TJ Lateef Has Changed Nebraska's Offense, Emmett Johnson's Big 2025 Season, And More With Dirk Chatelain

On this week's I-80 Football Show, Dirk Chatelain joined Josh Peterson and Jack Mitchell for a look at the Nebraska football season through ten games. They did a deep dive on Matt Rhule signing an extension, how good a job he's done at Nebraska, before unpacking the offense under TJ Lateef vs. Dylan Raiola. What should things look like moving forward?

They also discussed Emmett Johnson's big 2025 season, and Dirk explained why it's reminding him of a Husker legend from years gone by.

Below is a lightly edited transcript of select excerpts of the podcast.

Matt Rhule’s contract extension

Josh: Are you surprised that everything has gotten locked up and finished, and we're not really having those discussions anymore? Because I thought we'd at least get into the Penn State week and still be hot and heavy about everything.

Nebraska head coach Matt Rhule — Matt Rhule's contract extension will keep him in Lincoln beyond 2025. It's not that surprising that it's already locked up. | Kenny Larabee, KLIN

Dirk: Well, I think a couple of things happened. Nebraska did not make the College Football Playoff push that would have made him an even more natural candidate. I always kind of thought that Nebraska's record was going to be a secondary factor in the Rhule to Penn State thing, just because of his relationships there. You know, if you talk to people at Penn State, I think a lot of them are ready for an insider. James Franklin was an outsider. So I thought Rhule was going to be a great fit based on just the fact that of his ties there.

But I think the contract extension obviously probably sewed that up. I don't think anything's ever completely done on that. But, a little surprised that it hasn't lingered a little bit more, in part because there's not even much murmur there about who it's gonna be, right? I've paid less attention to it over the last two weeks. I imagine it will crank up a little bit next week, going back there, but probably not so much in Rhule’s candidacy and more in terms of, “Rhule going back home.”

Jack: If you're in Troy Dannen’s shoes, after Penn State becomes a potential suitor, are you thinking, “okay, I've got to lock him up because we just can't lose him because the alternative to that is terrifying?” Or is it, “well, I want to keep him, but I don't necessarily want to spend a whole lot more money doing this?” Obviously, we know what he decided in this whole thing, but I'm trying to figure out what exactly was motivating. Or is he thinking, “My fortunes are tied to Rhule’s?” And so I got to keep him here and I got to make sure he's successful. And so that's what he's trying to do here. What do you think was in his mind during that process?

Dirk: Well, I think first and foremost, Nebraska can't lose a guy and have another coaching search right now. It’s not a place that anybody wanted to be, regardless of whether you think Rhule is on schedule or behind schedule. I think you could argue that Rhule is probably a year behind schedule, especially when you compare it to some of the better reclamation projects out there, Indiana notwithstanding.

It's one of these deals where, like, what's the alternative, right? You know, you can't lose him. You got away with that. You got through it without giving him a bunch more money. I don't think Matt Rhule was going anywhere either way. But I don't think it costs Nebraska. It didn't cost Nebraska a bunch to make it happen. And you know, it's, it's probably one of these deals where you give a little bit to maintain a good relationship there, and hopefully you lock him up in the process for at least, at least one more year.

You know if he goes 11-2 next year, is he guaranteed to be at Nebraska in 2027? Probably not, but this is just the nature of the business. He’s done a good job, not a great job, but a good job. And I think because of that, you do what you can to keep him around.

“Nebraska’s offense hasn’t been good enough”

Josh: Let’s talk quarterback and I'm going to say a sentence that I hate saying, but I do want to do this. I'm going to read a couple of your tweets from Saturday night during the game because in all seriousness, I was a little surprised at what you said; “I don't want to make any grand proclamations about TJ Lateef based on three drives, but I will say this quarterback mobility adds so much to a college football offense takes pressure off of everyone else. Of course, this has been true for generations.”

Later on, you added, “If you determine that Raiola is still Nebraska's best option in ‘26, fine, but I hope tonight at least redefines the target/standard for clean quality offense. It hasn't been good enough this fall; tonight it was. Lateef had a lot to do with it. It's only UCLA but notable.”

And the reason I think I was surprised is I think anyone watching that game probably saw the same thing, but I think people are so afraid to say like, “yeah, so now maybe this is a discussion moving forward.” You seem to think it is. How much of that is just the cleanliness of Saturday and how much of it is the uncleanliness of the last 21 games under Dylan Raiola?

It was all smiles for TJ Lateef following his first career start in Nebraska's 28-21 win over UCLA. | Gary A. Vasquez-Imagn Images

Dirk: I don't want this to like come off as overly critical of Raiola, but I feel like people have kind of had blinders on and have done a lot of excuse-making for how the offense has looked. I mean, what was their excuse this year? By any standard, they had one of the top ten offensive coordinators in college football. They had a five-star quarterback in his second year. They had a ton of experience at the skill positions; probably their best arsenal of skill players in I don't know, a long time. I mean, they spent money on the offensive line. It wasn't gonna be a great offensive line, but it should have been a good offensive line. They had depth.

