Teams going to bowls get 15 extra practices before those games. Coaches always rave about that aspect of postseason play.

What Nebraska coach Scott Frost wouldn’t give to have those extra practices.

Because as it is, his young team has grown so much in three months. Since September, the Cornhuskers have gone from losing at home to a Sun Belt Conference team to winning three out of four in Big Ten play and almost taking down a top-10 Ohio State team.

If Nebraska could start this season over now, the results would probably be quite different.

The thing that sticks out to anybody who has watched Big Red all season is how much the team has matured and improved in a lot of areas. Bad teams led badly keep losing by bigger margins every week (looking at you, Louisville) while bad teams led well find a reason to fight and start to become respectable, or even good, by November.

Nebraska lands in that latter category.

Make no mistake: This program is still deficient in a lot of areas. The defense is often porous and it really only all came together on Saturday (more on that later). Nebraska is consistent in a bad way: It is 12th of 14 teams in the B1G in total defense (434.9 yards per game), passing defense (245.5) and rushing defense (189.5) — for good measure, the Cornhuskers are also 12th in the league in points allowed at 31.3 per game.

The special teams has been pretty bad all season, there have been penalties aplenty and the turnover battle has mostly not gone Nebraska’s way. There is not much depth at key positions and the injury bug has struck at unfortunate times, exacerbating the depth issue.

But the team has found a way around these problems more often than not in recent weeks, even if it has not always been pretty. Last week’s 9-6 victory over Michigan State is a perfect example.

“Every week I have been coaching them, I think there is a little more fight,” Frost said after his team improved to 4-7 by defeating the Spartans. “…I haven’t seen these guys quit. I’ve seen them keep practicing better and better. I’ve seen them keep playing harder. I’ve seen them come together better as a team.”

The Cornhuskers only rushed for 103 yards on Saturday. Then again the Spartans lead the FBS in rushing defense at 78.9 yards allowed per game, so even surpassing 100 is something of a victory. Freshman quarterback Adrian Martinez struggled, completing 16 of 37 passes for 145 yards. The Cornhuskers were shut out for three quarters in their home finale.

But a funny thing happened on the way to what easily could have been another loss in a season rife with losing. Nebraska found a way to win. Moreover, it found a way to win thanks to the very things that had been biting Big Red all season.

The special teams stepped up, especially freshman kicker Barret Pickering. He was huge against the Spartans, nailing three field goal attempts in the fourth quarter. Even better, he set he career long with a 36-yarder for his first field goal, then topped that with a 47-yarder for the winner. And he did it despite a pretty heavy snowfall and a strong wind in the second half.

And the defense? All that unit did was set its season lows in Big Ten play for points allowed, yards allowed (289) and first downs allowed (18). The unit registered seven tackles for loss, eight pass breakups and two turnovers. Most crucially, Damion Daniels recovered a Spartans fumble to set up Nebraska’s tying field goal. After that Nebraska surrendered just 68 yards total on three MSU drives, giving the offense enough time to slog toward the winning field goal then kill the clock in the final two minutes.

No, Frost and the Cornhuskers won’t get a do-over on the season. They will finish either 5-7 or 4-8 and miss out on a bowl. But there is still satisfaction to be drawn considering the progression from the team which got blown out in the last four games last season and started 0-6 in 2018.

“Some of the growing things we had to go through were necessary, and I’m crushed for the seniors we couldn’t get that (turnaround) done quicker,” Frost said Saturday. “This team has been through so much and to be where it is right now and have the second half of the season it’s been having, it makes it really special. And I think the seniors will probably look back on this and think it was a pretty special season after all.”