Nebraska football fans don’t agree on much. One thing they do agree on is that the days of dominance are probably never coming back.
From 1968 to 2001, Nebraska won at least nine games every single year. 34 years in a row. Tom Osborne retired. Frank Solich was run out of town, ironically, after a nine-win season, a fate that awaited Bo Pelini 11 years later in 2014.
Since Pelini was fired, Nebraska has had one nine-win campaign. The Huskers have only had a winning record twice, and just last season, ended an eight-year bowl drought.
So it’s understandable when people say things like, “Nebraska can’t win a national championship in this new era of college football.”
Many Nebraska fans will likely nod their heads in agreement, most of them anyway. It’s a harsh, but true reality. Plenty have given up on experiencing the good old days.
Dr. Tom isn’t walking through that door, after all, at least not as the head coach.
Nebraska will probably never experience a run of playing in the national championship game four times in five years, with four conference titles, three national championships, three Orange Bowl wins, and a Fiesta Bowl win, plus just three losses — one in the national title game to Florida State in 1994.
Over five years, Nebraska lost one regular-season game. Frankly, it’s hard to see any program, let alone the Huskers, have that kind of success over the next decade.
But does that mean Nebraska can’t win the national championship…ever?
That’s a bridge too far. With the right head coach, the right quarterback, and the right circumstances, this program can win it all again.
It won’t be easy. I wouldn’t bet on it either. But if Michigan can win a national championship, Nebraska can.
Some will say Nebraska isn’t positioned well enough in NIL, which might be true. But in the 2024 class and the 2027 class, they landed five-star caliber quarterbacks. If you can do that, you can win any recruitment.
Will Nebraska ever consistently sign top-10 classes? Probably not.
However, they proved in the 2025 class that they can sign a class with a blue-chip percentage of 60 percent. Regardless of the team ranking, if that is sustained, and the roster is made up of at least 50 percent blue-chips, from a high school recruiting perspective, that’s the sweet spot.
Quarterback recruiting is paramount. LSU and Clemson won national titles with blue-chip ratios just over 60 percent, much lower than some of the years Alabama won, because they had truly elite quarterbacks.
Nebraska needs someone like Dylan Raiola or Trae Taylor, or even beyond, to play like Joe Burrow, DeShaun Watson, or even J.J. McCarthy for a season. Michigan had a great defense and running game, but it wouldn’t have sniffed the natty without a first-round quarterback.
You also need to be elite at developing talent. In the 2022 class, Michigan signed Mason Graham, Kenneth Grant, and Colston Loveland — players ranked outside the top 200 overall.
All three wound up as top-15 picks.
Nebraska isn’t going to sign multiple five-star recruits in a class or a dozen top-100 prospects like Ohio State or Alabama. Yet, Michigan didn’t either. It had an NFL head coach capable of developing those players into something more, and that’s something Nebraska has the chance to replicate with Matt Rhule.
So even though it might seem impossible, Nebraska has enough recruiting-wise to be in that 50-60 percent range from a blue-chip perspective. The Huskers have proven they can do that and land elite quarterbacks before having any meaningful on-field success.
If Rhule starts winning with Nebraska, as in 9-10 win seasons, recruiting will take off. The draft picks will start piling up, and more talent will come to Lincoln.
Not enough to rival Ohio State or Georgia, or Texas, but enough to make the playoff. From there, with the right coach, the right quarterback, and the right kind of development, anything is possible.
Even a national championship.
It might seem far-fetched, and expecting a national title from Nebraska anytime soon is crazy. But impossible?
No, the Huskers winning a national championship isn’t impossible. They just need the right pieces and a lot of luck.
Chris has worked in sports journalism since 2005 writing for multiple newspapers and websites such as the Bleacher Report and Fansided before starting Husker Big Red, A fan site for hardcore followers of the #Huskers offering articles, podcasts, videos and more exclusive content on all things Nebraska
