There is no Friday Five this week. Nebraska football has taken over the Friday slot instead. TGIF and all that.
Nebraska begins November under the lights in Champaign, where two 5-3 teams arrive feeling very different about how they got there.
The Huskers started 5-0 and have since lost three straight games by a combined nine points. Indiana, Oregon and Washington all came down to the fourth quarter, and Nebraska came away empty each time.
Illinois has gone the opposite direction. The Illini have won three straight, including an overtime win against Michigan State, a 21-10 victory over Oregon and last week’s 20-17 win at Maryland on a field goal as time expired.
Same overall record but completely different momentum.
Friday gives Nebraska another opportunity to change that, and at this point the challenge is becoming pretty straightforward: an excellent defense has put the Huskers in position to win three weeks in a row. The rest of the team has to help finish one.
Nebraska at Illinois
When: Friday, Nov. 6 | 7 p.m. CT
Where: Memorial Stadium | Champaign, Illinois
TV: FOX
TV crew: Jack Kizer, Mark Helfrich
Radio: Huskers Radio Network
Radio crew: Kyle Crooks, Jeremiah Sirles, Jessica Coody
Records: Nebraska 5-3, 2-3 Big Ten; Illinois 5-3, 3-2 Big Ten
Last game: Washington def. Nebraska, 17-10; Illinois def. Maryland, 20-17
Series: Nebraska leads 14-7-1
In Champaign: Nebraska leads 5-3-1
Last meeting: Illinois def. Nebraska, 31-24 in overtime, in 2024
Weather: Clear skies Friday night with a low around 30 degrees. Winds northwest at 5-10 mph. The daytime high is expected to reach 48 with sunshine and some cloudy intervals before temperatures drop after sunset.
Setting the scene
Apparently Nebraska and Illinois only play each other on Fridays now because this is the third straight meeting between the teams on a Friday night. Nebraska won in Champaign in 2023, Illinois won in Lincoln in overtime in 2024 and the Huskers also won a Friday night game in 2017. In fact, the road team has won six of the last eight meetings in the series.
Illinois will have its own atmosphere Friday with a “Hail to the Blue Out,” while Nebraska plays its third consecutive prime-time game.
And then there’s how Nebraska got here. The Huskers’ five wins came by at least 18 points and their three losses have all come by seven or fewer. Basically, there hasn’t been much middle ground.
Nebraska has to make the offense easier on itself
Coach Matt Rhule spent a good portion of Monday talking about Nebraska’s offensive balance, or lack of it, against Washington. The Huskers threw 44 times last week. Some of that was dictated by what Washington showed defensively and some of Nebraska’s run calls included reads that ultimately put the ball in quarterback Anthony Colandrea’s hands.
Still, Rhule was clear about what he wants.
“Part of our game plan was we were going to have to win on these deep balls...but to your point I don’t want to throw the ball 44 times and run it 25 or 30, I would like to have true balance and what I would like to be able to do is run the ball well when we want to run it and throw the ball when we want to throw it and in that game I think we came out saying, ‘Hey, we wanted to throw it versus those man looks’ and we thought we would win on those routes and just didn’t win enough,” Rhule said. “It could be something as simple as a slant, and you know we are running a quarterback counter with a slant and it’s a low ball, and you know you go down to get it, and we don’t come up with a catch and then we run a slant at the goal line, it’s a three-step slant and we run a four- or five-step slant.”
Illinois presents another complicated picture.
The Illini play out of a 3-3-5 base defense and can bring pressure from different places. Nebraska knows the structure well — Rhule pointed out that the Huskers used it themselves for three years — but recognizing it and executing against it are different things.
That brings us to one of the more interesting comments Rhule made this week.
“I don’t want our guys going out there thinking too much,” he said. “I don’t want our guys out there pressing, so how do we keep it simple while also not being simplistic? That’s our challenge this week. That’s why we had the guys in here in the evening on Sunday.”
That may be the offensive question Friday because Nebraska has playmakers and Illinois knows it. That means opponents are going to adjust to Colandrea, Kwazi Gilmer and Jacory Barney Jr., and Nebraska has to be able to answer without adding so much to the plan that execution suffers.
The opportunity should be there. Illinois has struggled on third down defensively and has been especially vulnerable once teams reach the red zone. The Illini also changed defensive coordinators during the season, with Roger Cooper taking over on an interim basis.
Nebraska doesn’t need to reinvent the offense in Champaign but it does need to make the available plays.
Running the ball would help
For all the frustration over Nebraska’s offense lately, the Huskers still rank near the top of the Big Ten at 186.6 rushing yards per game. Jamal Rule is averaging 66.1 yards per game. Illinois’ Aidan Laughery is just ahead of him at 70. The difference lately has been how consistently Nebraska has been able to establish its backs when games tighten.
Colandrea can make defenders miss, extend plays and move the chains himself. Illinois defensive coordinator Roger Cooper spent part of this week listing all the ways the Husker quarterback can cause problems.
