On Saturday afternoon (3 p.m. CT, Peacock), No. 13 Illinois (8-2, 1-0 Big Ten) will host No. 23 Nebraska (10-0, 1-0 Big Ten) in Champaign for an early-season ranked-on-ranked Big Ten showdown.

The Cornhuskers made their season debut in the AP poll this Monday. Two days later, they dismantled – by 30 points – a Wisconsin club that entered the season ranked in the top 25, knocking off the Badgers 90-60 in Lincoln.

ESPN’s matchup predictor makes its pick for Illinois-Nebraska

Yet on Saturday, according to ESPN’s analytics, the odds are not at all in Nebraska’s favor. The matchup predictor gives Illinois a 77.5 percent chance of staving off the visitors this weekend.

And it makes sense for two key reasons: 1) Home-court advantage. Playing at home, especially in Big Ten action, already gives any team a massive leg up. For example, the Illini, despite losing 14 conference games over the past two seasons, have just five league losses on their home floor during that stretch.

2) Illinois is really good.

The AP poll doesn’t always reflect reality. Both of these clubs may, in fact, be better than their respective rankings in that poll. Nevertheless, the difference between the No. 20 team and the No. 25 team isn’t nearly as drastic as the difference between the No. 5 and No. 10 team.

LINCOLN, Neb. — One month ago, on the heels of a breakthrough performance by Emmett Johnson against UCLA, Nebraska launched a Heisman Trophy push for the junior running back.

Johnson enjoyed the limelight. Fans flocked to see him during an appearance in downtown Lincoln and at the high school championship games inside Memorial Stadium. He traveled home to Minneapolis during the Huskers’ bye week and visited his high school, Academy of Holy Angels. He had stopped in previously, but this trip was different.

“It was like a celebrity came to the school,” Holy Angels coach Jim Gunderson said.

In the final two games of the regular season with Nebraska, Johnson rushed for 320 yards, but the Huskers lost them in ugly fashion against Penn State and Iowa to cap a 7-5 regular season. As fast as the Heisman campaign began, it was over — but worthwhile, nonetheless.

Johnson ran this season in part so that running backs at Nebraska who follow him can fly. He leaves Nebraska with a sterling legacy.

On Wednesday, Johnson became the first Nebraska player to receive first-team All-America mentions since linebacker Lavonte David in 2011 — and the fourth running back in the past 70 years, matching Mike Rozier (1982 and ’83), Jarvis Redwine (1980) and Jeff Kinney (1971). His final year ranks among the top five in school history by a running back. Stack it alongside Rozier’s 1983 Heisman season, Lawrence Phillips in 1994, Ahman Green in 1997 and Ameer Abdullah in 2013.

Nebraska coach Matt Rhule and his staff aim to use Johnson’s success to help bring backs to Lincoln who can finish what he started.

“It’s very much not in vogue anymore not to wait your turn,” Rhule said. “Sometimes, it’s like, ‘I’ll just go here and do this, just go there.’ But guys like Emmett had chances. And they stayed. And he deserves everything that he’s getting.”

Johnson was named the Big Ten running back of the year, a first at Nebraska. Last Friday, he declared for the 2026 NFL Draft, foregoing his final season of eligibility and the Dec. 31 Las Vegas Bowl.

High praise for the B1G’s top back@Emmett21Johnson pic.twitter.com/g7EhpUE2EP

— Nebraska Football (@HuskerFootball) December 11, 2025

What separated Johnson this year?

• His 1,130 yards in Big Ten play were the most by a Power 4 back in conference play. He stands alone with 1995 Heisman winner Eddie George as the only Big Ten players to total 1,100 rushing yards and 300 receiving yards in one season of league play.

• Johnson led the nation by accounting for 40.8 percent of his team’s total yards.

• He was the fourth FBS player since 2017 to average 120 yards rushing and 30 yards receiving.

• His 1,821 yards from scrimmage and 1,451 rushing ranked second and third, respectively, in the FBS.

In form true to his roots, Johnson proved wrong skeptics who believed he could not handle 20 carries per game in Big Ten play.

Does everyone realize how freaking good Emmett Johnson is for @HuskerFootball ? Dude is a straight balla. Quick, decisive, tough, great as a receiver. One of the most underrated RB’s in the Country!

— David Pollack (@davidpollack47) November 28, 2025

“He has always had that chip to prove people wrong and be great,” Gunderson said. “This is how he envisioned it going, and he wasn’t going to be denied.”

Four years ago, on a Sunday in mid-December, less than a week before the signing period opened, Johnson accepted a Nebraska scholarship offer. Ron Brown extended it.

A month earlier, Scott Frost, the Nebraska coach from 2018 to 2022, fired four offensive assistants. Brown, with 24 years of experience as a Nebraska assistant under three head coaches, was elevated late in that season from offensive analyst to running backs coach. He reviewed tape of Johnson, who scored 42 touchdowns and rushed for 2,500 yards at Holy Angels in 2021.

And Brown wondered why no big school had snatched up Johnson.

“I was perplexed,” Brown said. “Because when I saw Emmett play, I thought, ‘This guy is special.’”

Brown had recruited Abdullah from high school in Alabama to Nebraska in 2011. And Brown coached Abdullah in his back-to-back 1,600-yard seasons as a junior and senior before an NFL career that continues this year in its 11th season. In Johnson, Brown saw some of Abdullah’s vision, change of direction, endurance and ability to recover.

Brown quizzed Gunderson, the Holy Angels coach, about Johnson.

“I probably threw 100 questions at him,” Brown said, “looking for something that might be a little bit off, something that I had missed.”

Nothing.

“Coach Brown could just see the intangibles,” Gunderson said, “the stuff that isn’t measured. He saw the potential and the kind of kid who was going to work and who believed in himself.”

Johnson started six games as a redshirt freshman in 2023. He started five in 2024 and found his rhythm in the Nebraska offense when Dana Holgorsen arrived as coordinator last season. In December 2024, Johnson considered entering the transfer portal.

Holgorsen’s commitment helped get him to stay.

“ I think he just wanted to know that somebody had a plan for him,” Gunderson said.

The plan was never to leave Nebraska early. Johnson simply wanted the chance to receive a heavy workload.

He got 32 offensive touches against Cincinnati in the 2025 opener, 24 against Michigan, 23 against Maryland and 29 against Northwestern. In November, after quarterback Dylan Raiola was injured, Johnson stacked three games with 31 opportunities apiece and a 27-touch effort against Penn State.

“This dude really did what he said he was going to do,” Nebraska tight end Luke Lindenmeyer said.

His reliability never came into question.

“I’m so proud of Emmett, man,” senior cornerback Ceyair Wright said. “I think his success is a product of who he is as a person, how he treats people and the work that he puts in.”

His humility and care for others rate as Johnson’s most admirable trait. Johnson said he wanted to share credit with his teammates for the accomplishments of this season. He rushed for 177 yards in the first half against Iowa and 217 for the game. But he stressed in the aftermath that he felt badly for older teammates who played their final games in Lincoln on Black Friday.

Turns out, he was among them. Johnson takes pride, he said, in building a new reputation for Nebraska running backs — more than a decade after Abdullah departed, three decades after Green and 42 years after Rozier’s Heisman.

“It matters a lot,” Johnson said, “because Nebraska is a special place. I want to be able to have recruits look at this place and know it’s special. It is special. I’m blessed to be the one doing that and helping. It’s bigger than just football.

“There are a lot of great humans here. That’s what I want to help push.”