Andy & Ari On3 - Can Nico turn Tennessee into a playoff team? | Matt Rhule helps Nebraska pick up the pieces

Episode Date: March 19, 2024

This show is sponsored by FanDuel. Go to fanduel.com/Staples to sign up and receive $200 in bonus bets if your first $5 bet wins.(0:00-1:04) Intro - NCAA Tournament, First Four TONIGHT(1:05-11:20) NIT Tournament Opt-Outs(11:21-40:00) Brent Hubbs joins to Check in on Tennessee(40:01-1:06:37) Sean Callahan joins to discuss the Lay of the Land in Nebraska(1:06:38-1:07:56) First Four NCAA PicksWe continue our 2024 schedule deep dive series with Tennessee, which started spring practice on Monday. Brent Hubbs of On3’s Volquest joins to break down a Volunteers’ schedule that — as new SEC schedules go — is not the scariest.How will the ascension of Nico Iamaleava to the starting quarterback role change Tennessee’s offense? Can the Vols be more explosive than they were last year, when a Joe Milton-led group took a step back from the previous year’s Hendon Hooker-led group? Plus, how much will having one of the nation’s deepest defensive lines help a group that struggled to get off the field on third-and-long plays last season?FanDuel has set Tennessee’s win total at 8.5. The over certainly seems reachable, but the bigger question is whether the Vols can go over by more than one win. If they can, they might be a College Football Playoff team.Next, Sean Callahan of On3’s Husker Online joins to break down a wild week in Nebraska. Last week, athletic director Trev Alberts — a former Nebraska football star — shocked the school by leaving for the same job at Texas A&M. On Monday, football coach Matt Rhule tried to rally Nebraska supporters who felt gut-punched by the move. Rhule showed he has mastered the political aspects of the Nebraska football job. He reassured the fan base while also encouraging greater donation and investment. He also staked his claim to having an even bigger voice in athletic department and school leadership.Now, he needs to get his team ready to win some games. Because if he can add wins to his political savvy, Rhule could have a very productive tenure at Nebraska.Want to watch the show instead? Join us on YouTube M-F at 8 am et LIVE! https://youtube.com/live/qZfHdbX4zygMust be 21+ and present in select states. FanDuel is offering online sports wagering in Kansas under an agreement with Kansas StarCasino, LLC. First online real money wager only. $5 pregame moneyline wager required. First online real money wager only. $10 firstdeposit required. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable bonus bets that expire 7 days after receipt. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com.Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG in Colorado, Iowa, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania,Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia. Call 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 in Arizona, 1-888-789-7777 or visitccpg.org/chat in Connecticut, 1-800-9-WITH-IT in Indiana, 1-800-522-4700 or visit ksgamblinghelp.com in Kansas, 1-877-770-STOP inLouisiana, visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland, visit 1800gambler.net in West Virginia, or call 1-800-522-4700 in Wyoming. Hope ishere. Visit GamblingHelpLineMA.org or call [phone] for 24/7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-877-8HOPE-NY or textHOPENY in New York

Welcome to Andy Staples on three. We are about there. The NCAA tournament begins tonight with the first four in Dayton. We've got two games on tap. The greatest event in American sports. And I say this as a football guy. I am a football guy. I like football better.

But the NCAA tournament is the best event in American sports. It starts tonight. You got Wagner versus Howard, two 16s trying to figure out who gets smashed by a one. Colorado State and Virginia trying to get a 10 seed. And as you heard, our guy James Fletcher III, Virginia could be a tricky matchup for somebody if they were to get through. Now, getting through Colorado State is another matter entirely. The Rams are favored by two and a half points. So we will find out.

But that is the first NCAA tournament action. First four in Dayton tonight. Now, there's another tournament that goes on this time of year. And it actually used to be the bigger tournament. That's the NIT, the National Invitation Tournament. Lot of hand-wringing on Monday about the teams opting out of the NIT. You had St. John's, Pitt, Ole Miss, Memphis, Indiana, Oklahoma opting out of the NIT. You had St. John's, Pitt, Ole Miss, Memphis, Indiana, Oklahoma opting out of the NIT saying, hey, we've got other stuff going on. We're worrying about building our roster.

The transfer portal's open. We got other things to worry about. And this was an interesting one. And we've seen teams turn down those invitations before. Maybe not for the NIT, CBI, that sort of thing. Tom Crean, former Indiana, former Georgia coach, had a very fiery rant on ESPN saying, you can't turn this down. It's one more chance to play. And I get that.

That absolutely rings true. Now, when he was in Indiana, they turned down a CBI invitation because his athletic director said, no, we're Indiana. We don't play in that. I don't know that Tom Crean had a choice in that matter. It was his AD who said that. So we'll see about that. But the factors that have caused this for those of us who cover football make a lot of sense. So let's break down the numbers. You think about the NCAA tournament, you have 32 automatic bids, 36 at-larges. So if you don't make the NCAA tournament,

it means you're at least number 37, but you're probably not really number 37 because I would say probably 12 of those automatic bids would have made the tournament anyway, and probably more than that. But let's just, for numbers that are easily divisible sake, let's say it's 12. So let's say that you are actually, if you're the first team out of the NCAA tournament, you're actually number 49. So basically you're a team that would play in the Myrtle Beach Bowl. If we're talking about football teams, you play the Myrtle Beach Bowl, you play in the Birmingham Bowl, you play in whatever they're calling the bowl mobile right now. Those are the games you'd be playing. You'd have a lot of opt-outs if you were a big-time program or a big conference program,

and you got put in one of those bowl games. You'd have a ton of opt-outs. You'd barely have a team. So this makes perfect sense as to why this is happening now in this era. And the old school people who remember when the NIT was a bigger deal, they're going nuts over this. ESPN's going nuts over this because they televised the NIT. They would like you to watch it.

But does anybody actually care that much? We could fix it. You want to fix it? Let's fix it right now. Here's how you fix it. You open the transfer portal two or three weeks later it's that simple now you might get sued over that and the players will win if they sue you over when you open the transfer portal so you probably don't want to open that pandora's box

but again if you look at football football's transfer portal opens the first week of december that is right before exams in most places. That's right before the end of the semester. The end of the spring semester at most places is not until the end of April. You could open the transfer portal April 1st and not have to deal with this right now. Most teams would go play in the NIT because there'd be nobody in the portal yet guys would have a chance to maybe play a couple games in the nit maybe show off what they can do if they're going to hop in the portal that's it that fixes the problem it doesn't need to be open right now it could be open april 1st that gives everybody plenty of time to pick a new school

figure out where they want to go in fact you, the thing about that one, like in football, you've got to be at your new place by January. Here, you don't have to be at your new place till July. So yeah, what are we even doing here? Move the transfer portal window. It's not complicated. If you're that worried about the sanctity of the NIT and people playing in it, just move the transfer portal window. Instead of opening it this week, open it April 1st. Problem solved. Done. Easy. That's it. Because in basketball, with your small roster sizes, and that's the difference between basketball and football. I said, if you're a power conference program, you get thrown in the Myrtle Beach Bowl, you're going to have a bunch of opt-outs. You still might actually have enough to field a team that can play in the game.

