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TheMichiganDaily, www.michigandaily.com

Behind Enemy Lines: A conversation with 
Nebraska football beat writer Jacob Bova

By MIKE PERSAK

Managing Sports Editor

In the softest part of its otherwise 
tough 
schedule, 
the 
Michigan 
football team has started to gain some 
momentum.
The 19th-ranked Wolverines (2-1) 
have dominated Western Michigan 
and SMU in the last two weeks, 
scoring a combined 94 points.
Now, though, things will begin 
to ramp up again for Michigan, as 
Nebraska (0-2) comes to Ann Arbor 
on Saturday, marking the start of Big 
Ten play.
The 
Cornhuskers 
have gotten off 
to a tough start in 
their first season 
under coach Scott 
Frost, falling to 
Colorado 
and 
Troy, 
both 
at 
home.
Nebraska 
quarterback 
Adrian Martinez 
suffered 
a 
leg 
injury 
against 
Colorado, and it’s possible that the 
Cornhuskers would be 2-0 if that 
hadn’t happened. Still, Nebraska 
seemingly hasn’t faced a team with 
Michigan’s talent.
The Daily caught up with Jacob 
Bova, a Nebraska football beat writer 
for The Daily Nebraskan, to talk 
about Cornhusker fans’ expectations 
for Frost, the health and ability 
of Martinez and predictions for 
Saturday’s game:
The Michigan Daily: With the 
first couple of losses, is there still a 
lot of faith in (Scott Frost) and a lot 
of hype for the program and where 
it’s headed? Or has it depleted at all? 
What’s your perspective on that?
Jacob Bova: I would say that a 
majority of Nebraska fans are going 
to give Scott Frost as much time as he 
needs to get this program right. There 
are like a few of those detractors that 
are already saying, like, ‘He’s 0-2. He’s 
not doing it.’ Those people are by far, 
they’re a loud minority. I feel like most 
Nebraskans will give Scott Frost the 
time he needs, and they have the faith 
that he will do the right thing. When 
he was at Nebraska as a quarterback 
and won the national title — by 
the way, we were the national title 
winners that year — anyways, 
when he won the national title that 

year, like, Scott Frost was loved by 
everyone. He’s always been someone 
that Nebraska fans — before he even 
got into coaching, he had some blogs 
that a lot of Nebraska fans followed. 
What he says has a lot of weight. And 
so, Scott Frost coming home, was 
like, it was seen by most Nebraskans 
as the only choice that Bill Moos, the 
athletic director, had. And people are 
gonna give him as much time as he 
needs. He just got a 7-year contract, 
so it’s like, I think most Nebraska fans 
are gonna be pretty patient with him.
TMD: Getting into the actual play 
this year, obviously Adrian Martinez 
goes down. Have you guys gotten any 
updates? Is he supposed to play this 
weekend? Does anybody know?
Bova: So what Frost said after 
the Troy game was that he looked 
good. And from what I saw from 
the sidelines during warmups, he 
was warming up, and there was no 
real, I mean, he had a brace on his 
knee, but he looks pretty close to 100 
percent, I would say. But at the end 
of the day, he didn’t practice until, I 
want to say (last week) Friday, I think 
— Thursday or Friday. So he didn’t 
practice until late in the week. This 
week, he’s practiced every day, and 
the offensive coordinator said that he 
looked better every day.
But this coaching staff is not one 
that’s going to risk putting him up 
against, I mean, Michigan’s d-line is 
for real, and our o-line hasn’t been the 
best. So he’ll be running a lot, and on 
a bad knee, if it’s still not 100 percent, 
there’s no way that Scott Frost is 
gonna risk it, especially since he’s a 
true freshman.
TMD: So if he doesn’t play, (backup 
quarterback Andrew) Bunch seemed 
to struggle a little bit. If you had to 
give a scouting report on Bunch, what 
would it be?
Bova: So for what he was told to 
do, he did an admirable job. The thing 
is, is what he was asked to do was not 
much. He didn’t offer any deep balls. 
I think he only had one completion 
when the ball went in the air for 15 
yards or more. So there was really no 
big play threat, yet, I mean, Nebraska 
has the receivers to do that. J.D. 
Spielman and Mike Williams are fast 
guys, and they can blow the top off a 
defense.
But, I don’t have enough faith in 
Bunch’s deep ball accuracy. Like he 
had a few throws deep that were just 
awful and into double coverage and 
that kind of thing. So honestly, Bunch 

