CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Nebraska finally had the depth at running back, finally had the strength in the offensive line, finally had the commitment to a downhill running game.
That was often the word out of fall camp, where the Huskers worked behind closed doors on an offensive plan for Illinois that perhaps many thought would mimic what NU did to end the 2020 season at Rutgers.
NU even kept its starting running back a secret all the way up until freshman Gabe Ervin trotted on the field with the offense, in an effort to perhaps game the slightest edge.
Then the game started.
“Not very good,” said NU coach Scott Frost in his blunt assessment. “Bottom line is we’ve got to run the ball better early and then once we got behind, we weren’t able to commit to it as much.”
Nebraska tried three running backs Saturday – Ervin, Markese Stepp and Rahmir Johnson.
Those three combined for 19 carries, 54 yards, and one touchdown. They averaged 2.8 yards per carry. Nebraska coach Scott Frost said the Huskers expected one front from Illinois and got a different one. NU “guessed wrong” in what it would see from the Illini in the run-up to the game.
But any adjustments NU made didn’t seem to work.
“We’ve just got to adjust on the fly. But that’s not what kills us. It’s catastrophic errors. We need to get over that,” center Cam Jurgens said. (The confusion up front was) “not enough to be losing this game, that’s for sure. I don’t think it played as big an effect as it should’ve.”
“I mean, that’s what we see from our defense. That’s not what loses this game. It’s us. We lost this game.”
In the end, it looked a whole heck of a lot like so many other Nebraska games in recent years – NU’s best running plays came when quarterback Adrian Martinez was flushed from the pocket and forced to run on a called pass play.
“Honestly, I think we did what we had to do. We’re only as successful as the guys up front,” Stepp said. “So we’ve got to adjust accordingly. I think we ran hard. We played to the best of our abilities.”
Stepp, the USC transfer, finished with three carries for 10 yards and Nebraska’s first touchdown. Ervin got 12 carries and finished with 33 yards. Johnson came on late and ran four times for 11 yards. The group’s longest run was Ervin’s 12-yard cutback with Nebraska backed up against its goal line in the first quarter.
Those 19 total carries were just two more than Martinez had by himself, a week or so after NU offensive coordinator said the Huskers wanted to find a back they could give the ball to 20 to 26 times per game.
Once Illinois scored 28 consecutive points, any hope of Nebraska sticking to the ground went out the window as Martinez alternated between airing it out and running for his life.
“I think early on, we needed to find that run game a lot quicker,” Jurgens said. “We went to the pass. We need to get that run game going a lot faster.”
Ervin was happy to finally play his first college game, he said. He was prepared for his moment as NU’s starter. But any hopes of a more memorable debut than that never materialized.
“We had a great game plan going into this. We tried to execute it (but) penalties just shot us in the foot,” Ervin said. “We’ve got to get a bigger push to make the runs more explosive.”
