A chance to do or dare

Nebraska-Penn State looks a lot different than it did in the offseason. If anything, it looks more important for the Huskers.

Courtesy Nebraska Athletics

The ideal offseason version of this Nebraska-Penn State game looked something like a surging Husker team, bouncing around the back half of the CFP rankings, traveled to Matt Rhule’s alma mater to take on a top-five Nittany Lion team that looked every bit the part of a national championship contender. It was easy to look at the schedule in August and know this was the toughest game on NU’s schedule, but if that was inevitable, what if the Huskers were good, too? A team with outside CFP hopes and nothing to lose?

The elevator pitch for this game has changed at least twice this fall. In early October, after PSU fired James Franklin, it looked like the Awkward Bowl with Rhule near the top of the list of presumed candidates for the vacancy. That sounded decidedly less fun.

Then, Nebraska extended Rhule at the end of October, practically removing him for consideration, while Penn State kept losing. No longer the Awkward Bowl, the game looked for a bit like one Nebraska “should win.” That sounded potentially more fun.

And now that we’re actually here, game week, the Huskers (7-3) will be the biggest underdog they’ve been all season to a Nittany Lion team (4-6) that has to win this week and next to have a shot at a bowl game. And that sounds like some classic, only-in-the-Big-Ten-in-November stuff.

But there’s a chance for this game to be a pivotal one in the Rhule tenure. Not because he’s returning home, but in part because the Huskers were at one point this week a double-digit underdog to a team that had its season collapse weeks ago and a program with the top priority of finding a coach better than the one who had it as a perennial top-10 team.

The Huskers’ immediate future is settled. They still have a chance for this season to be the best in nearly a decade. On paper, the two teams are much closer than the line would suggest.

So why shouldn’t Nebraska go into State College and walk out with an eighth win? There appears to be a popular answer, but it’s not so simple.