Some Mashing on messaging and the Husker QB room for 2024. As the portal peering goes on, let’s Mash it up. Quarterbacks are a main subject in this space. Of course they are. Ones in the portal and already here. What might Husker offensive coordinator’s Marcus Satterfield’s message be in visits with portal QBs?
If you’ve listened to him closely in some past interviews, you probably have a clue.
Earlier in the season he spoke on what he tells skilled position recruits as the Huskers waded through this first season with three different quarterbacks, injuries to some key receivers and backs, and turnover troubles.
Mainly, he said then, prospects can just look at this staff’s track record, which he believes shows how versatile they have been.
«I’ve coached a long time so I think you can look at the majority of my career. You can look back to the last two years and you can kind of see once everything gets put into place kind and what it looks like,» Satterfield said in mid-October. «If there’s a time we need to throw it 45 times for 600 yards and we run it five times, we’ll do that. We’ll figure out how to do it. We’re going to adapt to the guys we have and those guys trust us through the recruiting process and the relationships we’ve built.»
He thinks those skilled position prospects understand there’s bigger things ahead for this offense than just the 2023 chapter, and the surrounding circumstances, showed.
«They know that if you’re a receiver and you’re really fast and you can catch the ball, we’re not going to recruit you to come and block,» he said. «Like, you’re going to have to block but we’re bringing you here to throw you the ball and be a game-changer and help us win games. I think they trust us, trust the vision, trust what we’re doing here and know that when it’s all said and done that every position, every skill set, is going to be rewarded in this offense.»
QBs that Satterfield has visited with early this week you’d guess got a taste of what else could be going forward. Husker QB commit Daniel Kaelin, who got a visit from coaches this weekend, heard that message.
“The offense is not cookie cutter. It can adapt to personnel and the players they have,» Kaelin said of his recent conversation with Matt Rhule and Satterfield. «We were talking about it last night. They want to be pro style and be able to run every type of play and having everything in the arsenal.»
And while the ‘close’ word is kind of a bad word for this fan base at this point, maybe it will carry appeal to a quarterback who could see himself as the needed ingredient to help a team find those Ws that have been just beyond reach.
How many scholarship quarterbacks should a room have?
While the previous staff used to say five scholarship QBs on a team was the goal, actually pulling that off in this day and age seems like a feat in itself.
Not that you can’t shoot for it and maybe occasionally pull it off. It’s just that common sense and past history show us it’s a balancing act bolstering competition at quarterback while keeping the room’s depth to ideal size too.
Last year, as example, the Huskers had three QBs (Casey Thompson, Logan Smothers and Richard Torres) leave after the spring for various reasons, with Jeff Sims, Chubba Purdy and Heinrich Haarberg as the scholarship QBs remaining by the season.
If the Huskers had four QBs come next fall, I’d say job well done on the numbers front at least. The rest of it, we’ll see. You still need one of those guys to have the passing game vision, quick blinker and clutch gene not present enough in 2023.
On our site we’ve highlighted four portal QB names to this point we’ve gathered that the Huskers have interest in – and vice versa, it seems. With the QB portal conversation you’ll always hear someone out there say, ‘Go add two!’ Nebraska did actually pull that off in the December of 2021 with Thompson and Purdy, which was impressive, honestly. But that’s easier exclaimed than acted upon sometimes.
Adding one could be the shrewd play here. Especially considering what Matt Rhule said about Chubba Purdy and Heinrich Haarberg just last week. He pointed out Heinrich Haarberg wasn’t even in the QB meetings in 2022 before Rhule’s staff got there and the coach was proud of how he competed in his first real season of opportunity at the position.
Then with Purdy, «I saw a lot of positives in the way that Chubba played. I say to myself if Chubba had played more throughout the course of the year, would he be further along?» Rhule said. «And for whatever reasons he didn’t. He got banged up and all those different things. I think Chubba has a high ceiling.»
The Chubba conversation, and how he may have shifted it around here by his performance the last couple games, is central to all of this. If you believe enough in what you saw in those last couple games, one strong portal QB add to the equation would make it a possibly robust competition when spring shows up – with the early enrollee Kaelin also part of the mix.
Certainly you want an addition that relishes such competition.
Is it too early to speak of ‘gotta have it’ games in December for college hoops?
Yeah, probably.
Losing one game to a loaded team like Creighton does not desperation make. But no question Nebraska basketball has a biggie on Wednesday night at Minnesota at 8 p.m. Winning on the road in the Big Ten is not easy, no matter the foe. Yes, the Gophers are a team picked around the bottom of the league by most prognosticators. But Nebraska doesn’t get a lot of love at the moment in such preseason polling either. The Huskers (7-1) could get a giddy up back in their step by winning and starting league play off 1-0.
It’d probably bring folks back to PBA on this Sunday with some energy too when Michigan State comes to town. It might be an angry Spartans’ squad for that one. Tom Izzo’s bunch will be 4-4 and coming off a 13-point loss to Wisconsin. Sounds like a mean dog to deal with.
First things first: Gophers.
The Huskers have to obviously shoot it a lot better than they did Sunday, but also regain that defensive edge and tenacity on the boards. That could settle what I expect to be a close game in Minneapolis, a place where Nebraska won in overtime a season ago.
«I could sit here all day and tell you the same freaking thing. We gotta get better from this,» Husker head coach Fred Hoiberg said Sunday. «It’s something that we’re gonna grow from. I love the character and makeup of our team. We’ve got veteran guys and an old team. We’re gonna bounce back. We’re gonna compete on Wednesday and hopefully get back in the win column.”
A shot of hope for the road or just a fun fact existing in its own space – depending on your mood…
Two years ago Mike Norvell finished off his second season at Florida State with a 5-7 record and 3-point loss to a rival on Thanksgiving weekend.