But in basketball, if you have five, six opt-outs, you may not have enough healthy scholarship players to play a game. So I get it, but it's not that complicated. Open the transfer portal window April 1st. It still gives everybody plenty of chance to move. Everybody who wants to move can move. It's not complicated. It's actually very similar to football in that respect, although it would still be less of a compressed window than what football has in December. So don't freak out about this. Just fix the problem. Now, yeah, you may get sued about when the transfer portal windows open, but you're probably going to get sued over that anyway.

So get over it. At least in this case, I don't know that it inconveniences anyone enough to cause them to file a lawsuit. Because if you can get out by April 1st, get in the portal, you have the entire rest of the spring semester, which is at that point about a month, to figure out where you want to go. You don't have to enroll at your new school. You could enroll for the first summer semester. You could enroll for the second summer semester. You don't actually have to be there till July. It's so easy. But again, nobody thought of that. Nobody thought, wait a second, the coaches are going to

prioritize rebuilding their roster through the transfer portal rather than getting ready for an NIT game that they don't care about and nobody else cares about. But I agree with Tom Crean, a chance to play is a precious thing. A lot of these guys might not get another chance to play competitively, especially at this level. So why not make it possible for everybody to have what they want? So just change the portal window. Instead of opening it in the middle of March, open it the first week of April.

It's that simple. Fixes the problem. And then everybody plays in basketball's version of the Myrtle Beach Bowl. Congratulations. We got to talk a little football, though. We talked a lot of basketball lately. We got to talk a lot of football now. Because these deep dives into the 2024 schedule make me so happy, make me so excited for what's coming.

So we got Tennessee today. We're also going to talk to Sean Callahan of Husker Online about the week that Nebraska's had. Their AD's leaving. Matt Rule was talking about spring practice on Monday. That could get you excited if you're a Nebraska fan. Hearing Matt Rule talk about that team that he's got coming back because I realize there hasn't been a ton to cheer for over the last few years. I think you're going to have something different this year at Nebraska, and I think you might have a Tennessee team that exceeds expectations. It's interesting because these two fan bases feel very similar to me. They want so

badly for their team to be back where they believe it belongs. Back where it was in the 90s when it was among the best in college football. Tennessee is a lot further along in that goal than Nebraska. But they both want it that bad. And so it's interesting to watch these two because Nebraska is in a different spot than Tennessee is. But Nebraska might be where Tennessee was a couple of years ago.

It might be ascended. Tennessee feels like it's ascended. And now we've got to figure out, okay, where does it fit among the best teams in the sec? Our friends at FanDuel set Tennessee's win total for 2024 at eight and a half. Brent hubs. And I'm going to talk about that. When total you may,

after we talk about that, when total, or while we talk about that, when total want to go to FanDuel.com slash staples and sign up. If your first $5 bet wins, you get $200 in bonus bets. Now, you're probably going to want to sprinkle some on these NCAA tournament games. Maybe on these NIT games. Who knows?

But you also may want to sprinkle some on that Tennessee eight and a half. You may feel some type of way about it after you hear me and Brent talk about it. You may say, I don't know, maybe eight and a half feels a little high. I suspect though, you will feel like eight and a half feels a little low, but that is the beautiful thing about FanDuel. However you feel, they've got an option for you. So FanDuel.com slash staples. If your first $5 bet wins, you get $200 in bonus bets. Join up, sign up today in time for the NCAA tournament. All right. Let us talk Vols. Because this is one of the more intriguing teams in college football in 2024. But we have not been talking about them the way we talked about them going into last year.

Brent Hubbs explains that's probably a good thing. We are joined now by the great Brent hubs of ball quest that is on three's Tennessee site and Brent, Tennessee open spring practice on Monday, a very, very exciting year, new quarterback, the guy that everyone's been waiting to see, Niko Arama, I feel like actually since that citrus bowl performance, it's been a little quiet on the Nico front,

but it, it feels like it shouldn't be that quiet. No, I think it's a good thing. I mean, but, and I think it's a, it's,

it's because of what happened last year. Right. What, what was your phrase last year? You were on the Joe, You were driving the Joe Milton train coming out of the Clemson game, right? I drove it right into the side of a barn. I mean, everybody, there was such a buzz about Joe Milton. Whereas I think because of how that kind of worked, that maybe changed things a little bit. And some of the all season stuff.

And here's the other thing too. Nico's kind of a private deal. I mean, he's kind of a private guy. I know that sounds crazy because of all the attention he's gotten, but he's a pretty low key guy who just kind of goes about work. And I think that's what Tennessee likes about where he's at. I think he still feels like he's got a ton of things to prove. And this whole program's been pretty quiet.

Of course, basketball team's winning, so that changes a little bit. But really, it's been a pretty quiet football deal when you talk about football. There's been football storylines that have nothing to do with playing football. But from a football standpoint, it's been a pretty quiet couple of months. I think Josh Heupel's pretty happy about it. Well, and that's the thing is it feels like a good time for tennessee to be under the radar because this is a team that that could conceivably have a very good season and that's why i wanted to have you on uh yes they're starting spring practice but also to

go through this schedule and talk about the possibilities for tennessee this year because if nico is pretty good this is a team that could really exceed expectations, Brent. Well, there are a couple things going for them in addition to the schedule, which we'll talk about here. But when you watch them on the practice field and you do a deep dive in the roster, the first thing that jumps out to you, they've got a bunch of grown men playing on the defensive line. And this is a line of scrimmage league.

It's a line of scrimmage game. It's a line of scrimmage game. It's not just in the SEC. It's everywhere. And for Tennessee, they've got defensive linemen who are men. Now, they've got some offensive linemen who are young that are going to have to learn in a hurry, but they've got a bunch of men playing on defense. And I think that's something that you look at that you say, okay, Tim Banks got plenty to build around with this defense

because they're going to go 13, 14 deep on the defensive line. There may not be many teams around the country as deep as Tennessee is. And it's going to be highlighted by James Pierce, who a lot of people are talking about where his name is going to be called a year from now in the NFL draft. So that's where it starts for me with this team, but particularly this defense is that defensive front. Well, and you look at the offensive line, you talk about some young guys, but there's also a bunch of old guys. You know, Cooper Mays is back at center. Javante Spraggins is a three-year starter at guard. I know he's been dinged up and is kind of limited in the spring, but what does he need to do in the spring?

