Nebraska Football: Can the offense keep rolling against Michigan State?

Nebraska football has been rolling offensively, with seven straight games of more than 450 yards, can the Huskers sustain that vs Michigan State?

It has been fun to watch Nebraska football the past few games, especially with the tremendous steps forward taken by quarterback Adrian Martinez and the Huskers offense.

What Nebraska football has done in the first year of head coach Scott Frost is pretty impressive. The Huskers are now on a streak of seven games with at least 450 yards of total offense. In last Saturday’s win over Illinois, the Huskers rolled up 609 yards.

In terms of scoring offense, Nebraska is now fourth in the Big Ten with 32.2 points per game. The Huskers are also second in the conference in total offense with an average of 485 yards per game, which trails only Ohio State.

The question is, can the Huskers sustain that success against Michigan State?

Nebraska Cornhuskers

It’s a fair question. Michigan State is a stout defensive team. The Spartans own the best run defense in the Big Ten, as they allow just 76 yards per game. In terms of total defense (327 YPG) and points allowed (19.7 PPG), Michigan State is third in the league in both.

It will definitely be one of the better defenses Martinez and the Huskers have faced this season, however, the last time Nebraska faced a stout defense, in Wisconsin, it finished with more than 500 yards. Yet, the Huskers scored just 24 points and lost the game by 17.

While Michigan State is really good against the run, it is weaker against the pass and ranks 11th in the Big Ten in passing yards allowed. That’s a good sign for Martinez who throws for 245 yards per game and averages 306 yards of total offense.

At his disposal, Martinez also has two electrifying wideouts in Stanley Morgan Jr. and JD Spielman. Those guys should be hard for the Spartans to contain. Also, the zone-read run game has been successful in some instances against Michigan State at times. Michigan used some forms of it and a slew of power runs and racked up over 200 yards rushing, so it can be done.

Getting Devine Ozigbo going just a little bit will be huge for the Huskers, who also have the fourth-best rushing attack in the Big Ten at 226 yards per game. The Michigan State pass rush is solid and has 24 sacks in 10 games to tie Nebraska for fifth in the conference, however, Nebraska ranks 12th in sacks allowed.

Keeping Martinez protected will be essential and having a decent run game to rely on that will help immensely. There is no doubt that Nebraska has been on a roll offensively of late, but it will be interesting to see if the Huskers can keep it up against Michigan State.

If they can, Nebraska football should find a way to win the game and send the seniors out right at Memorial Stadium.