Huskers too strong for Kansas
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By BRIAN CHRISTOPHERSON / Lincoln Journal Star
LAWRENCE, Kan. – We’ve seen emotion from Shawn Watson after football games before. But that Apollo 13 reference was a first.
“You seen (the movie) ‘Apollo 13?’” he asked after Nebraska’s 31-17 win against Kansas on Saturday.
He was thinking of one scene in particular — where the boys from NASA are staring at a bunch of pieces on a table, trying to find an answer for their crew’s survival.
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The scene struck a chord with Watson.
“We had to put all the pieces on the table and find a way,” he said. “The staff’s been awesome. Because we thought we had something special that we were working on. And we had to get out of our comfort zone and go back and put all the pieces on the table, and hack away and find a way.”
Watson’s guys found a way Saturday.
On a day when Nebraska’s defense left Husker coach Bo Pelini “far from happy,” it was the offense that produced in the most critical moments, finishing with two touchdown drives to put Big Red atop the Big 12 North Division.
The Husker offense totaled 410 yards. Nebraska started the game with a six- play, 58-yard scoring drive. It ended the game with a 10-play, 74-yard scoring drive.
It wasn’t the greatest work of art. But progress? Yes, it was that.
“The thing we wanted to say is that we got our mojo back,” Watson said. “We’ve been nicked up, and the kids have just been resilient. They keep coming back and keep working. They’ve never questioned or doubted themselves at all. … They found a way to fight through it all, and it’s going to make us a great team of the future. The future is as fast as we let it, so I just hope we keep building on what we’ve started doing.”
Nebraska started junior Zac Lee at quarterback and he never gave way to true freshman Cody Green. Lee ran the ball better than he has at any point this season (nine rushes for 53 yards) and hit 13 of 21 passes for 196 yards.
“I thought Zac played a damn good football game,” Pelini said. “He was a leader — he gutted it up when he needed to.”
Nebraska-Kansas game highlights
At one point in the second quarter, Lee started to run the option right, only to pull back a few steps and fire a 37-yard completion to Niles Paul (who had a career-high 154 yards receiving) inside the Kansas 10-yard line. The play looked like something from the Tom Osborne era.
And that’s no wonder. The Husker athletic director has been floating occasional ideas to Watson.
That pass to Paul?
“Coach Osborne’s input,” Watson said, smiling. “It’s serious. Coach Osborne’s been awesome. He understands it. He gets it. And he never forces anything on me. All he does is say, ‘Look, here are some things that you may want to consider now that you are moving into this aspect of your game.’”
Watson’s voice cracked and he paused for a moment. He continued: “All those little twists, great stuff, he’s helped enhanced us. So Coach gets the credit for those.”
Watson said Osborne always comes to practice and watches, “but that’s because he’s a football fan. He doesn’t get involved. But he’ll come and say, ‘Have you thought about this?’ He’ll call me and come down. Usually he comes down early in the morning, cause I’m an early-in-the-morning guy and so is he, and we have a chance to talk before we go to work.”
Watson said Osborne has even offered some old video of option plays from his coaching days. Tight ends coach Ron Brown, with his knowledge of that system, has also been very important to the process, Watson said.
Osborne never imposes his ideas on coaches, said Watson, who enjoys the input.
“You can’t be so proud that your pride gets in the way of you winning as a team,” Watson said. “I’ll never do that. I love what I know, but I’m not afraid to open my box up and go outside my box so that we can win.”
Nebraska continued to use plenty of the power-I formation it used last week. But this time, Nebraska attacked downfield more. On NU’s first play from scrimmage, Lee hooked up with Paul for a 35-yard gain.
“We just saw some things that we could take advantage of in the defense, just get behind them a little bit, and really just let our receivers go ahead and make big plays, let them go ahead and get the ball over their guys,” Lee said.
Having Roy Helu didn’t hurt either. The Husker running back gashed the Jayhawks for 156 yards on 28 carries.
When he scored on a 14-yard run with 29 seconds left, the Husker sideline exploded. No one was happier than Watson.
“I couldn’t be prouder of a group I’ve ever coached, to be honest to you,” Watson said. “This group, because they’re young, because of what they’ve been through and how they’ve stayed together, and how the defense has stayed behind them, it’s just a great team that we’ve got.”
Reach Brian Christopherson at bchristopherson@journalstar.com or 473-7439.
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