Is It Time To Jump Off The Nebrasketball Bandwagon?

On the latest After Nebrasketball, Jack Mitchell explained to Kaleb Henry and Jacob Bigelow why he doesn't think all hope is lost and reasons to believe moving forward.

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The reaction to Nebraska's 69-66 loss at Maryland has been harsh. Is all hope lost? On Sunday's After Nebrasketball, Jack Mitchell explained to Kaleb Henry and Jacob Bigelow why he doesn't think all hope is lost and reasons to believe moving forward. Is this "copium" or is there truth to what he said?

Here is a lightly edited transcript of the conversation on the podcast.

Jack: I'm sticking to my assessment, my big picture assessment of how the schedule sets up. And I know there are people who, because it's four losses in a row, and who can blame them, that are really, really down right now; that feel like the season is spiraling out of control. USC is a must win now. USC is a must win for this team. These road games are opportunities, and this was another missed opportunity. But as long as they're losing these road games, and I'm talking specifically about this current group of road games that they're in and will have, and that's the run of Purdue, Maryland, Wisconsin, Oregon. Those are all long shot Hail Mary games, right? And you get one and it's an eraser of the down period that Nebraska is having here in January. You don't get any of them? Okay, you've got to get the home games though.

Jan 19, 2025; College Park, Maryland, USA; Maryland Terrapins forward Julian Reese (10) and Nebraska Cornhuskers guard Brice Williams (3) fight for a loose ball during the second half at Xfinity Center. / Reggie Hildred-Imagn Images

And USC is different. USC is now different. You lost any wiggle room that you got with that Rutgers loss. And so, the USC game is a must win. If you can get that USC game and you can get one more before February 9th, whether it's one of the long shot road games, whether it's Illinois at home or at Washington, in my opinion, guys, I mean, people who are down, frustrated, mad right now are not going to like this. But if you get the USC game and one more game by the Ohio State game on February 9th, you're still on schedule for where you need to be.

Now, it doesn't mean that you've earned it, but you're on schedule at that point with how the schedule sets up, where the home games, who they've been against, that you're still on schedule to get 2021 wins if you do what you need to do. And you don't have a hole that is going to be a huge issue to dig yourself out of. Now, if they can't win, they can't win. And that's a different story.

There’s nothing new I'm panicking over today than I wasn't. To be honest, today went better than I kind of expected it would generally. And it was still an L.

Jan 7, 2025; Iowa City, Iowa, USA; Nebraska Cornhuskers head coach Fred Hoiberg reacts with an official during the second half against the Iowa Hawkeyes at Carver-Hawkeye Arena. / Jeffrey Becker-Imagn Images

Kaleb: It was certainly was a missed opportunity. Now, I don't know if you saw the statistic or you saw me just tweet this out, but Fred Hoiberg has coached 175 games as the head coach of the University of Nebraska. Do you guys know what that overall record is? Because we hit a milestone today. This was loss number 100 in the Hoiberg era at Nebraska.

Jack:  It's interesting. There are people jumping hard off the bandwagon based on the last two weeks of two years of basketball. You know, everybody can do that. Got a lot of people who are worried about them making the Big Ten tournament right now. I'm not there yet. Again, am I really frustrated about how they got one blowout and then lost three one possession games? Yeah, for sure. But man, I don't know that I'm really quite ready to scrap the last two years have been based on this. But I can see that there are some people who are though.

Watch the segment above, or take in the full After Nebrasketball postgame show below.

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