“He’s an explosive-play threat, he’s squirrely, he’s all over the place, he keeps the ball alive, he moves the sticks with his feet, he’s got rare arm talent,” Cooper said. “He’s just a special player.”
That is great for Nebraska until the offense begins depending on Colandrea to manufacture everything. Illinois is going to pressure him. Matthew Bailey is one of the better safeties Nebraska will see and corner Juice Clark has been productive getting his hands on passes.
A functional conventional run game gives Colandrea considerably more room to operate.
Illinois is balanced enough to make Nebraska stay patient
Rhule didn’t spend much time publicly breaking down Illinois early in the week. What he did say was pretty direct.
“They’re gonna run the football, RPO you, play-action you,” Rhule said.
Then later: “They’re going to run the football.”
Illinois averages better than 164 rushing yards and 230 passing yards per game, and the offense has found a useful balance during this three-game winning streak. Laughery is the leading rusher and has topped 100 yards against both Ohio State and Oregon. Freshman Javari Barnett supplied a 64-yard touchdown run last week against Maryland.
Quarterback Katin Houser returned against Maryland after missing time with a broken bone in his throwing hand. He has thrown for 1,663 yards with 13 touchdowns and five interceptions.
His most dangerous target is not difficult to identify. Collin Dixon has 60 catches for 781 yards and 10 touchdowns. He accounts for more than a third of Illinois’ receptions and has seven more touchdown catches than any other Illini receiver.
Illinois also protects its quarterback well, having allowed only eight sacks. That will test a Nebraska front that has consistently created pressure this season.
The defense has done enough to win these games
There is danger in looking at Nebraska’s three-game losing streak and concluding it’s all fallen apart. Defensively, almost nothing has. Washington finished with 267 total yards and 32 rushing yards. Nebraska has now held each of its first eight opponents to 23 points or fewer, something a Husker defense had not done to begin a season since 1996.
The Blackshirts still lead the country in third-down defense and rank among the national leaders in total defense, scoring defense, rushing defense, pass-efficiency defense and sacks.
Illinois offensive coordinator Barry Lunney certainly noticed.
“I would say without question one of the best-coached, well-disciplined defenses that I’ve seen in my time here,” Lunney said of Nebraska. “Not to mention they’re very talented. Those things combined all create a great challenge for us on Friday night.”
Donovan Jones now leads Nebraska with seven tackles for loss. Jahsear Whittington has a team-high 4.5 sacks. Archie Wilson has produced a punt of at least 60 yards in three straight games.
There is plenty working right now. The problem is that Nebraska has reached the final minutes of three straight games needing one more stop, one more drive or one fewer mistake. And every time, the other team has made it.
The late-game contrast is notable
Illinois has spent the last three weeks finding ways to win close games. Nebraska has spent the last three weeks finding out how thin the margin can be.
The Illini beat Michigan State 38-37 in overtime, held Oregon to 10 points and scored 10 fourth-quarter points at Maryland and won on a walk-off field goal. Nebraska lost 20-17 to Indiana, 17-14 at Oregon and 17-10 to Washington. That means Friday is likely to become another test of how the Huskers respond when everything tightens.
“Just steady in the boat, man. Steady in the boat,” Rhule said. “Don’t take a rocking boat and a rocking sea and rock it even more, man. You can’t control what’s outside the boat. Your focus should be on being steady in the boat, going back to work this week and understanding this game against Illinois, if we play well, we’ll come down to the end and you have to make one more play than the other team.”
At some point, Nebraska has to be the team that makes it.
We never learn, we been here before
Bret Bielema held a crisp, enjoyable, 12-minute press conference this week leading up to Nebraska’s Friday night visit. He had a lot of good things to talk about.
What the numbers say
8 — Sacks allowed by Illinois this season.
15.6 — Points allowed per game by Nebraska.
32 — Rushing yards allowed by Nebraska against Washington.
60 — Receptions by Illinois receiver Collin Dixon.
186.6 — Nebraska’s rushing yards per game.
14-7-1 — Nebraska’s all-time record against Illinois.
Odds and ends
>> Friday marks the 23rd meeting between Nebraska and Illinois and the 13th since Nebraska joined the Big Ten. The Huskers are 5-3-1 all-time in Champaign, and Nebraska has won three of its last four trips to Illinois.
>> This is Nebraska’s fifth night game of the season and third in a row.
>> Both teams are also working on a short week. Under Rhule, Nebraska is 1-5 in short-week games. Illinois is 1-4 under Bret Bielema.
>> The Illini will wear blue as part of the program’s “Hail to the Blue Out.”
So, here we are again. Over the last three weeks, Nebraska was close. Heartbreakingly so. And now, Friday can change the ending.
The defense has given Nebraska enough chances. The offense has enough talent to be better than it has looked recently. Special teams have stabilized in several areas. Now Nebraska needs to put those pieces together for four quarters.
On a Friday night in Champaign, one more play might be all that’s needed.