On a cold and clear Friday night in Champaign, the Illinois Illini roared back from a seven point deficit, scoring 21 straight points to defeat the Nebraska Cornhuskers 24-13. Despite outyarding its opponent for their ninth straight game, the Huskers lost their fourth consecutive contest while Illinois extending their winning streak to four games.  This was a game with two teams headed in opposite directions. For some inexplicable reason, Nebraska was favored on the road against the Illini after suffering three straight fourth quarter collapses. Illinois head coach Bret Bielema, who lost his father last week, thoroughly outcoached Nebraska’s Matt Rhule and moved to 4-1 against the Huskers.

Nebraska had led going into the fourth quarter in every game this season until Friday night when Illinois was up 14-7 heading into the final stanza. Since their 20-17 fourth quarter defeat to Indiana on October 10, where the Huskers played quite well for 3 ½ quarters, they have managed to play worse in each successive game. While last week’s last minute loss to Washington was inexcusable, this week’s play was disgustingly undisciplined and inefficient. The Huskers entered the game ranked 119th in the nation in penalties and then proceeded to commit multiple drive killing miscues with 11 penalties for 82 yards. To make matters worse, the Huskers had four drives of 11 plays in which they scored zero points.

It’s not surprising that they totaled 426 yards to Illinois’ 376 when you are unable to complete drives with scores. In fact, on the aforementioned 11-play drives, the Huskers failed to even reach the red zone. A key metric that measures offensive efficiency is yards per point (YPP). The lower the number the more efficient the offense. A YPP of 13 is elite while above 16 is problematic. Nebraska’s YPP Friday was 32.8!! Last week against Washington it was 38.7 and in the four-game losing streak, the Huskers YPP is 26.8. That is inexcusable and is the recipe for a losing campaign. Even if the Huskers had managed a YPP in the last 4 games of 16, with the yards they did gain they would have averaged 22.6 points per game which would have potentially won three of those contests.

Despite the penalties and offensive inefficiency, there were several head scratching coaching decisions. The three running backs averaged 5.2 yards per rush, so why on a 4th and 1 at the Illinois 25-yard line, when you are down 7 points, do you throw the ball? After the turnover on downs, Illinois then drove 75 yards to go up by 14. Nebraska manages a 51-yard touchdown prayer to Jacory Barnet to cut the lead to 21-13 with 10:51 to go in the 4th quarter and attempts a two-point conversion. What analytics strategy suggested that was a good idea? When Nebraska then falls behind 24-13 with just 7:46 to play, they go to a dink and dunk time-consuming 11-play drive (even huddling on occasion) and then on a 4th and 3 from the Illinois 34-yard line, heave the ball downfield incomplete. Offensive coordinator Dana Holgerson was moved to the booth to develop that strategy?

The Blackshirts entered the game ranked 14th in scoring defense (15.6 ppg) and then yielded the most points to an opponent this season, against an offense ranked 65th in scoring. Nebraska led the nation with a third down conversion percentage of 21.4% before allowing Illinois to convert 8 of 15 chances (53.3%). The defense did limit Illinois to 84 rushing yards, including only 11 yards in the first half, the sixth time this season NU has held its opponent to less than 100 yards rushing.

Last week it was WR Chris Lawson who had a career day against the secondary and this week it was Illinois wide receiver Collin Dixon who tormented midseason All-American Andrew Marshall. Marshall’s draft status may have taken a hit as Dixon finished with eight receptions for 129 yards and a pair of touchdowns. The defense had been carrying the weight the last three games while the offense and special teams struggled. Friday, Nebraska finally managed to play complementary football as all three squads stunk. At least the Huskers remain the only FBS team to not have lost a fumble this season (sarcasm intended).

For the second week in a row quarterback Anthony Colandrea threw the ball more than 40 times as he finished 32 for 43 for 284 yards passing. He also added 27 rushing yards to account for 311 yards of total offense moving his career total offense number to 11,183 yards. He wasn’t as erratic as he was last week against the Huskies, and he was better at protecting the ball. He still struggles at times to locate open receivers as he appears to lock in on a target as opposed to moving through his progressions. Colandrea played his best ball on the 10-play, 98-yard scoring drive in the second quarter, NU’s longest drive of the season in terms of yards. On that drive, Colandrea was 4 for 5 passing for 38 yards while the Husker running backs ran 5 times for 50 yards. It was balanced and efficient and the playcalling made sense. It makes me wonder why they struggle to maintain that kind of consistency.

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Receiver Jacory Barney Jr. had six catches for 93 yards, with his 51-yard touchdown pass in the fourth quarter tying for the longest reception by a Husker this season. WR Nyziah Hunter tied his career high with six receptions for the second straight game and finished with 32 receiving yards, but an untimely offensive pass interference was one of the drive killers. WR Quinn Clark had a career-high three receptions totaling 20 yards. Tight end Luke Lindenmeyer had five receptions in the game, increasing his career total to 66 moving him into third place on the NU career tight ends receptions list. Kwazi Gilmer added 4 catches for 58 yards but added a few more drops to his resume as well.

Jamal Rule again led the team in rushing with 15 carries for 69 yards, running angry at times. Isaiah Mozee contributed 31 yards on 6 carries and Mekhi Nelson had a 15-yard TD on his solo carry, his fifth rushing TD this year. The running game was solid, but the penalties kept putting the offense behind the sticks and disrupted the run/pass balance.

The defense was led by Vincent Shavers, Jr. who had 7 tackles including a TFL. Caleb Benning and Dwayne McDougle III each had 6 stops, and defensive end Jordan Ochoa had a 10-yard sack in the second quarter, the first full sack of his career. He had previously split a sack against Akron in 2025. Cam Lenhardt also had a sack among his 3 tackles. Defensive leader and linebacker Owen Chambliss left the game in the third quarter when he reinjured his shoulder and did not return. Fortunately, the x-rays were negative. His presence was missed as Illinois scored 10 fourth quarter points in his absence.

Special teams were a major cluster. John Hohl, who replaced Kyle Cunanan last week as placekicker, missed field goal attempts of 45 and 54 yards and the Huskers are now 5 of 12 in field goal tries for the year. Archie Wilson averaged 43.0 yards on just two punts with a long of 51. The biggest special teams blunder was allowing the holder to rumble for 29 yards to the NU 2-yard line on a 4th and 12 field goal fake that ultimately allowed the Illini to take a 14-7 lead.

Matt Rhule is now 24-23 in his fourth year at Nebraska but just 2-11 in November with Rutgers, Ohio State and Iowa still to play. After managing to get to seven wins last year, six wins or less this year (after a 5-0 start) will be totally unacceptable to the fan base. But can Nebraska really afford to fire Rhule and eat his 47.9 million in base pay salary, not including the millions owed the rest of the coaching staff? What happens to a promising 2027 recruiting class if the axe falls and Nebraska is faced with another slow rebuild? Are we stuck with just a fatter Mike Riley? The natives are restless and if the Huskers can’t find a way to nab a couple of wins down the stretch, it is assured to get uglier. As always, Go Big Red!!

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