After throttling Central Michigan at home, the No. 21 Michigan football team travels to Lincoln to begin Big Ten play. The matchup promises physical defense, talented quarterback play and, for both teams, presents an opportunity to truly establish themselves in this season’s playoff picture. With the Wolverines’ early loss to Oklahoma and Nebraska’s struggles in seasons prior, the stakes and implications of this game are significant.
To preview the contest, The Michigan Daily spoke with DailyNebraskan Sports Editor Alex Berry.
The conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.
Expectations were high for then-freshman quarterback Dylan Raiola last year. What part of his game have you seen improve the most this season?
The biggest thing is just his patience while he’s in the pocket. He hasn’t had any interceptions this year. Now, granted, we’ve had two not-very-good opponents, but he’s not really forcing any throws, which you’d see a little bit last year. His eyes don’t really light up as much when he sees a guy 30-yards down field. When he knows that he’s double covered, he’ll check it down to the guy who’s open, and then he’ll have him pick up the yards.
You gotta give the offensive line some props, because he’s getting a lot more time. You see his head moving everywhere, going through all of his reads, and you see him checking it down to his fourth read sometimes, which I didn’t see much at all last year.
The coaches have said in press conferences that he’s playing quarterback. He’s not doing too much. He’s not trying to take over the game. He’s just playing quarterback.
Apart from Raiola, give me some playmakers on the offense that can test Michigan’s defense?
I definitely think running back Emmett Johnson. He takes all the carries. If it weren’t for these past two games — he has 52 carries on the season right now — I wouldn’t be surprised if he had 70 carries if we played legit opponents. He’s definitely the RB1. He has four touchdowns, averages 6.3 yards per rush and he’s a guy who’s just really shifty. He likes to cut across field a lot. He makes a lot of cut moves, and he just picks up extra yards.
Behind him would be running back Kwinten Ives, who’s kind of the opposite. He’s not the fastest guy, but what we saw from him a lot more last week, he let the play develop a lot. He would wait for the gap to open up.
Then receivers, there are three main guys in Dane Key, Jacory Barney Jr. and then Nyziah Hunter. Dane Key has scored a touchdown every game so far this season. He leads his team in yards with 190. Honestly, not too much about the tight ends. Luke Lindenmeyer, he’s a big guy. He’s more of a blocking tight end, he can move some guys if needed.
Last week, Bryce Underwood showed what he can do with his legs, rushing for 2 touchdowns and 100-plus yards. What do you expect Nebraska’s game plan to be against him?
You’ve got to have a quarterback spy. Our defensive line is very young. We lost all three starters last year in Nash Hutmacher, Ty Robinson and Jimari Butler, so it’s a revamped room with a lot of underclassmen. I mean, I’m no coach, but if I were them, I would probably put one of our jack linebackers, Dasan McCullough, as a quarterback spy for Underwood because he’s going to take off. That’s going to be the Huskers’ biggest problem on Saturday, because the pass defense has been great, but the run has been the biggest issue.
Big Ten games like these are frequently won in the trenches. What’s the current state of Nebraska’s offensive and defensive lines?
The offensive line returns a lot of guys from last year. We picked up Rocco Spindler from Notre Dame, and then we kept the other four, and they’ve done their job. I go back to Cincinnati because that’s probably been the toughest game, and they still looked phenomenal.
As far as the defensive line, there’s a lot of youth there, a lot of guys that still need experience. However, a lot of guys have gotten in the past few weeks, notably Williams Nwaneri. He transferred from Missouri, he’s a redshirt freshman, former five star. I don’t know how much he’ll do this week, but he’s a guy to definitely look out for, as well as Cameron Lenhardt. He’s been here for a while. And then Riley Van Poppel, he’s one of the leaders in that defensive line room. He’s not really a starter, but he’ll get a lot of snaps.
Those guys are the ones to look out for. But I would definitely give the upper hand to our offensive line compared to the D-line.
A lot has been made about Nebraska’s pass defense. Who are some standouts in that room that can have an impact against Michigan?
To be honest, all of them looked solid. You look at the stats, and Nebraska hasn’t allowed 70-plus yards in any game thus far, and the longest pass has been 19 yards or something. So all of them looked solid.
I would give the three seniors the most credit in Marques Buford Jr., Malcolm Hartzog Jr. and Ceyair Wright, those guys have looked spectacular. Hartzog had the game-ending interception against Cincinnati in Week 1. So if Michigan were to target anyone, it’d be junior Idaho transfer Andrew Marshall.
How is Nebraska considering this game from a bigger, program-wide perspective and, for a game like this, what can Michigan expect the environment in Lincoln to be like?
They’ve talked about how it’s going to be the biggest test thus far. A lot of the media and fans are saying that this might be the biggest game of Matt Rhule’s time at Nebraska.
It’s gonna be popping. It sold out a long time ago, and student tickets are going for 150 bucks right now, so everyone’s going to be there. It’s gonna be loud for sure.
What’s an aspect of this matchup that the media is overlooking?
I would say special teams, in probably both a good and bad way. So the past few years, Nebraska’s punt return has been horrendous. It was just non-existent, really. We got a new special teams coordinator this year, Mike Ekeler, from Tennessee. Against Akron, Jacory Barney Jr., the punt returner, had more punt return yards that game than Nebraska did all last season. The punt return game would definitely be a big improvement and something to look out for. Also the kicker, Kyle Cunanan, he’s 100% with everything, extra points and field goals with the 52-yarder in Week 1.
But then countering that, kickoff has been terrible. There’s been a kick out of bounds in every single game so far this year.
Prediction on how the game is going to go?
It’s hard to tell, because Nebraska has looked really, really good in these past few weeks, but they haven’t really played much competition.
On the Michigan side of things, I could definitely see Bryce Underwood leading in rushing yards. He’s going to be really hard for our defense to contain, I can tell you that. As well with Justice Haynes, because our run defense has definitely not been the strength.
On the Nebraska side, I think Emmet Johnson is going to get a lot of touches. He got all but maybe two or three touches Week 1. And I could see that happening again if needed. If he doesn’t get anything going on the ground, then Raiola is going to have his work cut out for him in the passing game.
Give me 30-27, Michigan.