starts, I have a hard time seeing 
Nebraska doing a lot. He’s a good 
enough athlete to where he can move 
the pocket, but he’s not a good enough 
athlete to run the read option, like, all 
the time.
I will say … if Martinez plays, what I 
would say is out of him, he’s a fantastic 
athlete. He’s a very good athlete, but 
also an underrated thrower. In the 
Colorado game, he had like a 50-yard 
pass to J.D. Spielman that was on a 
dime, like a perfect throw. And if he 
plays, first off, he’s going to be at 100 
percent, which means he’ll be able to 
run and do all that. So I would say if 
he plays, then I think that the game 
will get a little more interesting. If 
Bunch plays, I think it could be pretty 
ugly.
TMD: 
From 
an 
outsider’s 
perspective, a lot of the talk has been 
about the offense, … but I don’t know 
a ton about the defense. From what I 
can tell, the rush defense, pretty solid. 
The pass defense has been a little bit 
suspect, is that correct, or am I off on 
that?
Bova: No, that’s pretty accurate. 
I would say going into the year, a 
lot of people were asking questions 
about this defense. I mean, last year, 
the last three games, Nebraska gave 
up 50-plus points, and it was ugly. 
So there were a lot of questions 
going into this year of how the 
defense would look. But so far, the 
front seven has been, I think, has 
exceeded everyone’s expectations 
and have been very good. The game 

against Colorado, I’d say the corners, 
personally, I don’t think they played 
very bad. One of the corners, Dicaprio 
Bootle, this is his first year starting, 
and he’s physical and he’s played very 
well. The safeties in the Colorado 
game, I think is what cause a lot of the 
— Laviska Shenault, the wide receiver 
from Colorado, had a few where he 
just burned the defense. And I think 
that was a little more on the safeties 
than it was on the corners.
That being said, the Troy game last 
week, the secondary showed up. The 
secondary allowed — I think it was 
like 110 passing yards over the whole 
game. I mean, the defense, I’m more 
interested to see how they play against 
a team like Michigan, because, yeah, 
the rush defense’s numbers have been 
good, but it’s also been against Troy 
and Colorado, which are two teams 
that don’t run the ball very much.
And one last thing, the pass rush 
has been really good. They had seven 
sacks against Colorado and three last 
week against Troy. So, yeah, the pass 
rush has also been pretty potent.
TMD: Before the year, (did) you 
have a prediction of what you thought 
(Nebraska) would be? … What are 
your expectations for the rest of 
the year, and what would make a 
successful season for Nebraska?
Bova: So at the beginning of the 
year, I think 7-5 was seen as a decent 
number — like 7-5, maybe 8-4. But 
I guess there were pretty low-ish 
expectations, but also Nebraska’s 
schedule this year is brutal. I mean, 

we have to go to Michigan, to Ohio 
State, to Wisconsin, to Iowa and 
home against Michigan State. So it’s 
like, the schedule this year is brutal. 
And so, I think that 7-5, 6-6 or even 
8-4 were seen as probably like the 
baselines. Now? I mean, at this point, 
if Nebraska can get bowl eligible, that 
would be huge. That would require 
Nebraska, though, to win one of the 
Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, 
Wisconsin or Iowa games. Games that 
we’re gonna be significant underdogs 
in. You know, it requires us to win one 
of those and then not drop any of the 
other games. So, I think that if Scott 
Frost can get Nebraska to be bowl 
eligible this year, I think that would 
be seen as a success.
TMD: I know it’s hard to predict 
with the whole quarterback situation, 
but I want to ask you for a prediction. 
What do you think, score-wise, we’re 
looking at?
Bova: Earlier today, we have a 
podcast, and I had a score prediction 
21-9 Michigan. I feel like this game 
is gonna be pretty low-scoring. 
Michigan’s defense is for real. I think 
Nebraska’s defense is a lot better than 
what it was last year. But at the end 
of the day, I just don’t think that this 
team has enough — I don’t think this 
team is experienced enough and has 
had, I don’t know where the psyche is 
at this point. But I think the line was 
at like 18.5 or something like that, and 
I feel like that’s a little absurd. I think 
that might be a little much. But yeah, I 
said 21-9, I think, Michigan.

Nebraska at 
Michigan

Matchup: 
Nebraska 0-2; 
Michigan 2-1

When: Saturday 
12 P.M.

Where: 
Michigan 
Stadium

TV/Radio: ABC

EVAN AARON/Daily
Junior quarterback Shea Patterson will play in his first Big Ten conference game as Michigan’s quarterback on Saturday.

