https://www.usatoday.com/story/spor...x-week-3-trying-times-nebraska-lsu/675144001/
An old friend has returned to us this week. For the last couple years, Nebraska had left the Misery Index behind, bound for greatness under Mike Riley, no longer weighed down by Bo Pelini’s boiling rage and mediocre results.
That was what Nebraska fans had talked themselves into, anyway. And it would have been such a sweet story, with the nicest man in college football unifying a state where “Nebraska Nice” is both a slogan and a lifestyle.
But now reality has set in. And nice has nothing to do with it.
College football is always about looking forward, and Nebraska hiring Riley following the 2014 season was a reach into the past. His best work as a head coach was in 2006-08 at Oregon State, but three of the five seasons before he was offered the Nebraska job were of the sub-.500 variety.
Other than Riley being a steady presence and warm personality in public — basically a 180-degree turn from the volatile Pelini, whose brought Nebraska to the Misery Index several times toward the end of his tenure — there was nothing to suggest he was going to succeed in a job where the expectations remain high and the media scrutiny never ends.
Now in his third year, Riley and his boss Shawn Eichorst are on a trajectory to suggest they’re both going to flop completely in Lincoln when it’s all said and done. And perhaps Eichorst realized that following Saturday’s 21-17 loss to Northern Illinois, when an athletics director who prefers to be seen in public only slightly more often than Bigfoot put himself in front of reporters to address the elephant in the room.
“I’m frustrated, I’m angry, I’m disappointed,” Eichorst told the Omaha World-Herald. “It’s not acceptable. I’m supportive, but we have just got to play better.”
While losing a payday game to a Mid-American Conference team is practically a rite of passage for membership in the Big Ten, this was not a well-timed toe-stubbing for Nebraska.
Last week, the entire state was enraged when future Big Ten schedules were released and Nebraska’s traditional season-ending slot on Black Friday (the day after Thanksgiving) was going away in 2020 — seemingly at the school’s request. While it may seem like a small thing to those outside of Nebraska, it’s a tradition there going back 30 years, and the blowback was so significant that Eichorst had to do a public about-face within 48 hours.
Meanwhile, the World-Herald reported on Monday that Riley’s contract had quietly been extended earlier this year through 2020, news which didn’t land particularly well coming off a loss at Oregon in which Nebraska trailed 42-14 at halftime.
In other words, this is starting to turn into a Big Red circus. And as colleague Paul Myerberg pointed out, Nebraska has started 1-2 just three times in the last 56 years. Two of those have come under Riley’s watch.
While Nebraska fans may be renowned for their loyalty and deeply prideful of selling out Memorial Stadium an NCAA record 356 consecutive games, there’s only so much they can take.
Nebraska is stuck in a conference it doesn’t fit, stuck with a 64-year old coach whose best years are behind him and stuck with an athletics director who doesn’t want to embrace the job’s modern-day requirements of transparency and public relations.
Maybe the Pelini years and Pelini problems weren’t so bad after all. Either way, welcome back to the Misery Index, Nebraska. You’ll probably stay for awhile this time.
FIVE MOST MISERABLE
1. Nebraska: Toward the end of the Pelini era, there were a lot of thinkpieces floating out in the national media about whether Nebraska fans realized they were no longer a national power like they once were under Tom Osborne and whether those years had created unrealistic expectations for what the program could be today. While it’s a fun discussion because it ties into how television has changed the entire landscape of the sport, it’s kind of a straw man. Nobody in Nebraska believes they’re going to return to the 1980s or early 1990s. But is being as good as Wisconsin really too much to ask? The idea that Nebraska can't win a national title is ridiculous. Obviously, it would take the right coach with the right philosophy and some luck in recruiting. But can it happen? Of course it can. If Wisconsin can put itself on the periphery of the playoff discussion every year, there’s no reason why Nebraska can’t be as good or better. But Pelini couldn’t do it, and now it appears increasingly unlikely Riley will be able to either. At 16-13 overall and 9-8 in the Big Ten under Riley, Nebraska is just another program. Regardless of where you think Nebraska fits in 2017, it certainly should be better than that.
