Teams led by coaches with plenty of experience operating on the hot seat meet Saturday in Lincoln, Neb., when Nebraska hosts Georgia Southern in a nonconference game.
Nebraska coach Scott Frost is high on most lists of college football coaches likely to be fired this season, a spot solidified when his Cornhuskers opened the season by blowing a two-score lead and a loss to Big Ten foe Northwestern. The Huskers evened their record at 1-1 last week with a 38-17 home win over North Dakota, though the game was tied at 17 in the third quarter.
“Looking back on the game I thought there was a lot of good things we could take from it,” Frost said. “Usually when you watch tape nothing’s as good as you think or as bad as you think. It’s been a process to get everyone on the same page.”
Georgia Southern opened its season with a 59-7 home win over Morgan State, making for a solid debut under new coach Clay Helton. Helton was hired by the Eagles last November after he was fired by USC two games into his seventh season as head coach.
Helton’s USC tenure involved several seasons on the rumor mill as the Trojans never achieved the national heights expected at USC — much like Frost’s experience at Nebraska.
Following their season-opening pratfall, the Cornhuskers rushed for 244 yards and three touchdowns against North Dakota, more than doubling their ground production from the first game. Junior Anthony Grant ran for 189 yards and two scores, earning Big Ten Offensive Co-Player of the Week honors.
Georgia Southern got 367 passing yards and four TD passes from quarterback Kyle Vantrease, a 6th-year senior transfer from Buffalo who tied the school record for TDs and had the Eagles’ first 300-yard passing game since 2008.
Picked to finish fifth in the Sun Belt’s East Division, Georgia Southern is 0-2 all-time against the Big Ten with losses at Indiana (2017) and Minnesota (2019). The Eagles are 2-30 against current power-conference teams, the last win coming at Florida in 2013 when they were still at the FCS level.
Nebraska is 15-2 against Sun Belt schools, most recently losing at home to Troy in 2018 — Frost’s first season, when the Cornhuskers started 0-6. Nebraska is now 16-30 under Frost.
–Field Level Media