Pac-12 Notes – Nebraska Week

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Pac-12 Notes – Nebraska Week

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September 8th

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Washington State and Oregon State sue Pac-12 to gain clarity on future of the conference

From the San Jose Mercury News … The presidents of Washington State and Oregon State are taking the Pac-12 to court in order to gain clarity on voting rights and control of assets as the collapse of a century-old college sports institution veers toward an internecine feud.

The only remaining members of the Pac-12 as of next summer, WSU and OSU filed a joint complaint Friday in Whitman County (Washington) Superior Court that seeks to determine the makeup of the Pac-12 board of directors following the announced departures of 10 schools, according to documents obtained by the Hotline.

The Pac-12 and commissioner George Kliavkoff are the named defendants.

Washington State’s Kirk Schulz and Oregon State’s Jayathi Murthy are not attempting to punish any of the outgoing schools or prevent them from leaving for the ACC, Big 12 and Big Ten.

Instead, they want declaratory judgment from the court regarding the makeup of the Pac-12’s board of directors, which has voting authority and control of the conference’s finances.

Additionally, the schools are seeking a temporary restraining order to prevent the 10 outgoing members from voting on vital issues until the makeup of the board is determined.

The Cougars and Beavers are considering whether to join the Mountain West or attempt to rebuild the Pac-12. Either way, their futures depend, in part, on access to potentially tens of millions of dollars in Pac-12 assets — assets that are controlled by the board of directors.

The filing comes after a tense two weeks that began when Schulz, chair of the Pac-12 board, declined Kliavkoff’s request to call a board meeting to discuss “complex issues facing the Conference,” according to the complaint.

That led Kliavkoff to schedule the meeting himself (for Sept. 13). He invited all 12 board members, including those from USC and UCLA. The Los Angeles schools had been excluded from prior Pac-12 board meetings following their June 2022 decision to join the Big Ten.

The meeting could include a board vote on the conference’s governing structure and strategy.

Washington State and Oregon State don’t believe the outgoing schools, which will be members of competing leagues starting next summer, have the right to determine the future of the conference and are concerned the Sept. 13 board meeting “may doom the Pac-12’s ability to survive past 2024,” according to the complaint.

The Pac-12 bylaws state that if a school gives notice of withdrawal prior to Aug. 1, 2024, then its “representative to the Pac-12 Board of Directors shall automatically cease to be a member of the Pac-12 Board of Directors and shall cease to have the right to vote on any matter.”

What defines a notice of withdrawal?

WSU and OSU believe the public statements by executives from the outgoing schools — and the “welcome” announcements blasted on social media by their new leagues — constitute a legal delivery of notice, thereby rendering their presidents ineligible for the Pac-12 board.

The stakes are high. Major strategic and financial issues require super-majority approval (75 percent). If the court determines the 10 outgoing schools retain board-of-directors status until their departures next summer, they could form a voting bloc that dictates terms to WSU and OSU.

The bylaws indicate that all assets be split among the 12 schools if the conference dissolves.

The temporary restraining order is designed to maintain the status quo (i.e., no votes by the board) until the court determines which schools have voting rights.

WSU and OSU have requested a hearing for Monday and hope a restraining order will be issued before the scheduled board meeting on Wednesday.

… Continue reading story here …

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September 7th

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Steve Spurrier: CU/Nebraska bigger game than Alabama/Texas

From CBS Sports … No college football game in Week 2 features more brand power than No. 3 Alabama’s prime time battle against No. 11 Texas, but No. 22 Colorado’s clash with Nebraska at noon ET — Deion Sanders’ home debut for the Buffaloes — is suddenly generating all that much more buzz after a Week 1 upset over TCU. Legendary coach Steve Spurrier, during a mid-week appearance on the Paul Finebaum Show, opined that Colorado’s home debut under “Coach Prime” will upstage the Crimson Tide and Longhorns.

“I think [CBS Sports analyst] Rick Neuheisel said it when he [asked] ‘Who would’ve ever thunk that the second week of the season, Boulder, Colorado, is going to be center of college football when they play Nebraska?” Spurrier remarked. “I know a lot of people think Alabama and Texas is big, but to me I think Colorado and Nebraska is the biggest game in the nation this week.”

