Led by Martinez's improved passing game, Huskers should win Legends title

The excuse is a reasonable one even if it seems out of place.

Nebraska struggled at times offensively in 2011 and it’s inarguable that it shrunk in some of the biggest games, averaging just 24 points and 366 yards against Big Ten opponents.

In their four losses, the Huskers averaged 139 yards per game and scored 17 points or less in three of them, including the 30-13 defeat to South Carolina in the Capital One Bowl.

Nebraska believes its struggles were due in large part to a scaled-back playbook that was a shell of what’s to come in 2012. Coordinator Tim Beck, now in his second year, had plays he wanted to implement and use but couldn’t because the offensive personnel struggled to grasp them.

That’s right: A program known for “option left, option right” is complaining that its offense wasn’t complex enough.

Still, that’s the way it had to be. Taylor Martinez is and was a run-first quarterback and hadn’t developed as a passer. It would have been unfair to expect him to carry the offense more through the air than what he was comfortable with.

But Martinez spent considerable time in the offseason working with quarterback guru Steve Calhoun, and that extra work is expected to pay dividends. If Nebraska can add a legitimate passing attack to a running game that features Rex Burkhead, one of the country’s best downhill runners, the Huskers have a chance to make some noise.

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The Schedule

Nebraska has a bye week on Oct. 13 and will play six games before then, including two in conference play. The chances of the Huskers entering the bye at 6-0 are just 14 percent based on projected lines.

However, it isn’t out of the realm of possibility to think Nebraska will be 3-3. The Week 2 matchup at UCLA won’t be easy, and back-to-back games against Wisconsin and Ohio State to open Big Ten play could be disastrous.

The only two conference games you can pencil in as wins come in November, when the Huskers host Penn State and Minnesota in consecutive weeks. Other than that, the schedule is brutal and arguably the hardest of any Big Ten team. A fifth straight nine-win season will have to be earned.

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Oddsmaker's Take

“This is a team that I think is poised to do big things in the conference. I really believe Taylor Martinez will take the next step as a spread-offense quarterback. The bigger question for Bo Pelini is how his defense will respond after regressing last season following great years in 2009 and 2010.”

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Forecast

We’ve done nothing but talk about the offense to this point but the reality is that the defense is the major concern entering 2012.

The 2009 Nebraska defense allowed just 10.4 points and 272 yards per game, and folks in Lincoln believed that the vaunted Blackshirts were back. Then, in 2010, the defense allowed an average of 17 points.

Last year’s defense gave up 23 points and 351 yards per game and took a clear step back from the previous two years under Bo Pelini’s watch. Most troubling is that the Huskers registered just 21 sacks—the second-fewest since 1981—and only 11 of them came in conference play.

Part of the problem last year was Jared Crick’s season-ending injury. The Huskers weren’t able to recover and struggled to stop the run, particularly in games against Wisconsin, Ohio State, Northwestern and Michigan, all of which gashed them for more than 200 yards on the ground.

Seven starters return, and new coordinator John Papuchis insists that there’s enough talent in place to forge an immediate turnaround. But it still remains to be seen if Nebraska’s personnel will hold up against Big Ten opponents, who are far more physical than the finesse teams the Huskers were used to facing in the Big 12.

Bottom line: Nebraska is a good enough team to win 10 games and contend for a Big Ten championship in its second season in the league. The schedule is difficult, but a home win over Michigan will propel the Huskers to the title game.