wiped out big gains. It was the kind of sloppiness that keeps a drive from ever getting off the ground.
Illinois then delivered the blow that really took the air out of the stadium: a 29-yard run by the punter on a fake field goal. Nebraska trailed 14-7 after Illinois’ first third-quarter drive and never recovered from there.
And then there was the offense, where Dana Holgorsen managed to make things even harder than they already were. On a drive that had Nebraska trying to answer Illinois’ go-ahead touchdown, the Huskers got to 4th and 1 deep in Illini territory.
Holgorsen chose an empty backfield pass play, a decision that left Illinois with no reason to respect a run and ended with an incomplete pass to nowhere. It was hard to even tell who the target was.
Nebraska did eventually score on the next drive, but even that felt more like a break than a breakthrough. A YOLO ball into double coverage, with two receivers essentially in the same spot, turned into a 51-yard touchdown. Then came another mistake: a failed two-point conversion.
The final drive offered one last look at how far off track things are. Down 24-13, Nebraska had a blindside block by Mekhi Nelson on a defender Anthony Colandrea had already run past for a first down, and that gain was wiped out too.
Later on the same possession, the Huskers faced 4th and 3 and again lined up with an empty backfield. This time it was a Colandrea error, as he tried to force a throw 20 yards downfield instead of hitting the open receiver just beyond the first-down marker.
When it was over, Nebraska was staring at a fourth straight loss, and the message from the night was plain enough: this isn’t working, and Nebraska is moving backward.
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