While Sanders’ coaching style, including his unconventional approach to building a roster, have been critiqued by many, Spurrier had nothing but praise for Sanders given the team’s early results.

“A team that was nowhere, and now all of a sudden they’re beating one of the best teams in the country,” Spurrier told Finebaum. “A lot of the media, whatever, say, ‘Well, he’s really loud, and this, that and the other.’ Well he’s a ball coach, too, and he’s got his guys prepared and he’s got a good coaching staff.”

Longtime foes in the Big Eight and later the Big 12, Colorado and Nebraska are meeting for the 72nd time when the clash Saturday at Folsom Field in Boulder, Colorado. The schools most recently played during the 2019 season, a 34-31 overtime victory at home for the Buffaloes.

… Read full story here …

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CU/TCU  a ratings and financial coup for Fox

From The Athletic … Colorado’s 45-42 upset of then-No. 17 TCU was the most-watched college football telecast this past Saturday, drawing 7.262 million viewers, Fox Sports said Wednesday. Here’s what you need to know:

• The game, which marked Deion Sanders’ FBS coaching debut, was the Buffaloes’ first road win against a top-20 opponent since 2002.
• Fox Sports made a strategic decision to go all-in on Colorado over the first two weeks — including sending its pregame “Big Noon Kickoff” show to Fort Worth, Texas — as well as investing a ton of marketing resources.
• That proved to be a winning bet: It was the second-most-watched game of the weekend behind Florida State’s win over LSU on Sunday, which drew 9.17 million on ABC.
• Colorado-TCU was Fox Sports’ most-watched Week 1 “Big Noon Saturday” game ever, up 17 percent over 2022’s average (6.23 million). It was the network’s third-most-watched Big 12 regular-season college football game ever.

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18-team Big Ten will not use divisions for scheduling 

From The Athletic … When the Big Ten grows to 18 members next summer, it will do so without bringing back football divisions.

The league will use the same Flex Protect Plus model it created for football scheduling after adding USC and UCLA and simply adjust it to incorporate new members Oregon and Washington. Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti told The Athletic that “divisions don’t really work” for multiple reasons.

“They’re very difficult to balance because they’d have to be large,” Petitti said. “And secondly, if you’re playing nine conference games and you’re breaking into divisions, you’re playing so much against your own division that you’re not really crossing over. The inability to see other teams and really connect the conference is not ideal. So, there’s a competitive aspect to it, but there’s also a practicality.

“We want our members to see each other as frequently as we can make it happen. The system that we have does that. Divisions would make that way more complicated.”

Adding four West Coast schools is already a challenging endeavor. And the Big Ten has less than a year to fully prepare for its new members to join the league, which means less than a year to nail down cross-country travel and logistics in all of its sponsored sports. The Big Ten had been working through many of those issues with the two Los Angeles schools over the past year, so it can take a lot of the same principles and planning into its preparation for Oregon and Washington, who will also join the league next summer.

The Big Ten added the two schools from the Pacific Northwest on Aug. 4, a move that was followed hours later by the Big 12 adding Arizona, Arizona State and Utah. By the end of the night, the Pac-12 was on life support. It was a stunning and history-making day in the long history of college athletics.

Just nine days earlier, Petitti had stood on the podium at Big Ten football media days and said he was not focused on further conference expansion but rather on the integration of USC and UCLA. He reiterated that the Big Ten presidents and chancellors had been clear in their direction to do just that.

Asked this week what changed between that comment and the decision to add Oregon and Washington, Petitti pointed to Colorado’s departure from the Pac-12, a move that became official the evening after his media days appearance.

“The Colorado move to the Big 12 increased some inbound conversations,” Petitti said. “We then spent time talking about that with the group of our presidents, then involved the full group of presidents and the athletic directors just to sort of pursue what a structure would look like and (to discuss) whether it was real interest from Oregon and Washington. Those conversations all took place early during the week. What obviously changed was just the circumstances around it. It created a different timeframe.”

