Four Observations From Nebraska Football’s Loss to Iowa

LINCOLN—Nebraska and Iowa met for a Black Friday battle with both teams at 7-4.

By the end of the day, Iowa was 8-4, and Nebraska’s 7-5 record felt like a gut punch from another rivalry loss to the Hawkeyes. Below are four observations from the game.

“That’s unacceptable.”

– Nebraska coach Matt Rhule after the loss

Let’s begin with a couple of notes that went Nebraska’s way.

The Blackshirts opened the game with a pair of three straight three-and-outs, even with the latter ending in a field goal. In the first quarter, Iowa managed just 2.6 yards per carry.

On special teams, Nebraska recovered a kickoff that Iowa mistakenly let fall. Kyle Cunanan made all three of his field goals.

With those out of the way, oof. Bad misses galore.

On Nebraska’s first kickoff, head coach Matt Rhule and special teams coordinator Mike Ekeler elected to challenge Iowa returner Kaden Wetjen. Through 11 games, he averaged nearly 30 yards a return on kickoffs with one touchdown, adding three more scores on punt returns.

Wetjen took that kickoff 51 yards. A penalty moved it up another 15 yards, which meant the three-and-out by the Blackshirts still resulted in Iowa points.

“Certainly, the kickoff return and the field position tilted in the first half against us,” Nebraska coach Matt Rhule said after the game. “At one point, they had 10 points, and they had nine plays or something like that. I said, ‘Calm down; just keep playing.’”

In the second quarter, Iowa was picking up more than seven yards on every run. From the second quarter on, the Hawkeyes picked up 7-of-10 third downs, staying on the field longer against an increasingly tired Blackshirt unit.

That defensive unit had to spend extra time on the field in the third quarter. With Nebraska having just a pair of three-and-outs for drives in the quarter, Iowa had the ball for 12:38. The Huskers could have had another drive, but Jacory Barney Jr. got blown up while attempting to return a punt, and the ball sputtered into the end zone, which Nebraska did recover, but resulted in a safety.

The Blackshirts were eaten up by another quarterback who can make you pay with his legs. Mark Gronowski rushed for 64 yards and two touchdowns. He also threw just his eighth touchdown pass of the season. Gronowski’s 166 yards through the air are his most since throwing for 186 yards at Rutgers back in September.

In the punt game, Archie Wilson was forced to do most of his work into a strong south wind. The Australian averaged just 32 yards a punt, with a long of 35.

Despite a good start by the defense and moments where the special teams offered sparks, the field constantly tilted in Iowa’s favor. That’s what the Hawkeyes do under Kirk Ferentz, and they did it well again on Friday.

“To me, today was about big plays,” Rhule said. “They had control, and they ended up running. The play action off the run game and just having to do too much to sell out.”

In the same week Emmett Johnson was left off the finalist list for the Doak Walker Award, given to the nation’s top running back, Johnson showed that he was snubbed and should have been included.

Johnson finished with a career-high 217 yards and one touchdown on the ground. That’s the first 200-yard game by a Husker since Ameer Abdullah (225 yards) in 2014.

“I was just trying to leave it all out there on the field,” Johnson said after the game.

On the year, Johnson is up to 1,451 yards rushing. That’s good for eighth place on the NU single-season rushing chart. He also passed Abdullah (1,103 yards in 2013) for the most rushing yards in Big Ten Conference games, picking up 1,125 yards in the nine league games.

Johnson also passed Abdullah for career receiving yards, now up to fourth with 702 yards.

With 22 yards receiving, Johnson had 229 all-purpose yards on the day. He now has 1,821 all-purpose yards in 2025. That moves him onto the NU top-10 list for a single season, passing Marlon Lucky (1,743 yards in 2007), and Mike Rozier (1,790 yards in 1982) for eighth.

Johnson almost single-handedly had Nebraska in the game at halftime. He had already rushed 19 times for 177 yards and his touchdown. Within those rushing yards was his 70-yarder to set up the only touchdown Nebraska would get in the contest.