Like, he just needs to be healthy come fall it it feels like and this was the big question because you and I have talked about this and Austin Price who works on your site and I have talked about this the the question of the guys that this staff recruited on the line of scrimmage how many of them would they develop but it feels like especially in the offensive line they're still dealing with some old guys that they've had for a while. Yeah, they are. I mean, and when you look at, I mean, you take John Campbell, who was a transfer from Miami a year ago that played left tackle, you're going to flip him to the right side and you bring in Lance Hurd from LSU, who was a five-star guy who was going to at best split time at tackle in Baton Rouge for another year, which

he had no interest in. Caught behind two potential first rounders. Yeah, right. And Emory Jones and Will Campbell, yeah. It's not like he was a disappointment because he didn't win the job. It's- Right. He didn't beat out two guys whose names might be called,

might get a hat and a hug from the commissioner a year from now. So he's gotta be a plug and play guy. If those two guys at the tackle spot hit the way that you hope and believe that they can, you're really looking for one spot this spring and that's at left guard and you've got some viable candidates there and we'll see what that looks like. But yeah, I mean, there's a belief that this team can be really solid on both sides of the line of scrimmage, which gives you a lot to work with moving forward. And then you look back at that schedule and you say, man, if we can weather early,

right? If our young quarterback can handle being outside of Neyland Stadium early, well, what does this thing look like? Because I'm going to tell you, that NC State team in December, if we were doing this podcast, I went, you know what? They're not going to be very good, I don't think. But you look at what they brought in from the portal, Grayson McCall at quarterback, Noel Rogers at wide receiver, a running back who's got experience, who could play. They have made over that offense at NC State.

And we know that they play defense over there, right? I mean, that's typically what they hang their hat on year in and year out. I think that NC State game is taking on a little different tenor than what it was going to be when Tennessee was getting ready to play Iowa in the bowl game. I'm not saying NC State's suddenly going to go out and win the ACC, but when you looked at losing two dozen guys to the portal, which they were and what they replaced with Andy, that they had a pretty nice portal flip of that roster for them heading into next season. Yeah, I think they should feel pretty good about it. And I actually

love this as a test for Tennessee and probably, you know, love it as a test for NC State as well, because this is neither one of these is a they're going to win their conference kind of team that you're looking at right now. Now, maybe Tennessee grows into that. It's possible, but it's not an impossible feat to go win this game. It's a good test for young players and a good confidence boost if Tennessee can win it, because then they have another game to kind of warm up with Kent State and then they go to Norman. And that at-Oklahoma game for Tennessee is pretty critical

because if they win that game and they win the NC State game, there's a house money situation. Oh, there's no doubt. And again, now you're asking a lot of a quarterback who has played four quarters, essentially that count everything else was mop up duty. So you're asking a lot of that. Um, you're, you're, you're asking a lot of brew McCoy to get back and be, you know, ready to help you and be what you hope that he can be as a wide receiver. You're replacing a running back in Jalen Wright,

who I think was undervalued. We're seeing that by what he did at the combine and sort of the NFL buzz he is generating right now. He had a terrific year a season ago. Can Dylan Sampson be a bell cow back for you? Is Cam Seldon, who's a sophomore, ready to really take on a serious role in the backfield. So there are questions, but everybody has questions. I think you feel a little better about your questions if you're Tennessee because, again, you think you're going to be able to win in the line of scrimmage, and you feel like you've got a quarterback who's going to be able to do some things that you couldn't do a year ago.

I asked Josh Heupel on Monday when Tennessee opened spring practice about building his offense around Nico because that's one of the things Heupel's always talked about is we can win with a tall guy, a skinny guy, a short guy, a guy who can run. We just kind of tailor make it for the quarterback. Well, I'm curious as to what that is with Nico. And he said, there's some things that we'll tinker with and mess with this spring and look at and see where we are. But I think there's a belief they can do more things offensively with Nico at quarterback than what they ended up being able to do

with Joe Milton at quarterback last season. Yeah, and I think it starts with the run game because, you know, coming out of the Orange Bowl against Clemson, you loved the way Joe Milton had thrown the ball but then you watch him as the starter at Tennessee and you realize okay he's not great at the at the read option stuff and it looks like it looked like you know RPO stuff wasn't even really there because you didn't have the the traditional read option piece of it Nico again it's a small sample size but you look at him against iowa which is a very good defense they had everybody playing except for

cooper to gene who was hurt he seemed to know when to keep the ball and when not to keep the ball and that is a valuable skill because it essentially takes away a defender, whether that's in coverage or in the box. You have to decide who's going to deal with the quarterback in that situation. I don't think the defense has felt like they had to deal with the quarterback run with Joe Milton. No, because Joe was a reluctant runner, not a willing runner. And I think Nico will be a more willing runner. I think the other thing, too, is the processing of that, right?

You're seeing more and more of this. It's not just read it and run, but it's read it, then are you running or are you throwing the RPO out of it? A lot of different things you can do there. And I think some of those possibilities are there with Nico that weren't there a year ago. I think the other place it may help a little bit. If you go look at this run game, one of the challenges this run game has had against some opponents is opponents playing a three-man front with an overhang linebacker.

If you bring the quarterback legs into play, that changes sort of how they play you a little bit. And that's something that Tennessee had some difficulties with. You go back to that Missouri game a year ago, they had a really hard time with Missouri's defensive front and that overhang linebacker in that three-man front. Georgia's a different animal because they're Georgia. And Missouri was good last year, but Tennessee had some issues there. That's something that I think Nico can help them with

because of not just his willingness to run with his legs, Andy, but also his processing because you've got to make some quick decisions. And I think Nico has the ability to process pretty quickly as he continues to grow in this offense. Yeah, and those guys who are natural in terms of read option they've done it their whole careers they understand when to keep when to when to pull and i think that does help and it doesn't matter how fast you are like it speeds up your offense when that person can make that decision very quickly and can make it very instinctually and that it seems like Nico's that guy it also seems like Nico's a little bit bigger which Nico was a string bean as a recruit

but you'd look at his dad who's you know six foot seven 300 something pounds and think okay what is Nico as a 20 year old as a 21 year old and I think we're starting to see that yeah I. I mean, I think he's had a good off season. I think this team in general has had a good off season in the weight room. Uh, but, but I think you're seeing a little more definition out of Nico and a little more bulk. Uh, I don't think anybody's going to ever accuse him of being a big guy, you know, a true heavy guy, if you will. Uh, but, but certainly he's, his arms are bigger than they were. And I think he's added some weight. You got to remember, man, this guy's tall. I mean, like he's not a 6'4 guy. And when you look at me, okay, he weighs like a buck 80 or whatever. I mean, he's 6'6". So

carrying 230 pounds at 6'6 looks different than it does at 6'3 or 6'4. So, you know, I don't think he's ever going to be accused of being large or being huge, but I do think he's definitely added some quality weight and some muscle. I know that's been a huge priority of his this offseason, and I think it showed up on the practice field when Tennessee was out there on Monday. And so another priority for him in the offseason was helping Tennessee recruit some help for him in terms of receivers. Chris Brazel from Tulane seems like a guy who could come in there and get

targets pretty quickly. Yeah, and he's got a great opportunity this spring because Brew McCoy's out. So he's going to work as an outside receiver. Nathan Laycock is not going through spring right now. We'll see where he's at. So you're down a couple of bodies there to begin with. And now Brazel's got a chance to really jump in there and push Chaz Nimrod and Caleb Webb and some of these guys who need to have big springs. I think the opportunities are there for the taking for Chris Brazel. And we'll see how he goes.

