Nebraska
As spring practice begins, Nebraska football wants to dispel these 4 narratives
LINCOLN, Neb. — Nebraska returned to the practice field this week. And despite the shifting winds in college football, it’s not cutting names this spring from an oversized roster.
Not yet, anyway.
“I think of these first few days as classroom instruction,” coach Matt Rhule said Tuesday after the Huskers’ second of 15 March and April workouts. “A ton of teaching, a ton of installation.”
Yes, when the Huskers open the 2025 season in five months, they must carry a roster of 105 players. That’s pending approval next month of terms in the House v. NCAA settlement, which is set to bring revenue sharing and changing roster limits to college sports.
For now, the Huskers are OK with 126 players in spring practice. Seven more incoming freshmen remain on track to join the group this summer.
The impending cutdown looms. But among the 26 defensive backs, discussion has stayed minimal on the subject of a reduced roster, senior safety Marques Buford said.
“Everybody’s coming in and working their butts off every day to prove that they belong here and prove that they should be on this team,” Buford said. “Every guy in our room has the potential to be on this team in the fall.
“And honestly, that sucks that we can’t bring everybody with us. But at the end of the day, that’s where the game of college football is going. We have to accept that.”
Rhule said he does not have a depth chart this early in spring.
“It’s not the coach’s job right now to figure out who’s going to play and who’s not going to play,” Rhule said. “It’s our job to figure out who can play.”
According to Ty Robinson, the defender whose eligibility expired in December, Rhule’s teaching attitude elevates the program. It helped convince Robinson to return in 2024 as a graduate student for his sixth season.
Robinson’s strong play earned him an invite to the NFL combine, at which he impressed scouts by running a 4.83-second 40-yard dash — fastest among defensive linemen — at 6-foot-5 and 288 pounds. He met with more NFL evaluators on Tuesday at Nebraska’s pro day.
“I represent Nebraska through and through,” Robinson said. “I’m proud to say that I played at Nebraska. All these scouts I’ve talked to, I’ve made them aware of how great Nebraska is – and how it’s honestly under the radar.”
2025 Nebraska Football Pro Day
Live from Lincoln, Nebraska https://t.co/2uK06Rmxvh
— Nebraska Football (@HuskerFootball) March 25, 2025
Robinson looks to lead a draft class at Nebraska in April that exceeds three players for the first time since 2016. It’s a myth, he said, that the Huskers’ talent is down.
“It’ll be a gold mine here pretty soon,” Robinson said.
In the spirit of spring narratives, here are four that the Huskers are aiming to dispel.
1. Nebraska needs a running back from the transfer portal. Not so, according to Rhule. “I have no concerns at running back,” he said.
Emmett Johnson, the junior who has rushed for 1,008 yards in the past two seasons, leads the group. But the backs feature no additional experience of note.
Rhule has long spoken highly of third-year sophomore Kwinten Ives. He scored his first career touchdown on a 2-yard run in the Pinstripe Bowl. Ives simply needs an opportunity, Rhule said.
Redshirt freshman Mekhi Nelson is “dynamically explosive,” according to Rhule, with an edge that the coach loves. Rhule also mentioned walk-on Kenneth Williams and said that the Huskers are eager to get a look this spring at early enrollees Conor Booth and Jamarion Parker. Parker has bulked up from 175 pounds to more than 190 since January.
The coaching staff will assess the running back lineup after spring practice, but Rhule anticipates standing pat.
“We’ve got guys that we know can play,” he said.
Coach Matt Rhule has “no concerns” with his running back room, which includes junior Emmett Johnson. (Dustin Satloff / Getty Images)
2. Dylan Raiola is out of shape. Commenting on the importance of adding an element of escapability to Raiola’s game, Rhule said two weeks ago that the sophomore “won’t be a great quarterback at 240 pounds” and that he was working on his body composition.
It caused a stir, leading to speculation that Raiola had gained weight above his listed 230 pounds. The coach clarified on Tuesday. “I said he knows he can’t be 240. I didn’t say he was 240.”
Raiola threw to the Nebraska wide receivers at pro day, looking fit and stronger than in his final appearance last season. He’s practiced well this week, Rhule said, and the QB has focused this offseason on maintaining a good weight.
“He’s done a really nice job with his body,” Rhule said.
3. Name, image and likeness and revenue-sharing payments are spinning out of control. You can believe that, Rhule said. But you might be wrong.
“The hardest thing right now is (that) I still don’t know the rules, the parameters,” Rhule said.
If approved, the House settlement would allow athletic departments to use up to $20.5 million in revenue sharing to pay athletes. As much as 70 percent of that figure could fund a salary pool for football players. But outside of revenue-share dollars, the future of NIL payments is uncertain.