… Continue reading story here …

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September 6th

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Nebraska also ranked (in ESPN’s Bottom Ten!)

From ESPN … With apologies to the Oldest Surfer on the Beach, the Son of a Son of a Sailor and Steve Harvey, here’s the 2023 Week 1 Bottom 10.

3. North by Northworstern (0-1)

You know when Northwestern put this 2023 schedule together, they thought, “Are you kidding? We get In-A-Rut-gers Week 1 and then Dook Week 3?” Well, they just got Sonny-at-the-toll-booth’ed in New Jersey, 24-7, while Duke did the same to Clemson, 28-7.

4. No-Braska (0-1)

Those same conversations were likely happening in Lincoln, where the Cornhuskers saw season-opening trips to Minnesota and Colorado and thought, “Hey, this isn’t bad. We nearly beat the Gophers last year, and the Buffaloes are the defending Bottom 10 champions!” Then the Cornhuskers blew a second-half lead and lost to Minnesota, just like last year, and the Buffs are led by Deion Sanders, who spent Week 1 being anointed as the greatest coach in the history of football.

5. The Palm(in the face)etto State

There are three FBS schools in the state of South Carolina — Coastal Carolina, South Carolina and Clemson — and they all lost over the weekend. There are five FCS schools in the state of South Carolina. They went 2-3, but one of those wins was by Charleston Southern over North Greenville, one of the Palmetto State’s seven Division II schools — which went 3-4 over the weekend, including in a head-to-head matchup. So your final record for the Sandlapper schools was 5-10, with two of those wins coming head-to-head, capped by Clemson’s orange crush of a loss at Duke. I immediately texted my best friend from high school, now a highly decorated high school history teacher in Lexington, South Carolina, to make sure the following tweet (or X or whatever we’re calling it) was OK. He hung up on me. He’s a South Carolina alum. #toosoon

Waiting List: Huh-Why-Yuh, LS-Who, Flori-duh, No-vada, Central Not Western or Eastern Michigan, Muddled Tennessee State, TC-Who Just Played For The Natty And Then Lost To The Bottom 10 Champs?

… Read full story here …

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September 5th

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Buffs earn half of the six Pac-12 Weekly Awards (offensive, defensive and freshman Players of the Week)

From Pac-12.com … The Pac-12 today announced its 2023 football season’s first weekly performance awards, presented by Nextiva.

• 38-of-47 (.809) for 510 yards, 4 TD, 0 INT, 200.1 QBR 
• Set 9 school records including most passing yards in game with the best completion percentage and QB rating for 40-plus passing attempts in CU history. 
• Leads the nation in passing ypg and completions per game while 9th in completion percentage so far this season. 
• Most yards in an FBS debut for a Pac-12 school all-time 
• 24-3 as a starting quarterback in college with 22 straight regular season wins. 
• His 4 touchdowns surpassed the total that Colorado had on the road in 2022, coming up with 3 in 6 games.
• First Colorado player named Pac-12 Offensive Player of the Week since RB Jarek Broussard did it twice in 2020.  First Colorado QB to earn this honor since 2016 when Sefo Liufau won it twice and Steven Montez once.

DEFENSE:  Travis Hunter, So., CB/WR, Colorado (Suwanee, Ga.)

• Had a red-zone interception, pass breakup and 3 tackles, including a touchdown-saving tackle before his interception that allowed CU to keep it a one-score game.
• Also played offense and set a CU record with 11 receptions in a starting debut.
• Tied with teammate Jimmy Horn Jr. for 2nd in FBS with 11.0 receptions per game.
• First player in at least the last 20 years nationally to have a 100-yard receiving and interception in the same game
• 1 of 4 Colorado receivers to have at least 100 receiving yards against TCU. Only the 2nd time since at least 1996 that a Pac-12 school had four players with 100+ receiving yards in the same game (USC vs UCLA, 2019).
• First Colorado player named Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Week since LB Nate Landman did it twice in 2020.  First Colorado DB to earn the honor since Tedric Thompson won it twice in 2016.

