Here are five quick takes on Nebraska's updated 10-game schedule for the 2020 football schedule.
Big Ten sticks to their guns with a Sept. 5 start
When the other Power Five leagues all announced they were going to start between Week 2 and Week 4, it was hard to know which way the Big Ten would go?
With that said, many thought the Big Ten might go later and follow the trend of the other Power Five leagues. Credit commissioner Kevin Warren and the leaders of this conference though. They had a plan to start Week 1 on Sept. 5, and that plan offered flexibility.
This gives the Big Ten the ability to play 10 games over 12 weeks, with another four weeks of built-in flexible scheduling after the original 12-week season.
Huskers get a great draw out of the gates
When you play a 10-game conference schedule, getting off to a great start is very important. For Nebraska, they got served up about as favorable of an opening two games as any team in the league.
NU will open at Rutgers and then play Illinois in Lincoln. The Huskers should be favorites in both of these games. It really sets up things nicely for the Huskers to generate some early momentum.
Then, you get Wisconsin back in Lincoln for the second year in a row. This decision is very interesting because NU now travels to Purdue for the second year in a row.
NU gets another schedule break with Michigan State
When the league said they were adding another crossover game for each Big Ten West school, you never know how that's going to play out.
NU has gotten some bad luck with their Big Ten schedule draws in the past. This year they caught quite a break adding Michigan State on Week 12.
The Spartans have a brand new head coach in Mel Tucker and they did not have a spring or traditional off-season to set a solid foundation for this season. They also play Rutgers out of the East, who has a first-year head coach in Greg Schiano.
Getting Wisconsin at home again was quite a break for NU on the scheduling front as well.
This schedule was built for flexibility
On top of the early start, the Big Ten did their best to match-up bye weeks with division teams in order to make adjustments.
Nebraska shares byes with Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin in Week 7, while they share byes with Purdue, Northwestern, Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota in Week 10.
This will allow for division games to be possibly made up on either of those bye weeks if there are any COVID-19 hick-ups along the way.
Camp opens Friday
The other thing with this schedule release on Wednesday is it allows Big Ten teams to open up Fall Camp on Friday.
It was very important to get this schedule out early on Wednesday because a lot of things now need to go into place in order for Big Ten teams to open up Fall Camp on Friday and follow all the new safety guidelines put in place by the league.