The settlement includes language that would require third-party NIL deals above $600 to pass through an NCAA clearinghouse. It’s a stipulation that could significantly limit the earning power of football players beyond their revenue-sharing checks.
“You (could) no longer just stockpile players through money,” Rhule said.
An effective cap, even at roughly $14 million per team, would even the playing field among power programs.
“There’s a lot of schools that have benefited from unlimited bank accounts,” Rhule said. “If it’s limited, then it changes everything.”
4. Recruiting for 2026 has lost direction. Nebraska counts three commitments for the Class of 2026, ranking 40th nationally and 12th in the Big Ten, according to the On3 industry average.
The Huskers hosted a junior day on Feb. 1, but developments have been slow to get rolling among the next group of Nebraska recruits.
“We are probably just being very measured right now in trying to figure out how exactly this goes,” Rhule said.
Why? Again, follow the money.
“If you’re a coach who doesn’t care about saying something and then having to go back on it,” Rhule said, “it’s really a great time.”
For instance, Rhule said, he won’t allow himself to get in a situation where a player is promised $700,000 to come to Nebraska — but he shows up and gets $50,000 because rules didn’t permit the school to exceed that number.
“It’s a hard time to make a lot of promises,” the coach said.
Presumably, in April, more direction will arrive on revenue sharing, along with clarity on third-party NIL payments. For now, Rhule said, “it’s a time of great uncertainty.”
Nebraska won’t get left behind in this recruiting cycle, Rhule said. Its methods are by design.
“We’re prepared to have great June visits,” Rhule said. “And then we’re prepared to recruit all the way up until signing day — and be as aggressive as anybody in the country.”
(Top photo of Dylan Raiola: Dustin Satloff / Getty Images)
John Hansen, president of the Nebraska Farmers Union, will serve another two years at the helm after members re-elected him this month. He’s seen a lot of change in agriculture since 1990, but some things have stayed relatively the same, such as the price of a bushel of corn. Nebraska Public Media’s Jackie Ourada spoke with Hansen on “All Things Considered” about the state of agriculture, starting with how farmers are feeling about President Trump’s new $12 billion relief package that aims to offset damage done by tariffs.
Hansen: It plays to real mixed reviews for the folks who know how much money they lost in the first place thanks to the tariffs, which is somewhere, the Farm Bureau estimates, between $34 billion and $44 billion. We think $40 billion is a pretty good number. So, if you just lost $40 billion when you are already struggling financially, and you are already having to restructure your your farm loans to try to come up with more equity to replace the cash flow that didn’t work, and you already had done all that … So you lose $40 billion worth of value, and you get $12 billion paid back in some sort of fashion — not yet clear, who gets that. That $11 billion actually goes to the 20 crops, and then an additional $1 billion goes to specialty crops, so we’re certainly not going to be made whole. It’s better than a jab in the eye with a sharp stick, but not as good as being made whole.
Ourada: Farmers are, in Nebraska for the most part, going to, according to some of the economic surveys, benefit quite a lot from government payouts this year. So, I guess it’s difficult for me to hear that you guys have had a lot of calls about farmers being upside down, when the overall picture is that farmers are going to end up with a lot of economic benefits from the payouts from the government.
Hansen: So when you have commodity prices that are this low, and the reason you’re getting additional economic disaster assistance is because if you look at those prices, it’s a train wreck, a complete train wreck. So you’re helping try to offset that through some sort of federal economic assistance. But when you add that amount of assistance with the amount of shortfall that exists in commodity prices that tells you how far out of whack our farm policy and our trade policy is. We’re, unfortunately, in a situation where we’re forced to accept that those additional payments, although all farmers would rather get paid in the marketplace rather than through the mailbox with assistance from their tax-paying cousins and friends and brothers and sisters. And so we need to rethink about what we’re doing when we’re the world’s largest food producing nation, and we have a domestic farm policy and trade policy that puts family farmers and ranchers out of business, and that’s what we’re doing right now. Then it’s time to say, you know, big picture here, this is not working. The lack of stability is really difficult to navigate for somebody who’s on the receiving end of prices.
Ourada: What specifically would you like to see changed?
Hansen: Well, the whole structure. We don’t have really stability. We don’t have dependability. We don’t have any way to begin to cover cost of production. The cost of production that we have, just continues to go up and up and up every year. And yet, commodity prices are not tied to anything that reflects our cost of production. You can’t [say to] General Motors or Ford or or any major manufacturer, ”We want you guys to go out there and incur additional costs of operating every year. But we want you to sell your your end finished product for about the same thing that you know folks were buying it for 3030, years ago or more.” Their cost to the customer has to reflect their cost of production. And in the case of agriculture, farmers are price takers. We’re not price makers. We don’t set the price of what we produce, which is why the private, public partnership between agriculture and Congress needs to be rethought.