I feel like people have just kind of swept this under the rug; how disappointing the offense has been. And you can look at numbers and say, “Well, you know, they rank here and they rank here,” and that's great. But so often they've just kind of been an inefficient mess. And I don't think it's even close to been good enough.

So again, I'm not putting that all on Raiola, but I do think I've watched enough football and you guys have too, that you recognize how your margin for error increases when your quarterback can move. And can scramble and can occupy a defender in the run game. And when your offense is struggling to have a quarterback who doesn't move well, it really puts pressure on everybody else.

And I'm just gonna be honest, I think there is a portion of the Nebraska fan base that was so excited and so flattered that Dylan Raiola would come to Nebraska, that they sort of made a subconscious deal with themselves or with their friends that “we're gonna be real slow to criticize this guy because we're so thankful that he came here,” right? It's a little bit of an element of like the hottest girl in school said yes to prom with me, and so I'm not gonna say anything mean about her when she shows up 30 minutes late or whatever.

Dylan Raiola was sacked nine times against Minnesota. | Matt Krohn-Imagn Images

And I just think, regardless of what Lateef does, I think that's actually a secondary conversation. I think the primary conversation needs to be that Nebraska's offense hasn't been good enough, not even close to good enough. And Saturday was the best that it has looked, in my opinion, in a year and a half. Why is that? That needs to be the standard going forward. If Raiola can get the offense to that level, that's great. I don't really care who the quarterback is.

I think people need to recognize when they're eating a month-old single-stuffed Oreo versus a fresh double-stuffed Oreo out of the package. I think people have sort of confused a very mediocre offense the last year and a half and called it passable just because they were afraid to criticize Dylan Raiola.

Can Lateef keep it rolling against Penn State and Iowa?

Josh: I'm curious as to what you are expecting to happen the next two weeks because as I have described it a couple of times, if like UCLA is a 100-level course on defense, you could say Penn State is a 200 or 300, and then Iowa is a graduate level defense in terms of what they're going to offer and how they're going to try to defend him. There will be ups and downs. It will not look as crisp as Saturday night, but are you expecting it to still look like a better overall unit than we have seen over the course of the last year and a half?

Dirk: I don't know. It'll be interesting. I really don't know. But again, I don't want to dumb it down to Lateef versus Raiola. I want to reset the expectation. I want to shake people a little bit and say, “hey, what you thought was acceptable the last year and a half, that actually shouldn't have been acceptable.” You need to raise your expectation level for the offense.

I think Lateef might come back down to earth. You might see a little bit more of the offense that you saw against USC but you know, I'm also open to the alternative that Nebraska found something on Saturday and that they can take it to the next level. They’ve got good players on that offense. It's not like they don't have places to lean on when things get tough because they absolutely do.

“It’s a little bit Suh-like”

Jack: Have you ever seen a player go in such a quick time, slightly above replacement level to, I don't know, third team all-conference, to potential All-American as Emmett Johnson has done in whatever period of time you wanted to find that in; I guess just this season probably?

Dirk: It’s shocking and the fact that he gets better like seemingly every week is kind of crazy too. In some ways, please accept my context when I say this, but it's a little bit Suh-like in how long it took. Like Suh was a kind of disappointment the first one, two, three years on campus. He was good his fourth year on campus. And then fifth year, three [or] four games into the season, they go down to Missouri and play in the monsoon, and all of a sudden, Ndamukong Suh is like Reggie White. And it's like the rest of the season. He was Reggie White, right?

Emmett Johnson scored three touchdowns against UCLA and is the story of the 2025 Nebraska football season, says Dirk Chatelain. | Gary A. Vasquez-Imagn Images

Jack: That’s true.

Dirk: There's a little bit of a Suh thing going on here. You know, ironically, the program is kind of in a similar place too. They’re good but not great. They're spinning their wheels a little bit. But the nice part is Emmet can come back. You know, Suh was done. It'll be interesting to see what happens there. I think he's probably an NFL player next year. But it is cool. And I think a genuinely likable guy too.

My favorite players at Nebraska, just in terms of like watching them play, Lavonte David. Ameer Abdullah. I think Emmett Johnson is in that class. In recent memory. You know, Suh; he was fun, but it was a little bit like watching a kid beat up on kindergarteners on the playground. This feels like a guy who, I don't want to say he's ordinary in terms of talent, but it feels like he's getting the most out of it. And again, a really likable person included.

It's the story of the season for sure. And just to take us back to our original conversation, it's one more reason that Nebraska's offense should be one of the absolute best in the Big Ten right now.

For more from the hour-long chat with Dirk Chatelain, including thoughts on the end of the regular season, the state of the Nebraska football program, and some Nebrasketball talk as well, watch below!

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