Highly productive guy from Tulane, a true outside receiver, big frame guy, tall, long guy, looks like he can get out and go on you pretty good. So I'm curious to see how he goes throughout this spring. I think a guy nobody talks about in that receiving group, and Mike Matthews deserves all the accolades. He gets five-star player. He was really good in the all-star games. I think he's going to be a factor for Deco and can do some things in this offense. This guy, Braylon Staley, that they got from South Carolina,

is a bit of an under-the-radar guy, true slot receiver. Now, they've got Squirrel White there, but who's the backup slot? It may very well be Staley when it's all said and done, because I tell you what, I like the way he looks. I like the way he moves. He did some nice things in bowl prep to get everybody's attention. I think he's had a good off season to start. We'll see how it goes throughout spring, but you see a quick twitch guy in the slot. And in this offense, Andy, the slot position could be such a productive position for Josh Heupel and company. I think there's some weapons there for Nico to work with. I think the real question for this offense outside of left guard, what do they look like at tight end? Because that is a key element to this offense being successful. So you mentioned

how deep they can be on the defensive line. How important was it to keep Rodney Garner? Rodney Garner's worked at a lot of different places in the SEC. He's an Auburn grad. Sounds like Auburn really wanted him to come home. He stayed in Knoxville. How important was that? Well, I think it's important because of how technical Rodney Garner is in his coaching.

You know, Rodney is a three-decades position coach. You don't see that, right? Most of those guys moving on to be coordinators. That's never been Rodney. That's never been anything Coach Garner's looking to do. He wants to coach defensive linemen and he coaches the finite details of those defensive linemen. If you want to know what he's meant to the group, Omar Norman-Lott came back. Omari Thomas came back. All of these guys that they had, Bryson Eason came back. These guys that you wondered if they would return for a super senior season or if they would try to go pro or, you know,

would you stay in a group that's going to be 13 deep, you know, when you talk about the whole defensive line, they all stayed. And I think that says a lot about Coach Garner, who is not easy to play for. I mean, I'm out there watching him one day. He's had another knee replacement. Now both knees are done. He had his other one done back at the end of January 1st of February. He's out there with a cane right now.

And, I mean, you would have thought they were prepping for Alabama on day one of spring practice because he was loud. Guys were repeating drills. It was game on from the get go. There's no acclimation period. It doesn't exist, Andy. Sparing with his praise is the phrase I would use about Rodney Garner. Like if he says a nice thing about you as a player, you're probably a first round. Frame it, right? I mean, because listen, he's going to talk to the media on Saturday, and everybody's going to talk to him about James Pierce,

and he's going to tell you everything James Pierce doesn't do well right now. And that's the way it goes. And James Pierce, I mean, is a top 10 draft pick if he stays healthy. I mean, he may be a top five draft pick, uh, because of what he can do and his ability to play in space and rush the quarterback. But you, you, if you watch practice or you listen, at some point you think, man, James Pierce is going to be lucky to get off the scout team this year, because that's just the way it is with Rodney.

Now guys appreciate it. As youney. Now, guys appreciate it. As you get older, you really appreciate it. I've had a chance to do a couple stories on guys. I've talked to Richard Seymour, and he was like, he's the best thing that ever happened to me. And I talked to Byron Young, who was arguably defensive rookie of the year in the NFL this past year. And Byron Young said, for the first two weeks of spring practice,

I went back to the dorm every day questioning whether or not I could play at the SEC because I couldn't even get in a stance to make Rodney Garner happy. But you stay the course, you work through it, and you see where the end result is. And for Byron Young, it's a position to make a lot of money in the National Football League, and he's not the only one. There's a lot of guys that are a result of Rodney Garner because of his tough love and hard coaching. So let's take a look at this schedule. And the depth on the defensive line can be pretty critical as far as that goes.

Where it gets meaty, we mentioned that game at Oklahoma. Now they get a week off after that. Then comes a stretch of at Arkansas, Florida, Alabama. Now, at Arkansas on its face doesn't look like it'd be that bad. We don't know if Arkansas is gonna be good or not. There's a chance Arkansas could could bounce back. The Florida game is really interesting. But it's in Knoxville. Whatever juju Tennessee has in Gainesville, I don't know.

I don't understand it. I don't know why they can't seem to win there, but it feels like they've broken that curse in Knoxville. So they got that. Then comes Alabama, which Tennessee won the last time Alabama came to Knoxville. This time, no Nick Saban. Like, how different does that feel? Oh, it's going to be totally different because everybody

playing Alabama is going to go into that game with a different level of confidence. And that's, that's not to say Kalen DeBoer can't coach and they can't, they can't do things, but you know, the, the, the, the, the juju of Alabama, the mojo, the fact that Nick Saban would will you to a win or the opposing fan bases would say, Nick Saban, we get help from the officials to help you get to the win or whatever the case may be, is not there. So the feeling is that Alabama is gettable. How gettable are they, Andy? I mean, we'll see, right? I mean, it's way too early to say what they're going to be, what they are not going to be. They're going to be different than they've been in the past.

But how good they are, how good they're not, we'll see. I mean, for Tennessee, when you look at that stretch, to me, it starts with that Florida game. Okay? Everybody, you know, a lot of people are going to pencil that in as a Tennessee win. Tennessee's got to go win it. Okay? Yeah, you can't just assume that. That's a dangerous assumption.

I've seen way too much voodoo doll or something going on with that series. That makes no sense. Knoxville are in Gainesville. Tennessee's got to go win that football game. Now, the question is going to be where is Nico and where has this offense grown over the course of the first four or five weeks of the season. We talked about the test at NC State.

You go to Oklahoma. How do you handle that road environment? Two young quarterbacks in that game. That game's got a chance to have a bunch of mistakes in it and a bunch of plays. That game could be wild as could be. Then you've got to get yourself right, win or lose, to take on Arkansas at Arkansas, where we don't know what they're going to be but the question is when you get to that Florida game is how set are you how

much is your identity cast do you know exactly who you are are you still trying to figure yourself out you better hope you know who you are and if you do that then you like where you're at Florida that's going to be a game that they I mean mean, look at the close to Florida season, right? That's when they got to win on the road. That's a real challenge. That'll be a desperation type game, I think, early on for Florida. So an intriguing matchup, but you mentioned that middle gauntlet is stout. Tennessee's used to playing the middle gauntlet games.

