Run game impressive, defense still wins spring game 46-41
Offense was relatively hard to come back in Nebraska’s annual Red-White Spring Game on Saturday afternoon, but most of the highlights on that side of the ball came courtesy of an impressive day from Tommy Armstrong and his running backs.
In front of a crowd of 72,992, the senior quarterback ended up accounting for 200 yards of total offense, including 120 rushing yards and a touchdown on just six carries.
Senior running back Terrell Newby and sophomores Devine Ozigbo and Mikale Wilbon combined for 110 yards and two touchdowns on the ground, as NU ended up with 343 total rushing yards and four scores on 64 attempts.
In a reshuffled format that pitted the offense vs. the defense rather than splitting up the team via a draft, the Huskers’ first-team offense came roaring out of the gates against a defense made up of second- and third-teamers.
The running game had little problem marching 75 yards on eight plays for a touchdown. Newby ripped off runs of 23 and 18 yards and Ozigbo added a 22-yard rumble before Newby capped it off with a one-yard touchdown dive.
Later on in the second quarter, Armstrong reeled off a 44-yard run on a zone read keeper, and Wilbon used a pretty cutback move to score from six yards out.
There wouldn’t be another traditional score until the very last play of the half, as kicker Drew Brown connected on a 47-yard field goal as time expired to send the offense into halftime up 23-16.
In all, the offense rushed 29 times for 170 yards and two touchdowns in the first half, led by 66 yards on just three carries by Armstrong and six rushes for 48 yards and a score by Newby.
Armstrong was also 7-of-13 passing for 72 yards in the opening half and finished 8-of-15 for 80 yards.
"I'm just hoping as a unit we're able to do what we did out there, and if I have to run the ball, I'll run the ball," Armstrong said. "It's all on the coaches. They'll put us in the right position to win games. If it takes me running the ball a little bit more, I'm up for it. But we've got athletes all over the field. We just have to make sure we get the ball in our playmakers' hands."
Armstrong capped off his day with one of the best plays of the game, taking a designed keeper up the middle for a 37-yard touchdown early in the third quarter.
As far as the game’s outcome, redshirt freshman defensive back Kyle Kasun picked off true freshman quarterback Patrick O’Brien on the final play to give the defense a 46-41 victory as time expired.
"The football part of it, there's going to be stuff like there always is after every practice that you're just going to say, 'Jeez, we've just got to do this or that better.' head coach Mike Riley said. "We kind of sputtered around a bit sometimes, and then we looked pretty crisp offensively at times...
"Defensively, I think there was some great improvement in the fact that we didn't allow a lot of big plays and were pretty sound all the way around."