Mike Ekeler's Impact on the 2025 Nebraska Football Season

On this week's Saturday Morning Coffee Show, Josh Peterson and Jack Mitchell put together a list of items for the Nebraska Football 2025 Time Capsule. In it, they tried to find the questions needed to be answered and the impact they'd have on the success or failure of the 2025 season.

In the midst of that discussion, they looked a bit more at special teams and Nebraska's new coordinator Mike Ekeler.

Below is a lightly edited transcript of their conversation on the podcast.

Jack: You’ve kind of got nowhere to go but up. It's going to be a way harder pull for the the defensive coordinator to look better; the defensive line coach to look better next year, right? There’s no way you're going to be like, “well, that's way better than it was last year.” So, it's going to be one of those two in my opinion, guess it be Shorts too.

Josh: That's excellent way to describe it where the floor for the defensive line group, for example, it was already so high. If they're going to go up, you're talking about generational type players on the line and I don't think they have that.

Jack: I don't know how we're going to walk away and be like, yeah, the defense or defensive line or defensive backs are way better.

Josh: Correct, but we can definitely say that about offense. We can definitely say that about special teams. A couple comments [from the I-80 Club Discord]. Dilo says, “the OC and special teams hires on paper are as good as any in recent memory.” Couldn't agree more to which another says, “100%. Can't believe the lack of excitement for a Holgorsen.

Jack: We’ve talked about this; If Holgorsen did not coach those three games or whatever, four games, it would be a whole lot higher. It was like, cause he's not the new shiny thing anymore.

Nebraska Cornhuskers assistant coach Dana Holgorsen on the sideline during the second quarter against the Wisconsin Badgers. — Nov 23, 2024; Lincoln, Nebraska, USA; Nebraska Cornhuskers assistant coach Dana Holgorsen on the sideline during the second quarter against the Wisconsin Badgers at Memorial Stadium. | Dylan Widger-Imagn Images

Josh: Exactly. Which is so weird, but I think it's kind of melted our brain in a bit of a way. But I do want to read this other comment. “Love this topic.” Good. There we go. Thank you very much for the loving the topic. “What is special teams success? Top 70 in SP+?”

Jack: This goes to my question with quarterback too. How do you quantify what this looks like?

Josh: Is it about a number or is it more about not being catastrophic?

Jack: To me it's a lack of catastrophic mistakes, almost as much as anything.

Josh: Me too. It's less about the raw ranking and more about are they getting kicks blocked or punts blocked? Are they blocking kicks or blocking? Are they getting yards in returns?

Jack: And then it's field position is the other thing, right? It's stopping returns and getting returns.

Josh: Jordan says, “not having 10 blocked kicks.” Wow, that is so wild.

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Jack: Yes. We can break down what the true problems are. Inability to have a consistent kicking game. Inability to have a consistent field goal game. Number one, right? Lack of return yards on punts especially, but kickoffs and punts, number two. Yes? Number three, getting kicks blocked. Okay. That's another significant one. And then number four, actual turnovers on returns as well.

Was anything good? Nebraska themselves blocked kicks.

Josh: Did they do that last year?

Jack: Nebraska blocked two or three punts last year. I thought so [against] Purdue. I feel like they blocked a had a few blocked kicks last year.

Josh: So, a lot of that was not being catastrophic. I totally forgot about the block kicks against Colorado. Wow. Thank you very much guys.

Do we include kicker at all in this discussion? Like the ability to make field goals again? Is that something that you give credit to Ekeler for? Or is that one of those things that you have it or you don't? And you know, let’s offer a bit of forgiveness? If the kicker, not the snap and the hold, but the kicker, if that hasn't gotten way better.

Jack: I can't imagine Ekeler as the calming voice, like a golf coach that's going to come in and fix the technical stuff that is ailing the Nebraska kickers over the year over the years. I think that's about getting the right guy; getting the right guys recruited. Don't you think?

Josh: Yes.

Jack: I still don't get it with [Tristan] Alvano.

Josh: It still blows my mind that he is not worked out well.

Jack: And so it hasn't worked out. And so they've just missed that. And then in other years, they haven't had enough guys on the roster that can do it. Multiple years, they've had to go to guys that they didn't expect to be using at all. I think the biggest problem with that has been recruiting; Some bad skill at recruiting and some bad luck at recruiting and some injuries as well.

Nebraska Cornhuskers place kicker John Hohl (90) makes a field goal against Ohio State Buckeyes during the third quarter of their game at Ohio Stadium on Oct 26, 2024, in Columbus. | Kyle Robertson/Columbus Dispatch / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Josh: And Alex says it too. “I feel like the kicking aspect somewhat solved itself last year. The operation was the issue.” I randomly saw the field goal that [John] Hohl had at the end of the first half versus Ohio State, which was like 50 yards or whatever it was. And it was like, “what the hell?” But the operation was a real big struggle bus at times. Didn’t they miss a field goal against Iowa because the snap and hold were bad?

Jack: That's right. The hold and the snap were such the problem last year. And that is coaching. Going back, I'm going to go back a little bit on what I said. I forgot how terrible the snaps and holds were last year. So bad. So bad.

But again, is Ekeler getting that cleaned up? You know, it just doesn't seem like his specialty.

Josh: I mean, he's a special teams coordinator. He has to get that cleaned up.

Jack: I feel like he's good at motivating people – this is a complete stereotype, so I admit that – But like, I feel like he's good on bringing effort into special teams, right? Having a killer instinct. You don't need a killer instinct to be a good holder or snap.

Josh: That's an excellent point. “Go out there and kill somebody!”

Jack: Right.

Josh: “Coach, I’m just holding the ball!” They got a long snapper in the portal and they got a punter in the portal. So, in theory, special teams should be better. So right now, Jack, we have Dylan Raiola and we have special teams.

Jack: Those are my top two.

Watch the entire clip below.

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