So we'll see. It's what makes it fun. I mean, this is a group that has a chance to grow. Josh Heupel's teams have gotten better throughout the year for the most part since he's been here. Can this team do that? The other thing we have to figure out is what does it mean in relation to the new college football, the new format, the new postseason. So FanDuel has Tennessee at eight and a half wins. It's interesting because that's not the will they or won't they make the playoff question, which is what they're asking about Missouri, Ole Miss, LSU, and Alabama. All of

them are at nine and a half. This isn't a will they make the playoff over. I think nine is a pretty, it's not a safe bet, but I feel pretty good about that. My question is, can Tennessee win 10? Because I think if you win 10, you can make the playoff. And I think if they are six and one after the first seven, they're going to make the playoff. Yeah, I mean, you know, certainly you can make that case, you know, without a doubt. And again, I mean, I think that's the fun part of it is Tennessee's in a conversation.

They haven't been in the conversation, you know, very much the last decade and a half. There's a relevancy factor there that hasn't been there. Listen, you can pick, you get every beat writer on here for every team that's projected as a playoff team with the exception of maybe Georgia. And of course, Michigan's got questions with a new coaching staff, but you look at talent. There's a, there's a few teams you go, okay, that's playoff. They're a playoff team. They should be a playoff team. There's a lot of people with a lot of holes. Now, the transfer portal makes those holes very fillable, very fast in a lot of ways. If you hit, that's why you look at this thing for Tennessee. Jerron McCoy

at corner is really important for Tennessee. You look at Jacoby Thomas, who's a transfer from MTSU. He's got a hit because you're replacing two safeties in the back end who had a ton of experience. And I mentioned it earlier. There's no more important position on the football field for Josh Heupel's offense outside of quarterback than the tight end spot. They play with a tight end almost exclusively on offense. They don't go four and five wide, even though there's depth at receiver. They want that tight end in there because they can manipulate so much in the run game with the ability to flex a tight end out, move him back in, make him an inline blocker, an H-back, do a bunch of different things with those guys at tight end.

Can Holden Stays handle that? Ethan Davis, can he handle that? Can he be physical enough? Where are they at that tight end position? They only really have two tight ends on the roster. Cole Harrison will be a third who arrives this summer, but I'm not sure that as a high school senior graduating in May, how much he's going to be able to help them this fall. If there's one position they can ill afford an injury outside of quarterback, it's the tight end position. That position they must hit with stays and they must stay healthy there for

this offense to achieve what fans expect them to achieve with Nico, the balance in the run game, and what we saw two years ago that everybody wants to try to get back to. Well, and they also may not have to score as many if that D line is as good as we think it's going to be. That's the other piece of this. It is. And the one step that they have to make defensively, Andy, is taking that defensive line and using its strength to their advantage with pass rush and things. They've got to get off the field on third and long. They were not very good on third and long a year ago.

They did a great job getting teams into third and long. But in SEC play, particularly in losses, they had a horrible time getting off the field on third down. You look at that loss early in the year last year and in Gainesville, a couple of critical third and longs in that first half where Tennessee failed to get a stop and get off the field changed really the demeanor of that game. Tennessee's got to be a better defense on third and long, whether that means they blitz more, whether they play coverage better, they've got to be much better defense on third and long, whether that means they blitz more, whether they play coverage better, they've got to be much better there.

They really struggled after Kamal hadn't got hurt. They've got to play third and long better, Andy, if they're going to get to where you're talking about, nine and a half, potentially 10 wins. Well, we will find out if they can do it and probably find out pretty early. I didn't see state game probably going to tell us a lot. So yes, it's every time we do one of these, I get more excited because of these, these early season games that are going to

really kind of feed, feed us some information. Brent, I can't wait. Hopefully I might be a little birdie said I might be visiting Knoxville soon. So I'll see you there. We'll see you soon. All right, buddy. That is great. Brent Hubbs of Ball Quest. And yeah, as you can tell, I'm pretty high on Tennessee this year. I do think that the offense will look different. It will be a little more diverse.

You're going to see them attacking the middle of the field more. You're probably going to see a little bit different run game because it'll probably be attached more to an RPO-type game. This is going to be an interesting year in Knoxville. And also, the depth on the defensive line is a big deal. You know, this is something that Tennessee has not had, you know, a stacked D line room. I mean, okay, we can go back to John Henderson, Albert Hainsworth, but that is, that's over 20 years ago. If you want

to feel real old to think about that, they have had good pass rushers since then Derek Barnett, for example, but I don't know that they've had this completed D line in a long time. And so I think that part of it too, is something that you can't underestimate, especially in the sec, especially when you've got a lot of unknowns around the league at quarterback. You don't know how things are going to look. So we'll see what Nico does. It's a lot of pressure on him, but there's been a lot of pressure on him since he committed. So I don't know that that has really changed much over the last two years, even as he has ascended to the starting role. Speaking of pressure, there's a lot of pressure on Matt Rule as Nebraska's coach,

because you've got the hopes and dreams of an entire state. You've got a program that you're supposed to resurrect that hasn't made a bowl game since 2017. You've got so many things that you have to do to do the job correctly. And really nobody's been able to do the job correctly for over 10 years. I think we could argue that Bo Pelini probably did it correctly last. But Bo Pelini was not the politician that Matt Rule is. And I saw Monday an example of what Matt Rule, the politician, can do. Now, Matt Rule, the football coach, has got to catch up to Matt Rule, the politician. He's got to win some games.

But the way Matt Rule responded to Trev Alberts, the athletic director, leaving for Texas A&M, was very interesting. And it shows you that if Matt Rule can get this thing going on the field, he could be a potentially beloved figure in Nebraska for a long time because he's got the instincts to handle the political side of the job. We now need to see if he can handle the football side of it. We talked to Sean Callahan from Husker Online about where Nebraska is right now as their AD leaves, as they search for a new AD, as they continue to search for a new president. And what that means for a football program is a completely beloved institution that everybody in the state cheers for, that everybody in the state rallies behind, that everybody in the state wants to see be good again. Here's Sean.

We welcome Sean Callahan of Husker Online. And Sean, you have a very busy time in Lincoln, Nebraska. You've got men's and women's basketball in the NCAA tournament. There's an AD search going on and spring practice is about to start. And the reason I wanted to have you on today is Matt Rule talked, and this is the first time we've heard from Matt Rule since Trev Alberts, the AD, left for Texas A&M, since both basketball tournament selection committees matched Nebraska and Texas A&M in the first round. It's been a wild week for you guys. Yeah, I mean, honestly, I've seen a lot of weeks covering nebraska that are up there

but this is up there i mean and i go back 20 over 20 plus years to when steve peterson out of nowhere fired frank solich years ago and uh but this week during the heart of spring break when the campus was empty the coaches were all gone to have your athletic director who signed essentially a lifetime deal with Nebraska that guaranteed he would be the highest paid AD or one of the highest paid ADs in college football at all times. It was an eight-year fully guaranteed contract for Trev Alberts. You're like, okay, well, Trev's not going anywhere for a long time. To have that deal blow up in a matter of months after a lot of other things that happened behind the scenes where they

