I Said 52-10. It Was 56-7. Vegas Missed by 18.5.

Husker Nation, I put my name on a number Saturday morning. Here it is graded, no spin.

I said Nebraska 52, Bowling Green 10. It finished Nebraska 56, Bowling Green 7.

The scorecard

	Said	Margin	Off by
My pick	52-10	42	7
The line	Nebraska by 30.5	30.5	18.5
The model	38-10	28	21
Final	56-7	49	—

That line is the 30.5 it had drifted to when my pick went up Saturday morning. (Thursday’s board had it at 29.5. Use that one and Vegas was 19.5 off. The order doesn’t change.)

Score by score, my pick was off by 3.5 points a team: four short on Nebraska, three high on Bowling Green. The model was off by 10.5.

And the one I’m quietly proudest of: I had 62 total points. There were 63. The over/under on Thursday’s board was 51.5.

Two weeks, same story

The week before, I had Nebraska 42, Ohio 17. It finished 49-21.

Margin off by	Ohio	Bowling Green
My pick	3	7
The line	4.5	18.5
The model	11	21

Both weeks I also landed on the right side of the number, which is the one test that actually matters against a bookmaker. I had Nebraska winning by more than Vegas said: 25 against 23.5, then 42 against 30.5. Both times they did.

What I got right

The run game. I said Bowling Green’s quarterback was a pocket passer, not the kind of problem Ohio’s was. Bowling Green ran it 32 times for 85 yards, and no quarterback run appears anywhere in the box score.

Owen Chambliss played. Four tackles in his Nebraska debut.

The Blackshirts scored. I asked Saturday morning whether they would put points on the board themselves. Derek Wacker picked up a fumble and took it 25 yards for a touchdown in the fourth quarter.

What I got wrong

Nebraska, by four. I had 52, and this offense put up 56, with Anthony Colandrea throwing four touchdowns. I keep being told to trust this team less than I do, and I still wasn’t high enough.

And Bowling Green’s ten. They got seven, and didn’t get those until the fourth quarter was a minute old.

The honest part

Saturday morning I said that if it stayed close, I’d wear it. It didn’t stay close. That doesn’t make me smarter than Las Vegas. Two games is nothing, and one sharp Saturday can be luck as easily as reading. The model’s job is to be right over a whole season, and mine is to tell you when I think it’s wrong, then show you the receipt either way.

This time the receipt is a good one!

Husker Nation, North Dakota comes to Lincoln this Saturday, 6:15 on BTN. My pick lands that morning.