After losing to Illinois in the season opener, it looked like it was going to be a long, disappointing season for Nebraska football.
That was half-true.
While the Cornhuskers ended the year with a 3-9 record, they played an exciting brand of football and were in every single game. Not even kidding.
Let’s look back at the year that was for this team that may be considered the best to ever finish 3-9 — and yes, I know that doesn’t mean much but it’s still impressive considering how the season has gone.
Nebraska football was a handful of plays away from being 9-10 win team
In previous years, Nebraska may have closed up shop after a season-opening loss to a bottom-dwelling program with a new head coach, but Nebraska beat Fordham and Buffalo in the following games by a combined score of 80-10. And then Nebraska hit the road to take on No. 3 Oklahoma and everyone was just assuming it was going to be a bloodbath. It wasn’t. The Cornhuskers held their own, taking Oklahoma down to the wire before losing by just a touchdown.
At this point, everyone was wondering if that close loss was a fluke.
The Cornhuskers responded by going to East Lansing to take on No. 20 Michigan State and they led for most of the second half before melting down in the final minutes, surrendering a punt return touchdown that sent the game to overtime. Adrian Martinez threw a horrible interception that pretty much sealed a three-point loss for Nebraska there.
Two straight games against ranked opponents on the road, two straight one-possession losses that could have gone either way. Maybe this Nebraska team was better than we thought.
The following week, Nebraska shellacked Northwestern 56-7 to improve to 3-3 on the year and it just felt like there was a change in momentum within the program.
Nebraska hosted No. 9 Michigan after the Northwestern blowout and held a late lead but Michigan scored late to steal the win in Lincoln. Another game against a ranked team, another heartbreaking loss that probably should have been a win. Nebraska could have easily been 5-1 or 4-2 at this point.
Scott Frost’s team then went to Minnesota and lost by a touchdown, hosted a hot Purdue team and lost by five, hosted Ohio State and actually looked like they were going to pull off the upset but ultimately lost by nine, went to red-hot Wisconsin and lost by a touchdown in a back-and-forth affair, and then hosted Iowa and choked away a 21-6 lead to lose 28-21.
Every single loss Nebraska had this season was by eight points or less. In at least half of those games, the Cornhuskers coughed up a late lead to lose. Even if Nebraska won half of those one-possession games, it would have finished the regular season 7-5 or 8-4, at worst.
While it’s easy to sit here and call Nebraska a failure this year, that 3-9 record is absolutely deceiving. The Cornhuskers had a chance to win every game and gave a lot of teams one of their toughest battles of the year.
Being one of the best 3-9 teams ever (maybe even the best) is a small consolation for a bowl-less season, but maybe it could be used as momentum heading into 2022.