• 5 receptions, 135 yards, 3 receiving TD; 6 rush, 24 yards, 1 rush TD
• Tied for lead in the nation in scoring after the first week (24.0 ppg)
• Became the fourth true freshman in the last 27 seasons to score four touchdowns in an FBS debut and is the first in the past seven years to accomplish the feat.
• 13th in FBS with 177.0 all-purpose yards per game.
• 10th in FBS with 135.0 receiving yards per game.
• Set 3 school records, most receiving yards by a running back, most receiving touchdowns in a game and most receiving touchdowns by a running back.
• First true freshman RB to start a season opener at Colorado since 1991 (Kent Kahl).
• First Colorado player to be named Pac-12 Freshman of the Week since WR/KR Jordyn Tyson in Week 9 of last season, the only other time a Buff has won the award since it was created prior to the 2019 season.

… Read full story here …

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September 4th

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CBS Writer: Believe in the Buffs after the season

From Tom Fornelli at CBS Sports … Do I believe? Well, that depends on what you’re asking me I believe in.

Do I believe that Colorado could be a better team than I anticipated it would be in 2023? Yes, I believe that could be the case. It’s hard not to believe a little more after watching the Buffaloes take down No. 17 TCU 45-42 in Deion Sanders’ Colorado coaching debut. I also believe that TCU was overrated to start the season, as the Horned Frogs lost a lot of key players from the team that reached the College Football Playoff, as well as its offensive coordinator. The Frogs began the season ranked No. 17 more as a tip of the cap for last year’s accomplishments than expectations for 2023. That said, even if TCU is a team that could finish the year closer to 7-5 than 10-2, you’d have to be willfully ignorant not to be impressed by what you saw from Colorado on Saturday.

My expectations for the Buffaloes weren’t very high this season. It wasn’t a question of whether or not I believed in Deion Sanders or his plan for the school. It was more of a depth issue, considering Sanders brought in 87 transfers during the offseason in an unprecedented overhaul of the roster. While some of those 87 transfers were studs like Travis Hunter, I had questions about how the Buffaloes would hold up on their offensive and defensive lines.

Those concerns still exist. For all of Colorado’s offensive fireworks against TCU, the Buffaloes finished with only 55 yards rushing, averaging 1.6 yards per carry. Offensive coordinator Sean Lewis — who was not one of the transfers but was a brilliant hire for Sanders, plucking him away from his job as head coach at Kent State — and the Colorado staff did an excellent job scheming around it. You don’t have to worry about your offensive line holding up in pass protection when you get the ball out as quickly as Shedeur Sanders did against TCU.

Sanders finished his Colorado debut with a school-record 510 yards passing, but his receivers also deserve a lot of credit. While Sanders took plenty of shots downfield, Buff receivers finished with 273 yards after the catch. That’s more than any team in the country had this weekend. Dylan Edwards, the freshman lightning bolt the Buffs have at running back, finished with 135 yards receiving, and 109 came after the catch.

Another of those receivers was Travis Hunter, who, yes, I very much believe in, but I always have. Hunter played over 120 snaps in the game, catching 11 passes for 119 yards on offense and with an interception and three tackles on defense. But this is who Hunter is and who he is supposed to be. While Deion Sanders may want to push the narrative that nobody believed in Travis Hunter because he played for Sanders at Jackson State, one must remember Hunter chose to be at Jackson State. Just like Hunter could’ve chosen to play for any coach at any school in the country. He wasn’t considered the No. 1 recruit in the 2022 class and one of the highest-rated recruits of all time by accident. Saturday’s performance was simply the first chance for many in the country to see Hunter in action for the first time.

And they saw him in a lot of action, which I believe could lead to problems down the road. I don’t care how good Hunter is; I’m skeptical that he can continue to play so many snaps without a heightened risk of injury or, at the very least, wearing himself down for the latter part of the season. When you have a player as talented as he is, I can understand the desire to have him on the field as much as possible and to get the ball in his hands, but there’s a balancing act Sanders, and his coaching staff need to figure out going forward.