restructured the leadership where he was reporting to the president which was ted carter that he left ohio state we did a lot of things to kind of appease and you know make trev alberts happy stadium project that he's trying to lead right now that still hasn't been officially you know finalized um so to have this all blow up and then Matt Rule, I mean, Matt Rule came here for really two people, Ted Carter and Trev Outwards, and now they're both at Ohio State and Texas A&M. So it was an interesting day to have Matt Rule on Monday kind of be the first true person from the university to field live questions, to speak almost as the leader of the university that, you know, what's going to be next and

and how they get through this well and that's the thing i thought he came out delivered the perfect political message like matt rules got to win the football games but he's got the politics part of being the nebraska coach down because it is a very political job i mean let's be honest that tom osborne the best who ever did it what did he do afterward he became a politician so it feels like matt rule definitely has that that capability and you know let's i'll play a clip from from rule that you you were in the room for and i was it was interesting because he he said a lot of things he said you know my son's starting at nebraska my wife is starting

a business here it was a lot of hey i realized trev alberts left i realized you probably are thinking what about the guy who trev hired the guy who ted carter, and now they're both gone. It seemed like he was very, very critically wanted to make sure everybody knew he was, he was still here. Well, it is a tough time losing someone of Trev's caliber. All I'll say is, you know, I believe he put 15 years in here in athletic administration and from everything I see in our athletic department, this is a well-run athletic department. And this is a good place. And I know he's allowed me to do the things I think are necessary.

So he's left a place better than he's found it. And so I think it's an unbelievable, unbelievable opportunity for us to move forward. And the one thing Trev would always say to me is, and I think he took this really seriously as the Husker that he is, he said to me, no, I'm only standing in this position as the athletic director at Nebraska. You're only standing in the position you're in because of the decisions that coaches like Tom Osborne and administrators made 20 years ago to put us in this position where we're financially stable, we're secure, we have elite facilities, we have tremendous commitment. And the onus on Trev, and now the next AD, the onus on me and the coaches and leadership here is to make sure that 20 years from now we look back and we say,

you know what, the people that guarded this place during this time were tremendous stewards of the university. And I think that's really, really important. You know, we can't take a step backwards. We have to take a step forwards. And the thing that I'll say is we have to be unabashed in our desire to be the best. Like we cannot worry about optics. We cannot worry about what people say. The way you win in college athletics today is you invest. I love that. I mean, this is pure politician, like like never waste a crisis like turn it into a fundraising opportunity that's what Matt Rule did well and honestly you know Trevor Alvarez is only here two and a half years as the AD of Nebraska so yeah Bill Moose was here a lot longer and Bill Moose hired a football basketball baseball coach and got a football facility built in that time

I mean Trevor Alvarez's main things where he hired Matt Rule and he's trying to lead this process to get the stadium project done, which is $450 million, but actually probably ending up being more than that when it's all said and done. But you're right. Nebraska is going to be here a lot longer than Matt Rule. It's going to be a lot longer than Trev Alvarez. So they've got to just move forward as a university, and they've got a lot of great things. I mean, they just moved into the new weight room this week in that new $150 million football facility that was built. It took a little bit longer to finish because of the COVID and some of the other things that kind of slowed it down.

But they've got a lot of great things going here, and Matt Ruhle understands that. And honestly, he's in a great position now to almost kind of have a big voice in picking his next boss because matt rule is going to be a key part of this he's going to at least have an opinion and you know matt rule well enough to know andy that he'll have a strong opinion on kind of like the right kind of guy that needs to be the next boss at the university of nebraska yeah and i think there's some people he likes that he's worked with before now like he mentioned pat craft in the in the press conference pat craft was his ad at temple he's now the ad at penn state i don't know that nebraska will hire penn state's ad away but

last week i didn't know that texas a&m could hire nebraska's ad away so who who knows with this but but you're right it does it definitely feels like Matt Rule is kind of taking ownership here and filling a void. Matt Rule got asked about why Trevor Albert's left. And he said, oh, I don't know. And then he said he was very forthcoming. I think Matt Rule knows why Trevor Albert's left. And I'm curious from your perspective, because I know what I've heard and that a lot of it had to do with the fact that Ted Carter, the president, who's now the president of Ohio State, call sign slap shot, former Navy pilot, he leaves. And then the Board

of Regents, which is a popularly elected group, which is, that's not normal compared to most states. Most states, the governor appoints those people so they're usually more more aligned uh but seven months in they don't have anybody you saw the governor criticize that the other day how much of that was a reason for trev alberts leaving this job yeah in the board of regents you're, they're elected officials in Nebraska. There's eight of them, and essentially half of them are Omaha Lincoln, and the other half are from other parts of the state, and just like Nebraska, there's a lot of differing political opinions and things everywhere else, and I think for this group of eight people to align on this president hire, and that's really what they're trying to do.

The Board of Regents needs to make the next president hire. They're deadlocked four to four, and this was reported by Henry Cordes of the Omaha World-Herald. There's two candidates that they want, Jeff Gold, the current chancellor of the Nebraska Medical Center, and then they're looking at another candidate who's from the Nebraska Chamber of the Nebraska Medical Center. And then they're looking at another candidate who's from the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce. So they have two candidates in mind. Mike Flood, who's a congressman, you know, has been approached. Brian Sloan is the other candidate, by the way,

that they were deadlocked on. You know, you hear men, I mean, the ultimate perfect candidate would have been Ben Sasse, the president of Ural, modern Andy Ford. New University of Florida president. He still owns a house in Nebraska. He's from Nebraska. He loves Nebraska.

He's a Husker at heart. And that would have been like the home run guy that just the timing probably just didn't work out. But, yeah, that's what they've got to figure out. This Board of Regents has to align on this next move. and they could not decide between Sloan and Gold, where they were deadlocked at four. And that indecisiveness, I think, played a factor in Trev Alberts leaving. And obviously, you saw Governor Jim Pillen, who is a former Husker football player himself. Also, he's kind of like a version of John Dutton from Yellowstone. He's a,

he's a hog farmer, you know, like just kind of a tough guy. Yeah. And he's not afraid to, to, to make his opinions known and on anything. And, um, the governor is heavily involved in this as well. So, and the governor is a former board of Regent, um, leader as well before he became the governor. So he understands all how all this process works too. And it's got to be frustrating for people at Nebraska. And this is something I think that's unique to college sports. It's maybe different for other businesses because in other businesses, people leave for jobs for varying reasons. And if this is why Trev alberts left for this job it makes sense but because trev alberts is a husker because he left when he did it creates this sort of existential dilemma whereas if it were a normal

business nobody would even blink they'd be like oh i get why he left but now you know it feels like you you've got to have matt rule and other people kind of stepping in and saying, look, this is a great job. This is great. And I do imagine like there's probably 80s that would crawl across broken glass to be Nebraska's 80. Yeah, I think the other thing was that stadium project. And if there wasn't somebody hired as the president that was fully aligned and on board of his vision of he essentially wanted to create a Wrigleyville around Memorial Stadium with entertainment districts and hotels and redo

