JD PicKell: How Nebraska's new-look defense will match up against Big Ten offenses

Consider On3’s JD PicKell a believer in Nebraska’s new-look defense under Tony White’s guidance.

In his latest episode of The Hard Count, PicKell explained how the Cornhuskers will match up against traditional Big Ten offenses, believing Nebraska has the recipe for success moving forward.

“So breaking this down, the Big Ten, like I said a ‘Bust-You-Up’ kind of conference historically,” started PicKell. “Michigan, you saw what they did last year. Iowa, historically, a run the football kind of team. Dealing with Wisconsin, Minnesota. Like, that’s the approach in the Big Ten. We’re going to line it up, try and move you against your will. So how will a 3-3-5 defense work? There’s a couple of main goals with Tony White’s defense, who’s the defensive coordinator for Nebraska under Matt Rhule, just so we’re all on the same page.

“Goal No. 1, we’re going to attack the offense with speed. Remember, we took some big bodies off the field. We took one big body off the field, but guess what? We put an extra fast guy on the field. We put one more safety on the field for us, okay. A little more speed. You can be a little bit more nimble. The thought behind the 3-3-5, I think the perception is it’s kind of like a net. You’ve got more guys that can spread out across the defense with this 3-3-5. I would say in reality, the goal is for it to be more of an attacking defense. Think of it as more of a swarm than a net, does that make sense? Because you’ve got speed on the field. We may not be as big, on theory at least, on paper, but we can get to the ball a little bit quicker. We have a little bit more speed we can attack you with.”

In addition to speed, PicKell believes that the 3-3-5 defense White is going to deploy at Nebraska will confuse Big Ten offenses, and it could work greatly to the Cornhuskers advantage.

“That’s the other side of this. They want to be confusing in a 3-3-5 defense,” explained PicKell. “Because with running backs pre-snap, and quarterbacks pre-snap trying to figure out where a blitz is coming from, where a pressure is coming from. Pre-snap, you’re look at the safeties, so we think with one more safety on the field, we can be a little bit more creative. We can mix and match where we want to lineup those three safeties. We can put one on the box and have two up high. We can put all three back. We can creep up towards the line of scrimmage. There’s a lot more creative liberty we can take now with this personnel on the field. So we can attack in more creative ways, we can be more confusing, we have more speed on the field. This is why I think this has a very good chance to work.

“One, it’s worked before. I mean Tony White, his track record speaks for itself. Last year, Syracuse was Top 26 in terms of pass yards allowed per game, and rush yards allowed per game. So there’s a strong track record there. Other side of this is the defense itself, when you look at how it’s supposed to work, you’re not trying to play other teams in the Big Ten kind of game.”

Time will tell if it works out for Nebraska, but JD PicKell, and of course Matt Rhule, are believers in Tony White’s defense to get the job done inside the Big Ten.