Yeah, it's that time, son.
We've basked in the glory of beating Indiana for six full days now, and it's time for us to have a good ol' fashioned reckoning. Winning is fun! However, we're faced with two choices: thinking about what's going to happen tomorrow, or making a fanbase wide decision to pretend we win tomorrow instead of paying attention to the actual results, eventually resulting in us being unable to distinguish between reality and this sick fantasy world we've created and turning into Marion Cotillard's character in Inception. You guys can do the latter, because she's hot and it would be cool if you all turned into her, but I'd rather you not frame me for murder.
After the jump, me and teh crew have predictions. Leave yours! Unless you're from a species that doesn't have the mental capacity to comprehend linguistic recursion and therefore can't refer to things that aren't being currently presented to them, in which case you're unable to refer to events in the future. In that case, you probably shouldn't read this.
MountainTiger
The numbers say that Nebraska is a significantly better team than Northwestern. The game is in Lincoln. Nebraska just played their best game so far this year in throttling Michigan State in a manner Nick Saban described as "the most beautiful thing I have ever seen." Still, I have been down on Nebraska since the preseason, and I'm not going to change my mind the day before the game. I just can't bring myself to make the logical pick. The best reasoning I can give is that Nebraska has been extremely inconsistent this year, but that really doesn't go very far. Whatever, there would be no point in blogging if I couldn't make the occasional homer pick. I already am having nightmares about Taylor Martinez tearing through the Northwestern defense, but in the end Northwestern stuns the nation by handing the Cornhuskers their first Big Ten home loss.
Northwestern, 45, Nebraska, 42
Herman
Northwestern's defense, yeah we know all about that. Our offense, well it's good, but aside from the Indiana game, it hasn't been good enough to keep up with all the points our defense has given up. Opposing teams are able to contain our offense when they get a pass rush and harass our QBs. A good pass rush, combined with our not-overly-impressive offensive line, results in still-gimpy Persa getting sacked and throwing interceptions and Colter getting happy feet, which generates little good when he runs forward and is disastrous when he runs backwards. However, as I look at the stats, I see that Nebraska is middle of the pack in just about every defensive category, including sacks, where it has 13, just two more than our 11, and we all know how anemic our pass rush is. Given that, I like our chances at an upset. The chances aren't great, but they're better against this defense than against Penn State's or Illinois' or Michigan's.