the stadium and do a lot of things that have never been done before. It would have been the largest project ever done in the city of Lincoln and at the University of Nebraska by a wide margin. If you don't have a president that's fully on board or the regents who fully support some of the things being done

and there's pushback on your ultimate vision, that too would be hard after as far as they've gone with this project. So that's the other elephant in the room. You know, what will happen with this project? What will a new president think? Are they going to scale any of it back? We just saw that Ole Miss recently. Yeah, I was going to ask you that as tabled and i asked trev alberts that we actually interviewed trev andy on wednesday the week before he left the wednesday before the

wednesday um and you know he i he didn't want to speak on that old miss situation but he was confident that he thought by the end of the summer they would be in front of the border regents to move this forward and the plan was they're gonna have a bulldozer in there after the Iowa game. I guess that would have been the game before the Iowa game, which is Wisconsin. They could essentially start building this two-year project of Memorial Stadium, but they're not near that point as we know right now. Well, but the thing is with the difference between Nebraska and Ole Miss, and this is where probably Nebraska and Texas A&M are more similar. I don't think you have to choose one or the other at a place like Nebraska where it's, do you have people donate to NIL or

do you have people do this stadium project? And as you mentioned, this is not your typical stadium project. There's some, you know, some public stuff around it. There's, you know, there's other income revenue streams that could potentially come from something like this. It's sort of a, you know, reinvigorating that area. Although I was going to say, when you think about where it is, it's a pretty nice area already. And you've got a pretty nice downtown right there too. But it makes sense why they were in Florida state recently did something like this, where they have a, an area near the stadium that they they've with the, with the help of the athletic department kind of reinvigorated.

And that makes more sense, I think, than just dumping money into the stadium where you could be sending it to NIL. But the thing is at Nebraska, I think the passions there that people probably going to give no matter what. Jim Collison, Right. And the NIL here, they're very lucky. I mean, the largest boosters of the program, the Pede family, run the pro, run the NIL. And they, they have backstopped this to the point where they've been able to get through some rough waters with the coaching changes in the 80 situations um you know but the peds have made it where if they're short they're there to help support and make sure whatever needs to be done from an nil perspective is done and you know that that's helped through this but eventually yeah i think the vision is nil will be brought more in-house where the university and Matt Rule talked about this day that they

might have 20 million dollars a year from their own money going towards annual NIL where the collective would still have a role but you know the university is going to be able to help more because of these absorbent TV money payouts that these schools are receiving right now. Yeah and here's here's Matt Rule on that and he actually talked about Trev Alberts kind of telling everybody beforehand and why that's important for whoever comes next. Trev had, make no mistake, Trev spent the last year trying to tell everybody, hey guys, revenue sharing is coming. Like we have to have a plan for revenue sharing when $20 million is probably going to be going to the athletes at some point here. And, you know, I don't know if anyone really listened. I don't know if I really listened. And all of a sudden now those lawsuits are starting to come to fruition and it's like, oh, what, Trev was right. And so we're going to have to,

we're going to have to do, you know, think of things differently. And so as he now leaves and as he transitions, that's what has to happen here. We have to have to do, you know, think of things differently. And so as he now leaves and as he transitions, that's what has to happen here. We have to have amazing leadership that is saying to themselves, Hey, what's the next 20 years going to be like, and how do we make sure that the university of Nebraska athletics is relevant in all of that? I love that. I said, don't mess this up. And I have a list. If you guys want to come to me, I got some folks I know.

Oh, there's no doubt. Matt rule is want to come to me. I got some folks I know. Oh, there's no doubt Matt Rule is going to have a big – I mean, there is really no true captain of the ship at Nebraska right now. He is the captain of the ship. Like, he is taking the wheel. He's the leader. He's the highest-paid guy. And look, you know, when football wins, all boats rise. And he has made a lot of gains this offseason,

keeping Tony White in place after Tony White had multiple opportunities for head coach jobs and other things, getting Dylan Raiola, getting a really good group of transfer players in here, and getting most of the key guys to return for that extra fifth or sixth year of school. So they've got a team and they've got a schedule, Andy, where their first seven games, you could arguably make a case they could be favored in their first seven games. It's not out of the question when you look at those first seven games

through Indiana that Nebraska could theoretically be favored in all those games. Exactly. And Matt Rule is working on some best practices stuff, and he talked about that too. And it was interesting to hear who he called last week. We need to return to the days where everybody across the country

is coming to the University of Nebraska to see how things are being done. I called Kirby Smart last week and asked him if I could come down and visit Georgia. We sent our performance nutrition people down to see Florida and Alabama. I want people coming here. You know, when Julie was the head dietitian at Temple

and she was putting together a training table, she studied Nebraska. And so that to me is the place that we're at. Julie is Matt Rule's wife and is talking about that Nebraska was considered the best. And Nebraska was always considered the cutting edge in terms of performance. They invented strength training for football at Nebraska. Well, there's three things that they're known for and it was all Tom Osborne. They created an academic support program where

they actually had counselors and people working with the student athletes and the resources for athletes academically, but the strength and conditioning, yeah, they were the first football team anywhere to do that, where, you know, back in the day, the original powerhouse programs like Michigan and Ohio State, they were coming to Nebraska to study what Boyd Epley was doing in the weight room, then the training table, they were the first school to have a nutrition program for student athletes where they were, you know, fed the steaks and the healthy foods before anyone is even thinking those things. And that was the genius of Tom Osborne in that era. He was always one step ahead of those things and helped build Nebraska. Um, and you know, he was, you could argue has moved to the

big 10. He was several steps ahead by getting Nebraska to leave the Big 12 to go to the Big Ten because if they're not in this position right now, who knows where Nebraska is if they're not a Big Ten member. So Osborne is huge in a lot of these key things that have happened over the years. Yeah, and now Matt Rule trying to fill that role. Now, the only way he can do that is win games. But like you said, the schedule fits the defense is going to be good you mentioned Tony White's back we haven't talked about Nash Hutmacher

Nash Hutmacher yet but I I believe the polar bear will be uh heavily featured this offseason and then of course Dominic Raiola as well yeah Yeah, Nash Huttmacher qualified Andy for the national tournament in NCAA wrestling, his first year wrestling. He didn't join the team until December, and he made the nationals as a Big Ten qualifier. So unbelievable story with him having to take his weight from about 330 down to 285 to wrestle, and he was able to do that. And I'm sure he'll be back over 300 the minute wrestling's over

but just an unbelievable athlete leader of this team all across the board so that that's been a great story and a fun story to follow but they've got a great defensive unit the receivers they added to they added two difference making guys from the portal that are going to go a long way jamal banks from wake forest and Isaiah Nayor from Wyoming and Texas. I think those two guys are going to be big additions. Yeah, and that's the thing. That is the question, is what will the offense look like? Do you think, because Rule talked about the two freshmen

obviously being kind of very eager to learn. We have not seen them in a practice yet. But Heinrich Harburg is there, who was the starter at the end of last season. How do you think that competition is going to go through the spring? Yeah, Heinrich Harburg won five games last year. So, I mean, he won all their games for me. I believe he started seven or eight games. And Dylan Raiola is going to have to beat him out. I mean, he's going to have to prove it in the spring.

