One of the most concerning things about the Nebraska football team's play of late is that Tony White’s defense simply hasn’t looked as locked in as it has in the past. That was on full display against USC when his unit allowed more than 400 total yards and found several wide-open receivers en route to the 28-20 win.
It turns out that those who thought the defense looked out of sorts against the Trojans weren’t hallucinating. Earlier this week, the Huskers defensive coordinator and several of his charges indicated some serious communication issues.
“We were playing two different coverages, and that is never going to work out well,” linebacker John Bullock said. That’s not something Nebraska football fans want to hear. Not this late in the year. Not with as many veteran defenders as there are on the squad.
Nebraska football running ‘two different defenses’ in loss to USC
“There’s a break in the process somewhere that allows those kinds of things to slip in there,” White said during his press conference on Tuesday. Earlier in the week, head coach Matt Rhule made it clear he was more than a little angry over the situation.
“The deep touchdown to No. 2, that should never be a touchdown,” Rhule said, referring to USC’s toss to a wide-open Deuce Robinson, who ran behind NU corner Malcolm Hartzog, who appeared in man coverage while other members of the secondary were in a deep zone.
“If it’s cover three, play cover three,” Rhule continued. “You don’t guess.”
“It’s like a dam,” White said Tuesday. “When one hole opens, you plug that one, but then there’s another hole, so you’ve got to consistently dive into the process, make sure everything, from top-down, is correct.”
Now, in Week 13 of the season, the Nebraska football DC is trying to find ways to fix communication and avoid confusion. Not a great place for the program to find itself with two games to go in the season.