… Continue reading story here …

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CBS Bowl Projections: CU jumps onto the list

From CBS Sports … Florida State’s dominant victory over LSU on Sunday has caused some shuffling among the New Year’s Six bowl projections. This as the College Football Playoff projection remains unchanged as Week 1 of the 2023 season wraps up.

While the Seminoles move up to No. 5 in the projected CFP Rankings and remain slotted for the Orange Bowl, the Tigers move out of the Orange Bowl projection but remain in a New Year’s Six game after their defeat. Now, LSU is projected to face USC in the Cotton Bowl.

Penn State moves into Orange Bowl as the highest-rated team among those available from the Big Ten, SEC and Notre Dame. When the Big Ten is in the Orange Bowl, the ACC gets the Big Ten’s spot in the ReliaQuest Bowl, so the bowl projections for each of the teams in those conferences have been shuffled due to that switch.

Georgia, Michigan and Alabama all won easily against overmatched opponents to retain the top three seeds. Indiana made projected No. 4 seed Ohio State work a little harder in a 23-3 win on the road.

From the Pac-12 (in order of selection) … 

• Fiesta Bowl … Washington v. Tulane
• Cotton Bowl … USC v. LSU
• Alamo Bowl … Oregon v. Kansas State
• Las Vegas Bowl … Utah v. Iowa
• Holiday Bowl … UCLA v. Louisville
• Sun Bowl … Oregon State v. Syracuse
• Los Angeles Bowl … Colorado v. Fresno State
• Independence Bowl … Washington State v. Baylor

… Read full story here …

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ESPN: Top Ten Heisman candidates (Week One) includes three Buffs

From ESPN … Who won the Heisman this week?

Last year in this space I attempted an experiment that I rather enjoyed. Instead of tracking any sort of changing conventional wisdom regarding the Heisman Trophy, I simply awarded the Heisman every week. I ranked the top 10 players based on who performed best that week, awarding 10 points to the first-place finisher down to one point for 10th place. (Caleb Williams won this race, just as he won the actual Heisman.) It was fun enough to do it again.

Here is this week’s extremely Pac-12-heavy Heisman top 10.

1. WR/CB Travis Hunter, Colorado (11 catches for 119 yards, plus an interception and a pass breakup, against TCU)

2. QB Shedeur Sanders, Colorado (38-for-47 for 510 yards and four touchdowns against TCU)

3. QB Jordan Travis, Florida State (23-for-31 for 342 yards, four touchdowns and one interception, plus 38 rushing yards and a touchdown against LSU)

4. QB Michael Penix Jr., Washington (29-for-40 for 450 yards and five touchdowns against Boise State)

5. QB Caleb Williams, USC (a combined 36-for-49 for 597 yards and nine touchdowns, plus 40 rushing yards against San Jose State and Nevada)

6. RB Jadyn Ott, California (20 carries for 188 yards and two touchdowns, plus a 13-yard reception and glorious hurdle, against North Texas)

7. QB Dillon Gabriel, Oklahoma (19-for-22 passing for 308 yards and two touchdowns, plus a rushing touchdown, against Arkansas State)

8. QB Drew Allar, Penn State (21-for-29 for 325 yards and three touchdowns against West Virginia)

9. RB Dylan Edwards, Colorado (five catches for 135 yards and three touchdowns, plus 24 rushing yards and a touchdown, against TCU)

10. OLB Kaimon Rucker, North Carolina (8 tackles, 5.5 TFLs and 2 sacks against South Carolina)

… Continue reading story here …

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September 3rd

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Pac-12 teams undefeated in Week One

Thursday, August 31st  

• Florida at No. 14 Utah … 6:00 p.m., MT, ESPN … Utah favored by 6.5 points … Result … No. 14 Utah 24, Florida 11
• Nebraska at Minnesota … 6:00 p.m., MT, Fox … Minnesota favored by 7.0 points … Result … Minnesota 13, Nebraska 10
• Southern Utah at Arizona State … 8:00 p.m., MT … no line … Result … Arizona State 24, Southern Utah 21