The Husker junior now has a couple of decisions to make: whether or not to play in the bowl game and whether or not to go early for the NFL draft.

“I’m just going to go back home and talk to my family and let God take over that,” Johnson said. “I’m going to take this time to just pray about everything. I love this place a lot, so I just got to go pray about it and let God decide what I’m going to do.”

November has been a tough month for Husker football fans for some time.

Nebraska is just 2-10 in the month under Matt Rhule. The Huskers have not won more than one game in November since 2016.

Since joining the Big Ten Conference, Nebraska is just 21-37. That includes going 4-0 in 2012.

“When you end the season the way we have the last two games, it has to rest solely on me,” Rhule said in his postgame opening statement.

Against Iowa, Nebraska is now 30-23-3 all-time. That includes going 3-1 in the first four years of being conference foes in the Big Ten.

But over the last decade-plus, it has been all Hawkeyes. Iowa has won 10-of-11 Black Friday contests. The lone win for the Huskers came under interim coach Mickey Joseph in 2022. The last full-time head coach for Nebraska to beat Iowa was Bo Pelini.

Nebraska’s only win over Iowa since joining the Big Ten was in the first year of the game, becoming a rivalry: 2011.

The talk from many (most? all?) of us surrounded the almost mythical boost Matt Rhule’s teams have taken in year three under him. Temple went 2-10 and 6-6 before posting back-to-back 10-win seasons. Baylor jumped from 1-11 to 7-6 to 11-3.

Nebraska has made improvements each season under Rhule. The 6-7 2023 was followed by a 7-6 last year. The Huskers are 7-5 and heading to a second straight bowl game, but these seven wins feel much further back compared to the seven wins in 2024, where Nebraska was getting over the hump by finally getting back to a bowl game and even winning it.

Hindering the potential for more wins down the stretch were injuries at the quarterback position. Dylan Raiola was lost midway through the USC game. TJ Lateef filled in admirably, leading the Huskers to a win at UCLA before struggling at Penn State and having a tough day against Iowa, which included tweaking his hamstring and limiting the type of playcalls that could involve him moving around.

“TJ got hurt early on in the game, and that limited a lot of the things that we wanted to do,” Rhule said. “(Offensive coordinator Dana Holgorsen) was like, ‘Hey, I’m not going to be able to move him around.’

“One of our big thoughts this game was, in the drop back game, he’d scramble around because sort of the way that they play, and we had to kind of abandon that early.”

Lateef finished 9-for-24 for 69 yards and no touchdowns through the air. This comes after another week of speculation and increased reports about Raiola’s future in Lincoln.

Ask Husker fans and media about Lateef being able to take the reins after the UCLA game? You’d have definitely received favorable answers. After the Iowa game? It might be better to roll into 2025 with some experience at that position, barring a major offseason of improvement for Lateef.

Nebraska was also playing a bunch of underclassmen all over the roster. The depth chart seemingly got younger by the week. That’s another place where another year of development could pay off handsomely for the program.

The year three bump didn’t happen, but some could also argue this was really year two (Scott Frost got a year zero!). That’s not the camp that I’m in, but whether that’s the case or not does not change how expectations lead into 2026.

Even if the record didn’t take a jump, the trajectory of the program looks improved. Questions remain ahead of signing day next week and the transfer portal in January. If the Huskers can get to next fall with this young talent making offseason jumps, the real Rhule bump could be just around the corner.

“I think people have a right to be upset with how (the season) ended,” Rhule said. “I’m going to work as hard as I can, as long as I can. I’m going to surround myself with really positive people, not toxic people, and try to continue to move the program forward.”

Have a question or comment for Kaleb? Send an email to kalebhenry.huskermax@gmail.com.

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Have a question or comment for Kaleb? Send an email to kalebhenry.huskermax@gmail.com.

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