That didn't go well. Not well at all.

After looking forward to beating the crap out of these guys for five years, I have to say Nebraska's 40-7 schooling at the hands of Joe Paterno's Nittany Lions is extremely disappointing. Even more disappointing is the way the Huskers played, because Penn State is most certainly not 33 points more talented than NU—not by a long shot. No, Nebraska made this look easy for the Lions with questionable preparation and poor execution. Going to your opponent's home field and getting taken apart is bad enough, but bringing the tools is ridiculous.

Where to start? Well how about defense, or the lack thereof. Very disheartening. I felt the Blackshirts played the Penn State power game well, but it seemed to come at the cost of giving up everything else. Penn State opened the game with a flurry of short and medium passes, and to his credit, Zack Mills made JoePa look like a genius for it. The Lions ran off Nebraska's secondary coverage and threw underneath it all night, and the receivers were so wide open it was sickening to watch. This wasn't Arena League stuff, this was the type of thing kids draw up in the dirt when playing in the park. Everybody go out this way, Timmy, you come back over here and I'll hit ya. I often wondered how Larry Johnson got so wide open too. It's not like he was some four-carry-per-year H-Back they threw out as a change-up, he was the tailback for the love of Mike. Kinda important guy in the whole scheme of things, y'know.

One of the few—OK, only—bright spots was the play of the defensive line. Chris Kelsay, LeKevin Smith and Titus Adams brought the heat, and were just a step away from getting Mills on numerous occasions despite often facing superior numbers of blockers. Made me wonder what could have been had more linebackers been brought in to help out. On the few short-yardage plays when PSU tried to run it right at 'em—early, before Penn State figured out they could get ten yards with every pass and just threw it—the D-line stuffed 'em, hard. But once again Nebraska linebackers were as hard to find as Sasquatch, and so when Penn State trapped and sealed the DL on various draws, scissors plays and sweeps it was Green Acres for Mills and company.

Offensively things weren't great, but did some good things and for a while there I was pleasantly surprised. The inside power game was working better than I had possibly hoped it would. (Unfortunately it had less impact than I could have imagined) Dahrran Deidrick was gashing Penn State for chunks of yardage, bowling over and dragging Lion defenders just as he always does. DD ran as hard as I've ever seen him, and gets props. The boys impressively stepped up and delivered in the first quarter, blasting their way out of peril from their own one-yard line. The scoring drive—the—was one of Frank's better series in his tenure as OC in my opinion. Frank mixed it up with play-passes, power, trap, option and some new looks as the maligned Husker offense roared 80 yards downfield for a score without once facing a third down. Then as quickly it had appeared this aggressive, unpredictable offense vanished into the cool Pennsylvania night, never to be seen again. Fifteen or so minutes later, Penn State led 20-7 and, as is becoming all too familiar, its defensive tempo changed dramatically. The Lion front seven became extremely aggressive, eschewing assignment football and attacking the backfield, causing mistakes and folding the offense under the pressure while the secondary played off looking for play-action. And why not? Who cares if a 34 trap gains 25 yards on one play—you're two scores up and moving the ball, and can risk it in exchange for nailing the offense for drive-killings losses. Then when time becomes Nebraska's enemy as well, cherry-pick interceptions as the Huskers become desperate and start throwing. Same philosophy Nebraska used to play defense with, back in the glory days of the 1990s that seem to be fading fast. So the offense doesn't get a thumbs down, but it doesn't get a thumbs up either. The field position wasn't good but if the offense can't drive 80 yards—or even the 60 required for a decent field goal attempt- more than once in a dozen possessions it isn't doing its job either.

A pretty disgusting performance all-round, so what's next? Hopefully a reevaluation of goals and priorities. The Blackshirts came into the season with pretty lofty talk of domination erasing past sins, and I suspect most of us bought into it... and to some degree needed to. That's shot now, in unmistakable and devastating fashion. The problem now is that confidence lost is not easily regained. I would think Bohl and the defensive staff need to start over, build faith in the fundamentals, perhaps set lower, achievable goals for Iowa State and following games. Bohl might start conservatively, ask the Blackshirts to do what he knows they can, and build on that bit by bit. I suspect the offense learned a great deal about itself as well, and will be better for the experience. Certainly Jack Trice Stadium won't look as intimidating as it might have after weathering that blue and white hurricane.

I thought the Penn State trip would tell us a lot about our team, and it didn't disappoint in that regard. Hopefully the experience can, in the long run, be a positive one. Replace hope with reality, assumptions with knowledge. Maybe the staff can start to put things back together from there, with a better understanding of what they've really got, and build a better team for it. I don't envy them the task.

Send questions and comments to wildhoss@huskerfootballzone.com