Oklahoma's victory over the Nebraska Cornhuskers demonstrated to everyone that Nebraska football's troubles extend well beyond Scott Frost.
One week after sacking Frost as head coach, the Nebraska football team appeared to be in shambles against longtime Big Eight opponent Oklahoma.
It was the culmination of a tumultuous week for Nebraska football. The week was then capped off by a humiliating 49-14 loss to the Sooners.
Recall that last Sunday, Nebraska made Scott Frost a cautionary tale in college football coaching. His sacking provided the strongest evidence yet that, no matter how pristine a job appears to be, it can still fail spectacularly. That morning, athletic director Trev Alberts dismissed Frost for $15 million, deeming Frost's departure so important that waiting until Oct. 1 and saving $7 million was not worth it.
Frost's Cornhuskers had lost the night before to Georgia Southern, a Sun Belt opponent coming off a 3-9 season. The Huskers were now 1-2 on the season and 16-31 in Frost's four years. Frost was ready to save his job less than a month ago by just making a bowl in 2022. That's something he had not done in his first four years. The school did not waste any more time after seeing that Frost's promise wasn't translating on the field.
His dismissal seemed more imminent following a season-opening defeat to Northwestern on Aug. 27. So, in the near term, the news on Sunday was not shocking. But in the long term, it is remarkable that Frost has so little (apart from buyout money) to show for his Nebraska stint.
Take note that when the Huskers signed Frost away from Central Florida following the 2017 season, he appeared to be the ideal coach hire. He had recently finished a quick turnaround for the Knights. They had gone from 0-12 the year before his arrival to 13-0 in his second year. Frost would be 43 in his first season in Lincoln, well into his peak. He understood the lay of the land as a Nebraska native and a standout quarterback for the Huskers under Tom Osborne in the mid-1990s. He couldn't have been a more appealing candidate.
Then it simply stopped clicking. Frost couldn't really get much going, even for a short period of time.
His downfall was a string of unforced blunders. Frost was routinely impolite in dealing with his own players, his coaching staff, his superiors, and the media who followed the club, as The Athletic's Mitch Sherman highlighted. Frost also had horrible luck, which he exacerbated with strategic mistakes in both game management and organizational structure. In the end, his tenure as the Huskers' head coach became a detailed study of the numerous ways a coach may go wrong.
Even when he was no longer calling the shots, Nebraska football couldn't rise. In their game against Oklahoma, for instance, Nebraska football's offense was horrific.
Against the Sooners, the Huskers were basically lucky if they would wind up getting a first down, at least following its opening drive of the game, which culminated in a score. A porous offensive line that allowed big losses hampered nearly every drive for the Huskers. QB Casey Thompson was sacked four times for 32 yards as Nebraska allowed nine tackles for a total loss of 56 yards. That's crazy since Nebraska lost 65 yards in the Huskers' previous three games combined.
Junior running back Anthony Grant and freshman running back Ajay Allen fared no better in the run game, thanks in large part to that line. The pair combined for only 85 rushing yards in the game, which when combined with Thompson's 129 throwing yards resulted in the game's lone score on the first drive.
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Thompson struggled to locate his receivers and running backs. Often, he would have little to no time to throw and almost no gaps to run through. After the offense's success in the first three games, it's troubling to see how quickly everything just fell apart against Oklahoma.
As bad as the offense was for the Huskers, however, Nebraska football's defense was also a broken mess.
Following a season-high 42-point performance against Georgia Southern, Nebraska's defense seemed befuddled against Oklahoma. While the offense failed to score, the defense lacked almost anything needed to halt the Sooners' powerful offense.
Oklahoma totaled 580 yards of offense against the Huskers. While that number was lower than what the Huskers gave up to Georgia Southern, the Sooners relaxed a bit in the second half, resulting in a season-high 49 points allowed.
Though the defense pushed several drives to a halt, the scores it gave up much outweighed those it stopped. Nebraska football's defense allowed a 61-yard touchdown run on a broken play, two 20-plus-yard touchdown throws, and four rushing scores in the first half alone. Oklahoma scored two more afterward in the second half, cementing the nightmare for the Nebraska defense.
By the time the fourth quarter began, both teams' reserves were on both sides. This indicated the lopsided nature of the contest. It's difficult to predict what can turn the Nebraska defense around. This is especially true when there isn't much good improvement from week to week.
Frost, though, fell well short of Nebraska's expectations. Remember that no team had a losing record against his Huskers after playing them more than once. Every club in the Big Ten West was at least.500 against Frost. Only Illinois (2-2) did not have a winning record against the Huskers. Frost was not fired by the school because he could not equal the Nebraska of 1970 or 1995. It let him go because, despite his alumni background and prior success, he couldn't compete with the Purdue, Minnesota, or Northwestern of 2022.
Now it's left to interim head coach Mickey Joseph to pick up the pieces.
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