Ourada: I have a few friends who farm. They’re around my age, 30, and they are constantly griping, I would say is a good word about dad or grandpa not handing over the farm keys to them. And I’m thinking as you you’ve been with the Farmers Union now since 1990. What does your succession plan look like to the Farmers Union? What does the Farmers Union look like after John Hansen steps down?
Hansen: Well, that’s a great question. It’s one that’s an active discussion. Relative to farmers union, I made it clear at last this last year’s convention held a couple weeks ago, that we’re certainly looking for new folks to pick up the reins if they want to. And there’s a lifetime of opportunity and and in serving agriculture, I happen to think I have the best job in the state. So give me a call.
This interview has been edited for length.
GRAND ISLAND, Neb. — The Nebraska Court of Appeals has affirmed the conviction and sentencing of a Grand Island man charged with sexually assaulting a minor.
Cory Gilmore was sentenced in June to 36 to 48 years in prison on two counts of first-degree sexual assault. Court records said he was initially charged with first-degree sexual assault of a child, first-degree sexual assault and third-degree sexual assault of a child, but pleaded no contest to the two sexual assault counts as part of a plea deal.
According to an arrest affidavit, a report of a possible sexual assault came into the child abuse hotline that Gilmore sexually assaulted a minor girl when he was intoxicated.
A Grand Island police officer later interviewed the girl – who is younger than 19 years old – who said she was sexually assaulted by Gilmore from early 2021 to December 2023.
In his appeal, Gilmore claimed the District Court abused its discretion by imposing an excessive sentence. He also claimed his trial counsel was ineffective in failing to take the deposition of the alleged victim and failing to move to withdraw Gilmore’s plea before sentencing.
In its ruling, the Court of Appeals denied Gilmore’s claim of ineffective trial counsel. In his appeal, Gilmore said that at sentencing, he notified his counsel that he wished to withdraw his no-contest plea as he didn’t want to plead guilty or to say he did something he didn’t do.
The Court of Appeals said that at no point did Gilmore inform the District Court that he wished to withdraw his plea and that the District Court asked him if he made his plea “knowingly and voluntarily.”
The Court of Appeals also said in its order that at Gilmore’s sentencing hearing, the District Court looked at Gilmore’s risk to reoffend, his criminal history and the fact that he “showed no remorse for the trauma he has inflicted” in imposing its sentencing. The Court of Appeals said this was appropriate and that his sentencing was not excessive.
Red Wings photographer given special moment after tragic loss
San Francisco: Anti-ICE protester gets probation for ‘depredation’ of ICE van’s tire
Why Senate hopeful Jasmine Crockett is appearing at a Dallas hip-hop concert
Five Things I Think I Think About the Miami Dolphins – Week 15
Still holiday shopping? Or maybe traveling? Here’s your weekend weather breakdown. – The Boston Globe
Florida High School Football Rankings: Top 25 teams – Oct. 21
Cleary's 21 help Le Moyne down Central Connecticut State 69-64 in OT
How old is Bo Nix? What to know about Oregon quarterback ahead of 2024 NFL Draft
99th annual Pony Swim held in Virginia
Video: ‘It Didn’t Have to Happen This Way:’ U.Va. Faculty Call for Review of Police Response to Protests
Video: Man on Roof Faces Off with ICE Agents for Hours in Minnesota
Maryland to study slavery reparations after lawmakers override Dem governor’s veto
Louvre reopens partially after workers extend strike in aftermath of heist
Trump’s BBC lawsuit: A botched report, BritBox, and porn
Video: Prosecutors Charge Nick Reiner With Murdering His Parents
-
Iowa3 days agoAddy Brown motivated to step up in Audi Crooks’ absence vs. UNI
-
Washington1 week agoLIVE UPDATES: Mudslide, road closures across Western Washington
-
Iowa4 days agoHow much snow did Iowa get? See Iowa’s latest snowfall totals
-
Maine1 day agoElementary-aged student killed in school bus crash in southern Maine
-
World1 week ago
Chiefs’ offensive line woes deepen as Wanya Morris exits with knee injury against Texans
-
Maryland3 days agoFrigid temperatures to start the week in Maryland
-
Technology6 days agoThe Game Awards are losing their luster
-
South Dakota3 days agoNature: Snow in South Dakota
