Husker offensive line key for rushing success
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By BRIAN CHRISTOPHERSON / Lincoln Journal Star
The Husker offense behaved like a middle-school bully Saturday.
Yeah, but it was against Nevada.
It racked up 52 points and 625 yards.
Yeah, against Nevada.
And 413 of those yards were on the ground.
Yes, and I beat my kid brother at arm wrestling yesterday. Are you still talking about the Nevada game?
OK, maybe we are. Sorry. It’s all we’ve got to go on for now.
Surely the Husker offensive linemen won’t mind if we continue for a bit. They have got to be feeling pretty good right about now.
It’s only one week into the season, but Nebraska leads the country in rushing (413 yards) and junior Marlon Lucky has more rushing yards (233) than anyone else in NCAA Division I-A.
And the linemen, oh, those linemen. They’re talking like they used to talk around here, back in the days when 400-yard rushing performances were met with little more than a shoulder shrug.
“We run the ball. That’s the main priority here. That’s the tradition here and we’ve just got to live up to it,” Husker left tackle Carl Nicks said. “We weren’t surprised. I told Marlon before the game if he don’t get over 200, I’m not going to be happy.”
Lucky got the headlines, but NU’s offensive line gave out the headaches to Nevada’s defense in a 52-10 win.
“To run the ball effectively, it’s been a goal. It’s been a focus of this offense since we arrived,” Husker coach Bill Callahan said Monday. “You can’t win in this conference without being able to run the ball. We were pleased with how we ran it Saturday, but that’s just one game.”
One game against Nevada.
This week features a trip to Wake Forest and maybe the holes at the line of scrimmage aren’t so big down there in North Carolina.
Certainly, Nebraska probably won’t get in the 70 rushing plays it did against the Wolf Pack.
As Callahan said: “Things change according to game-planning. One week you can throw it for 400 and rush for 100. It’s all based on who you’re matched up against.”
After Saturday’s game, the coach said “the profile” of Nebraska’s offensive line has changed.
More size. More experience. More depth. More versatility.
The Huskers played five guys at the tackle spots Saturday — Nicks, Lydon Murtha, Matt Slauson, D.J. Jones and Mike Smith.
Slauson was also taking snaps at right guard, the position he’s listed at on the depth chart.
Husker senior quarterback Sam Keller couldn’t stop gushing about the guys up front. Such would be expected from a quarterback touched by a defender only once all game.
Of course, that’s kind of the way it’s supposed to be this year, Husker offensive line coach Dennis Wagner said.
“We have a veteran offensive line. We need to do this every week to help Sam along.”
Still, Callahan looked at the stat sheet with a hint of surprise when the game was over.
A former offensive line coach, he knew his guys had their way, but not to the extent the statistics showed.
“You know what? If you would have told me that was going to happen, I would have told you you were crazy,” Callahan said. “I never thought in a million years that we would have had the numbers that we had. I was kind of astounded afterward that the numbers were that high. It didn’t feel like that during the course of the game.”
Maybe Callahan didn’t feel it, but Nicks did.
In the postgame interview room, someone told him Nebraska had the ball for a remarkable 40 minutes and 38 seconds.
“Was it? Geez, I thought it was about 50 (minutes) with how many plays we were running,” Nicks said. “We were a little tired, our legs were a little tired, but you know, it was all worth it. We was just pounding the rock.”
Reach Brian Christopherson at 473-7439 or bchristopherson@journalstar.com.
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