An old friend has returned to us this week. For the last couple years, Nebraska had left the Misery Index behind, bound for greatness under Mike Riley, no longer weighed down by Bo Pelini’s boiling rage and mediocre results.
That was what Nebraska fans had talked themselves into, anyway. And it would have been such a sweet story, with the nicest man in college football unifying a state where “Nebraska Nice” is both a slogan and a lifestyle.
But now reality has set in. And nice has nothing to do with it.
College football is always about looking forward, and Nebraska hiring Riley following the 2014 season was a reach into the past. His best work as a head coach was in 2006-08 at Oregon State, but three of the five seasons before he was offered the Nebraska job were of the sub-.500 variety.
Other than Riley being a steady presence and warm personality in public — basically a 180-degree turn from the volatile Pelini, whose brought Nebraska to the Misery Index several times toward the end of his tenure — there was nothing to suggest he was going to succeed in a job where the expectations remain high and the media scrutiny never ends.
Now in his third year, Riley and his boss Shawn Eichorst are on a trajectory to suggest they’re both going to flop completely in Lincoln when it’s all said and done. And perhaps Eichorst realized that following Saturday’s 21-17 loss to Northern Illinois, when an athletics director who prefers to be seen in public only slightly more often than Bigfoot put himself in front of reporters to address the elephant in the room.
“I’m frustrated, I’m angry, I’m disappointed,” Eichorst told the Omaha World-Herald. “It’s not acceptable. I’m supportive, but we have just got to play better.”
While losing a payday game to a Mid-American Conference team is practically a rite of passage for membership in the Big Ten, this was not a well-timed toe-stubbing for Nebraska.
Last week, the entire state was enraged when future Big Ten schedules were released and Nebraska’s traditional season-ending slot on Black Friday (the day after Thanksgiving) was going away in 2020 — seemingly at the school’s request. While it may seem like a small thing to those outside of Nebraska, it’s a tradition there going back 30 years, and the blowback was so significant that Eichorst had to do a public about-face within 48 hours.
Meanwhile, the World-Herald reported on Monday that Riley’s contract had quietly been extended earlier this year through 2020, news which didn’t land particularly well coming off a loss at Oregon in which Nebraska trailed 42-14 at halftime.
In other words, this is starting to turn into a Big Red circus. And as colleague Paul Myerberg pointed out, Nebraska has started 1-2 just three times in the last 56 years. Two of those have come under Riley’s watch.
While Nebraska fans may be renowned for their loyalty and deeply prideful of selling out Memorial Stadium an NCAA record 356 consecutive games, there’s only so much they can take.
Nebraska is stuck in a conference it doesn’t fit, stuck with a 64-year old coach whose best years are behind him and stuck with an athletics director who doesn’t want to embrace the job’s modern-day requirements of transparency and public relations.
Maybe the Pelini years and Pelini problems weren’t so bad after all. Either way, welcome back to the Misery Index, Nebraska. You’ll probably stay for awhile this time.
FIVE MOST MISERABLE
1. Nebraska: Toward the end of the Pelini era, there were a lot of thinkpieces floating out in the national media about whether Nebraska fans realized they were no longer a national power like they once were under Tom Osborne and whether those years had created unrealistic expectations for what the program could be today. While it’s a fun discussion because it ties into how television has changed the entire landscape of the sport, it’s kind of a straw man. Nobody in Nebraska believes they’re going to return to the 1980s or early 1990s. But is being as good as Wisconsin really too much to ask? The idea that Nebraska can't win a national title is ridiculous. Obviously, it would take the right coach with the right philosophy and some luck in recruiting. But can it happen? Of course it can. If Wisconsin can put itself on the periphery of the playoff discussion every year, there’s no reason why Nebraska can’t be as good or better. But Pelini couldn’t do it, and now it appears increasingly unlikely Riley will be able to either. At 16-13 overall and 9-8 in the Big Ten under Riley, Nebraska is just another program. Regardless of where you think Nebraska fits in 2017, it certainly should be better than that.
