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3 thoughts looking ahead to a huge recruiting weekend for Nebraska Football

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Nebraska Football
Robert Goddin-USA TODAY Sports

Nebraska football is hosting a huge recruiting weekend and here are three thoughts looking ahead with over 30 visitors coming to Lincoln.

Now that Big Ten Media Days are in the books, following another impressive performance by Matt Rhule, Nebraska football is literally just around the corner.

Players and coaches will move into the dorms on Sunday. Fall camp starts Monday and you can feel the excitement pulsing through Husker nation.

However, before the coaches get to work in fall camp, they have a final recruiting weekend to deal with and it’s going to be a big one for the Huskers. As of right now, 34 recruits are expected to visit Nebraska football over the next three days with 15 players from the 2024 class and 19 in 2025.

We have talked about some of these recruits such as Christian Jones taking a visit, or four-star offensive tackle Grant Brix. Some 2025 quarterbacks will be on campus too, plus Caleb Benning, and here are some thoughts heading into a huge recruiting weekend for Nebraska football.

It’s a key weekend for Caleb Benning’s recruitment

Things are picking up in the recruitment of Caleb Benning who took a visit already this week as soon as the dead period lifted. The lone crystal ball from 247 Sports is for Nebraska football but there is a question about how many defensive backs the Huskers will take.

Amare Sanders has been trending with projections to Nebraska football too. He’s a 6-foot-1, three-star cornerback from Florida and it seems like a commitment announcement could be coming soon.

However, I still wonder if the two recruitments are connected. Something Rhule said at Big Ten Media Days struck me. He talked about having a certain number of in-state guys but also how it meant more to them.

That’s why I think Nebraska is going to take Benning. That could have nothing to do with Sanders. They technically play different positions. The Huskers are playing five defensive backs now in their base defense so they are going to sign a lot of defensive backs.

Rhule’s statement about valuing those in-state kids — I thought about Benning immediately and after this weekend, I’m hoping the Huskers have the clear lead.

I believe you take as many good players as you can get, so if Sanders and Benning both want to commit, I see no issue with it.

Nebraska football shouldn’t overthink it with Benning and I don’t think they are or will.

A key weekend for 2025 quarterbacks

Daniel Kaelin is going to visit this weekend. The 2024 commitment was one of the first recruits to announce he was going to be on campus for the cookout hosted by Nebraska football.

Two other quarterbacks will be visiting the Huskers and they are in the 2025 class. Alex Manske is a 6-foot-3, 205-pound quarterback out of Iowa and this will be his third visit this summer.

Manske feels like the top target at the position. But winning his commitment won’t be easy, even though the Huskers do feel like they have built up some momentum.

Carson Boyd is also going to visit. He’s 6 feet, 170 pounds, and out of St. Louis. Both Rivals and 247 Sports have him ranked as a three-star prospect. Purdue is the leader via the On3 prediction machine but Boyd also took spring trips to Arkansas and Louisville.

Nebraska probably isn’t close to getting a commitment from either quarterback but it will be another step in that direction and at the quarterback position specifically, it will be interesting to see who comes back to visit for a game in the fall.

No commitment feels imminent

Things definitely change once recruits get on campus but it doesn’t feel like any of them visiting this weekend are close to a commitment at this point.

Nebraska football seems to have real momentum with Christian Jones. Maybe he would join Tyson Terry and Caden VerMass in committing early. VerMass and Terry are also ranked in the top three in the state for the 2025 class, along with Jones, who is No. 1.

All three players will be visiting this weekend, so a commitment is possible. There’s a reason Jones has gotten multiple crystal ball projections after all.

According to Sean Callahan, Grant Brix may want to take more visits in the fall before making a decision. Benning has talked about a later timeline and Devoux Tuataga — an EDGE rusher in 2024 — also seems like he will take an official visit in the fall to Nebraska and maybe other schools before deciding anything. He will visit Oregon this weekend after a visit to see the Huskers on Friday.

Anything can happen in recruiting, so a commitment is possible. I just wouldn’t bet on it.

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FB RECRUITING

Nebraska Football lands athletic playmaker in JD Crisp

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Nebraska Football
Mandatory Credit: Dylan Widger-USA TODAY Sports

Nebraska football continues to recruit for the 2024 class. They picked up a commitment from 2024 wide receiver JD Crisp on Wednesday afternoon. Crisp played both sides of the football in high school, playing both defensive back and wide receiver for Second Baptist High School.

He is not ranked in the 247Sports regular or Composite Rankings. However, he does have a solid offer sheet.  Crisp had seven offers in total, including one from Minnesota. He was officially offered by the program on September 16 and quickly made his decision.

It’s also worth noting that his recruitment was active throughout the summer. He attended Texas A&M Aggies camp on June 14. At the very least, he garnered interest from a prominent Texas school. That is notable in of itself.

What could he bring to Nebraska football?

It’s interesting that he is a two-way player. He played both the receiver and safety positions in high school. As far as Nebraska is concerned, I could certainly see him playing at receiver. He has as a tremendous amount of athleticism, and played mostly on the outside and high school. Crisp was very good at catching in space, and making contested catches and tight windows.

Playing receiver would make sense for him, given Nebraska’s lack of depth at the position moving forward. He has the agility and ability to become a solid piece if developed properly.

Nevertheless, he has overall qualities that could make him a good safety as well. This coaching staff loves the opportunity to work with athletes and molding them as they see fit. His ability to fire off the football and read a play certainly stands out.

