Is the problem with the 0-2 Nebraska football team that players are half-ass’ing their assignments on game day? 

Cornhuskers defensive back Marquel Dismuke did not say that, exactly, but he implied his teammates have to play above reproach going forward or the returns could be as bad or worse the rest of the fall.

“We can’t put our heads down and go half-ass—half-speed, my bad,” Dismuke was quoted stating to the Omaha-World Herald. 

The senior from Compton, California later said the team could not use an empty Memorial Stadium as an excuse for poor player. Nebraska has sold out every home football game in Lincoln reaching back to John F. Kennedy’s presidential administration in the early 1960’s and have traditionally enjoyed a robust and electric home crowd to cheer them on.

“If you’re focused on the stands, you’re focusing on the wrong thing,” Dismuke told the World-Herald.

The winless Cornhuskers are hosting the suddenly sheepish 0-3 Penn State Nittany Lions. The Nittany Lions were nearly universally selected to pick up their first victory of the season last Saturday at home against Maryland, but instead took a 35-19 drubbing that was only made to look closer by 12 points scored during 4th quarter garbage time when the game was out of reach. The Nittany Lions have gone from potential playoff team to the bottom of the Big Ten East in three ugly weeks.

It’s true 2020 has been a strange year. Now you can add to that two of college football’s most tradition rich programs playing each other in November for the first win of the season between the pair of them.