And, you know, he's got far more arm talent and just natural abilities. But, you know, you know how that goes, Andy. You've still got to be able to prove it. And this will be a big spring. And don't sleep on Daniel Kalin either. He was an Elite 11 quarterback they brought in. They have two Elite 11 freshman quarterbacks, Dylan Raiola, Daniel Kalin, and then last year started returning in Heinrich Harburg.

So it's a really good group. Not very deep, though, with just three people, and they may or may not go to the portal post-spring, but that's a tough sell. How do you convince somebody and basically tell them you've got to be good enough, but not quite good enough?

And the pool of available players, you're eventually trying to find a Tristan Jebby at Ohio State this past year. By the way, Tristan Jebby began his career at Nebraska. Casey Thompson. Yes. Oklahoma. A billion years ago.

Casey Thompson went back to Oklahoma. You know, so that's the kind of guy maybe they could add late. But, again, that's a tough deal to like even find the right quarterback. So that's a big storyline. Will they have enough depth at quarterback this year? Yeah, well, in the Kyle McCord situation, because he was looking at Nebraska at the same time Raiola was considering flipping from Georgia to Nebraska.

And it seems like the idea of McCord being a bridge year guy was a non-starter. And so McCord winds up at Syracuse. And now you've got maybe one of the freshmen starting in Nebraska. So we'll find out. Yeah, because Raiola, if he wanted that, he could have stayed at Georgia. And he could have waited his one year. Yeah, Carson Beck's going to be the starter for another year, yeah. And I think the opportunity to be the starter in year one was a major factor to get Raiola.

If he wanted to be a bridge guy, he could have stayed with Georgia. But he's going to get the NIL opportunity he wants here and be the potential starter in year one, which obviously at Georgia, that wasn't going to happen. Yeah. He's got a coach who might be the governor of the state before all this is over. So this is a... He is pretty much the governor. Him and the governor of the state before all this is over. So this is,

uh, he is pretty much the governor, him and the governor. How many football coaches, Annie, you talked to a lot, literally have day-to-day dialogue with the governor. Not many, not that there was a time when Arkansas, when their governor was a massive Arkansas state booster. And, and so he was heavily involved, but but it is it has been a long time since there's been that level of of communication well he's a former host I mean he played exactly like he I mean he had a key fumble recovery in a game to beat Oklahoma back in back in the 70s so he was a good player for Nebraska too I mean yeah and it means a lot i mean football here means so much i don't think people on the outside get it until you come and see it here but this the level of attention number of media members the way it's covered it's it's really unlike a lot of other

places in in the country yeah and and matt rule sort of grabbing the theon here, I think is smart. I think, again, it's all political, but that's part of the job. That is part of the job when you're head football coach in Nebraska. So now he's got to add the wins to it. But I think if he does, let's say he wins seven games this year, eight games this year. That is combined what he's doing now with that and that's a pretty good foundation for yourself to be there a long time if that's what you want right no doubt i mean it's

all set up and that schedule was a gift i mean i'm not saying they're gonna win all seven but they could easily win all seven to start the year. Michigan's going, how come we didn't get that schedule? Michigan had that schedule the last two years pretty much. That's true, pretty much. Michigan didn't play Colorado, though. Yeah, well, the Deion thing will be interesting because they'll be coming off playing North Dakota State, and all eyes will be on that game just as it was last year.

But if Nebraska doesn't turn it over a bunch of times at the end of the first half, I think we're talking about a little bit different situation. In Texas, Michigan is that same day, so you have to think that's the big noon game on Fox, which people around here are happy about because they want Colorado in here at 2.30 or even better nbc night

game they i mean they want a hornet's nest for deon sanders that day i would say night game i will say i've been to a september game at 2 30 in the afternoon in lincoln it's hot everybody thinks nebraska's called it is hot there in september you got mosquitoes still. You got humidity. September can be hot. October is warm here. I mean, we haven't had a lot of cold months in November. I mean, like Frost's first year was the coldest November in 25 years where we had some really bad games. But generally, you're going to see 50s and even 60s in November now.

Yeah. I'm very excited for all of this, but just watching Matt Rule sort of take that role on, voluntarily, by the way, and I think it bodes well for him as long as he puts it all together on the field. Yeah, it's going to be an interesting spring. They start practice on Sunday, April 27th spring game,

a very late spring here for Nebraska, which I think they like that. They like to get a full winter in, go on spring break. They have a week this week of other post-winter conditioning games and activities they're doing. Then they'll go right into spring ball. Then the players will get a full month off. So it's a great schedule for a coach to kind of build a team. Well, we're going to see what kind of team he has built.

Sean Callahan. Thank you so much. And, uh, you got some basketball to cover now. Yeah. I'm not going to Memphis. Um, our guys are often simple and Robin are going to be in Memphis and should be a good week. A lot of red will be on Beale street.

Oh, well get some ribs, the dry rub. Phenomenal. Go to the Bass Pro Shops pyramid. There's lots of fun to be had. And, uh, and hopefully the,

the Trev Alberts new team as the opponent isn't, isn't too triggering. So Sean, thank you so much. Hey, thanks Andy. That's Sean Callahan, Husker Online. There's a lot to chew on with Nebraska,

but I think if Matt Rule can duplicate on the field what he's doing as a politician, there's a chance he could be very successful at Nebraska and, and I mean, grand scheme successful, but again, that has to be done on the field as well as at the mic. So he's got the, at the mic part down. Now you've got to get the on the field part, right? But remember correctly, Nebraska was five and three going into those last four games. They lost four games by a combined 16 points. They are not that far away. And I think that is Sean Callahan's point when you look at that schedule. Again, I get so excited thinking about this stuff.

But you know what else is exciting? We've got games tonight in the NCAA tournament. Wagner and Howard, 16 versus 16. Howard, three and a half point favorite. I'm going to go with the Bison in this one. Going to go with the Bison in this one. Then you've got Colorado State, Virginia. This is not your typical Tony Bennett, Virginia team.

They do play that excellent pack line defense. Offensively, they are not what they have been. I know what you're thinking. Tony Bennett, Virginia teams always look bad offensively, but the difference is this one's not very efficient. Like the one that won the national championship was number two in offensive efficiency. Even if they didn't care, if they scored a bunch of points, they could score points when they needed to. And they just liked milking the shot clock.

This group not great at scoring in general. And that is why I will take the Rams to cover this spread and move into the bracket proper. Guys, it's the best week of the sports year. Let's go. We'll talk to you tomorrow.