The commitment of Crisp adds to a 2024 recruiting class that ranks 24th overall nationally. The class itself is stacked with talent. It currently has 25 commitments in total.

It will be interesting to see what Crisp can do for Nebraska football. He is definitely more of a project player. Nevertheless, his athleticism and speed is intriguing. One of this coaching staff’s strengths is identifying how players fit into the program. They will have to do that with Crisp.

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BASKETBALL

Nebraska Cornhuskers news: Jeff Sims still not 100 percent, a flip attempt, and more

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Matt Krohn-USA TODAY Sports

Nebraska football QB Jeff Sims still isn’t 100 percent, plus more Nebraska Cornhuskers news.

One thing we know for sure about the Nebraska football quarterback situation is that we won’t know anything until kickoff on Saturday against Louisiana Tech.

Matt Rhule said that he won’t be making any announcements prior to the game, similar to last week, about the starting quarterback. Marcus Satterfield told reporters on Tuesday that Sims took “50-55 percent of the snaps” so he’s improving, but according to Rhule, he’s still not 100 percent.

Rhule indicated that Sims is throwing the ball well. The Nebraska Cornhuskers just want to see some more movement skills out of their starting quarterback. One of the starting quarterbacks I should say since Sims and Heinrich Haarberg were listed as co-starters this week on the depth chart.

We’ll see how it plays out. If Sims is healthy, I expect that he will get the start or at least play, but with how thin Nebraska football is at running back, both quarterbacks will probably be needed, especially with their prowess for pounding the rock.

Nebraska Cornhuskers aiming to flip Michigan State 4-star

Andrew Dennis is a 6-foot-5, 275-pound offensive lineman rated as a four-star prospect by the 247 Sports composite rankings. He’s out of Mt. Pleasant, Michigan, and has been committed to Michigan State since April but Nebraska football is one of many programs to throw out a recent offer.

We don’t know if Dennis has any plans to visit Nebraska football. He’s been offered by Auburn, Stanford, Penn State, and Purdue just since Monday. I wouldn’t get too serious worrying about Dennis until he takes a visit to Nebraska, but if that happens, watch out.

It’s at least a name to keep on the radar and a decommitment definitely seems possible with the situation going on at Michigan State with Mel Tucker getting fired.

Nebraska Cornhuskers Big Ten basketball schedule released

We knew which teams Nebraska basketball would play in the 2023-24 Big Ten season but got the official schedule on Tuesday. The Huskers released it on their official Twitter account.

Nebraska basketball will open Big Ten on December 6th against Minnesota on the road. Fred Hoiberg’s first conference home game will be against Michigan State on December 10th.

The schedule is fairly balanced in terms of the home and road games. The Huskers have consecutive home games twice on the conference schedule. Nebraska has also back-to-back road games twice.

My first impressions though, are that Nebraska basketball is capable of a winning season in Big Ten play, which would definitely keep Fred Hoiberg in place and likely, would give the Huskers a realistic shot at making their first NCAA tournament since the 2014 season.

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Nebraska football is trending for a priority target, plus more Cornhuskers news

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Dylan Widger-USA TODAY Sports

Nebraska football seems to be closing in on the commitment of three-star athlete Caleb Benning, plus another win for volleyball.

For the first time this season, Nebraska football fans are enjoying a victory Monday following the Huskers’ 35-11 win over Northern Illinois on Saturday.

It was an important win for plenty of reasons. But Matt Rhule’s team needed some momentum. The Huskers got it with that win and now, they are picking up momentum with top recruiting target Caleb Benning.

Benning has been one of the top high school players in the state this fall. He was injured last year, which slowed down his recruitment, but the Huskers have been putting on the full-court press and hosted him for a visit during the game on Saturday.

After that, Benning told reporters how much he wanted to play in the Nebraska football defense. He also said that a decision could be “pretty soon” which sounds like great news for the Huskers.

Over the weekend, Nebraska football also picked up a new expert projection to land Benning from Bryan Munson of Husker Online. This was after another recent crystal ball from 247 Sports.

The On3 prediction machine now gives the Huskers a 91-percent chance to win the commitment of Benning, while all of the crystal ball projections agree. Even Greg Smith, a former Nebraska insider who covers Midwest recruiting for rivals, also projected Benning to Nebraska.

The 5-foot-10, 183-pounder is one of the top targets left on the board along with the likes of Grant Brix, Brandon Baker, and Jayshawn Ross. His addition to the 2024 class would be huge and regardless of his ranking, Benning is a player the Huskers need on their roster in the future.

Nebraska volleyball notches another top-25 win

The Cornhuskers were back in the Bob Devaney Center on Sunday and scored another win over a top-25 opponent, their second of the week with a 3-1 win over Kentucky by the scores of 25-14, 25-22, 23-25, and 25-21.

Merritt Beason was on fire for Nebraska volleyball as she had a team-high 17 kills, a total that was matched by freshman standout Harper Murray. Beason also added three blocks, as did Murrary, but Beason hit .438 compared to .308 for Murrary.

Nebraska had 62 kills compared to 53 for Kentucky, which was limited to just a .243 hitting percentage. The Huskers only had four service aces but Bergen Reilly had 32 assists in the win, while Lexi Rodriguez pitched in with 18 digs and had a perfect serve-receive percentage.

The Cornhuskers (9-0) open Big Ten play this week against Ohio State on Friday at 8 PM CST.

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