A highly anticipated college football season is going to begin in Lincoln, Nebraska in under a week. The Nebraska football team begins their 2023 campaign on August 31st against Minnesota football on the road. This will be the first game for new head coach Matt Rhule, who comes in with a lot of pressure on him. Nebraska has been down in recent years while Scott Frost was the coach, and Huskers fans are eager to see their team compete for championships again. It's not going to happen overnight, but Rhule knows he has to turn this proud program back around fairly quickly. The first test against Minnesota isn't going to be easy, but Rhule is feeling confident about many areas of Nebraska's game heading into the matchup.

“I'm confident that we're going to play hard,” Rhule told the media according to a video posted on Twitter by Andy Kendeigh. “I'm confident that we're going to be a physical team. I'm confident that if things don't get well early, that we're not going to panic. I'm confident that if things do go well early, We're not going to celebrate. I think our guys understand that this is a 60 minute game and a 12 game season. And I'm confident that we'll have fun together.”

The big issue with Scott Frost's Nebraska teams was closing games. The Cornhuskers went 3-9 in 2021 but didn't lose a single game by double digits. They were right in it every time, but just couldn't close it. Matt Rhule wants his team to win the fourth quarter.

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“We're going to be a team, I don't know when, we're going to be a team that plays our best football in the fourth quarter,” Rhule said. “Coach Osborne came up the other day … ‘we always wanted to be a team', his Cornhuskers, ‘that won the fourth quarter, was the best team in the fourth quarter'. That's what we've been preaching since day one.”

Nebraska football has had the talent to compete in the Big Ten, and if they can start finding a way to close games, they can make some noise in the West.