Friday, September 1st 

• Stanford at Hawai’i … 9:00 p.m., MT, CBSSports … Stanford favored by 3.5 points … Result … Stanford 37, Hawai’i 24

Saturday, September 2nd

• Colorado at No. 17 TCU … 10:00 a.m., MT, Fox … TCU favored by 20.5 points … Result … Colorado 45, No. 17 TCU 42
• Portland State at No. 15 Oregon … 1:00 p.m., MT, Pac-12 Networks … no line … Result … No. 15 Oregon 81, Portland State 7
• Boise State at No. 10 Washington … 1:30 p.m., MT, ABC … Washington favored by 14.5 points … Result … No. 10 Washington 56, Boise State 19
• Cal at North Texas … 2:00 p.m., MT, ESPNU … Cal favored by 7.0 points … Result … Cal 58, North Texas 21
• Nevada at No. 6 USC … 4:30 p.m., MT, Pac-12 Networks … USC favored by 38.0 points … Result … No. 6 USC 66, Nevada 14
• Washington State at Colorado State … 5:00 p.m., CBSSports … Washington State favored by 11.0 points … Result … Washington State 50, CSU 24
• Northern Arizona at Arizona … 8:00 p.m., MT, Pac-12 Networks … no line … Result … Arizona 38, Northern Arizona 3
• Coastal Carolina at UCLA … 8:30 p.m., MT, ESPN … UCLA favored by 14.5 points … Result … UCLA 27, Coastal Carolina 13

Sunday, September 3rd 

• No. 18 Oregon State at San Jose State … 1:30 p.m., MT, CBS Sports … Oregon State is a 16.5 point favorite … Result … No. 18 Oregon State 42, San Jose State 17

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Nebraska haunted by series of one-score losses

From the Lincoln Star-Journal … Close games have not been kind to Nebraska in recent years. Since the start of the 2021 season, Nebraska has a 2-14 record in one-score games. Its loss to Minnesota on Thursday is the latest in a line of stinging defeats, but remember that 13 of those 14 losses came under Scott Frost in the previous two seasons.

Of NU’s 14 one-score losses, the Huskers trailed during the entire fourth quarter seven times. Among the other seven losses, there are five instances where Nebraska entered the fourth quarter with a lead only to lose it later on. Only twice, against Michigan State in 2021 and Georgia Southern in 2022, did Nebraska suffer the ultimate heartbreak of fighting back to take a lead prior to the eventual defeat.

Rhule indicated he takes nothing from the many one-score losses before he coached Nebraska. Instead, his team is simply 0-1 in such contests under his leadership — and it’s up to him to turn that around.

“I’m not even thinking about anything that ever happened before I got here; that has nothing to do with me,” Rhule said Thursday. “I don’t want our players to think about that. I’m thinking about what’s next.”

Passing game woes … 

With two-thirds of Nebraska’s offensive plays coming on the ground, the Huskers were both unable and unwilling to develop much rhythm in the passing game. Quarterback Jeff Sims threw for just 114 yards, with 34 of them coming on his touchdown pass to Alex Bullock. You don’t have to go back far to find the last time Nebraska had even fewer passing yards than that — the Huskers did it in back-to-back games against Michigan and Wisconsin last November.

Some of the struggles against Minnesota can be attributed to the small details escaping Nebraska. For example, a second-quarter bubble screen to running back Rahmir Johnson could’ve gone much differently with a better-placed throw from Sims.

A fast, accurate throw is needed on quick passing plays like that, which are also all about timing. Sims’ throw wasn’t a bullet, and it also required Johnson to reach to his back shoulder rather than immediately turning upfield. Those small details allowed Minnesota to close in and tackle Johnson for a 1-yard loss, rather than a 2-yard gain that could’ve been possible with a better throw.

Sims was also under pressure on many of his dropbacks. Minnesota recorded five quarterback pressures, including a third-quarter series in which all three of its sacks came off the left side of the line with pass rushers working against tackle Turner Corcoran. Alongside the interceptions, a lack of execution on the small details hurt overall.

This post, about the Nebraska game, from the 2023 Season, is filed under Article.
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