Matt Rhule reveals how comfortable he'd be without Jeff Sims at QB
At the end of Nebraska‘s loss to Colorado, starting quarterback Jeff Sims went down with an injury. Now, his status is uncertain for the Cornhuskers’ Week 3 game and home opener.
Behind Sims are two backup quarterbacks, Heinrich Haarberg, who came into the Colorado game, and Chubba Purdy. Head coach Matt Rhule is confident in both of them going forward but does know the offense needs to improve this season.
“I just lean back on kind of what I said at the end of training camp that I thought we could win with Chubba and I felt like we could win with Heinrich,” Matt Rhule said. “They both can run, so we can maintain some of the things we’re doing quarterback run-wise. I think some of the plays we’ve called have been quarterback draws and maybe they’ve been seen as a scramble, but we’ve called some quarterback draws those guys can execute at a high level. So, I think both those guys can run the offense.”
Through two weeks, Nebraska is 126th in the country in scoring offense, averaging just 12 points per game. It’s early in the season, but Rhule still knows that the Cornhuskers need to improve on offense regardless of who is playing quarterback.
“Obviously, with where we’re at right now, the offense isn’t doing what we want it to do, in general. So, I think all of us as a team have to be better as a team to have a chance to win the game, but I have a lot of confidence in both those guys and I think they both bring unique skill-sets to the table.”
Haarberg has completed 33.3 percent of his passes this season with a touchdown. That’s been in limited playing time. For his part, Purdy has only thrown one pass, an incompletion, this year. He has 464 career passing yards and four touchdowns.
Matt Rhule reaffirmed Jeff Sims is the starter
If Jeff Sims is healthy enough to go, Matt Rhule reaffirmed that he will be Nebraska’s starting quarterback.
“Jeff is our starting quarterback. So, if this hadn’t happened, he’d still be out there. That being said, we can’t keep turning the ball over. And when you’re the quarterback, not everything is your fault. They snap the ball and it hits a guy in motion, sometimes that’s the quarterback’s fault, sometimes it’s someone else’s fault. So, this is a top-down, starting with me, hey, we have to be better. We can’t be minus eight. It goes without saying, right? It’s just that can’t be in our building, not out in the world, that can’t be the only narrative in our building,” Rhule said.
“In our building, it can’t just be well, we turned the ball over. It’s 13-7 with six minutes left to go in the third quarter and we lose 36-14, like that’s not acceptable either. So, we’re asking everyone to get just a little bit better.”
At the same time, Rhule acknowledged that Sims needs to be better than he has been to this point.
“All that being said, Jeff is our quarterback, but Jeff also has to protect the football. When the ball is on the ground — things are gonna happen, especially on the road, we have to dive on the ball and just hold the ball there. So, I’m obviously not getting that point across. I’m gonna get it across to everybody as we move forward. But I don’t know what he looks like, so I don’t want to comment too much. If he was 100 percent healthy, I’d have him out there with the ones.”