Interim AD and Nebraska legend Tom Osborne did what anyone who at least remotely follows college football knew what he would do, give the pink slip to Bill Callahan.  I've read a lot about how he isolated himself from the fans of Nebraska while past coaches really embraced the community, but ultimately, it comes down to wins and losses.  If he's 10-2 every year, who cares if he's isolated from the community or if he runs the west coast offense? 

The reason why Nebraska wasn't successful this year has nothing to do with the change in offensive philosophy that he brought to Lincoln.  That defense was atrocious.  Yesterday's game against Colorado was the only time I watched Nebraska play this year, but Colorado on offense seemed to run similar plays on a frequent basis simply because the Buffalo coaching staff knew it would be successful.  Looking at the numbers defensively, they could stop a high school team. 

In listening to Osborne's press conference earlier today, he has very high expectations, similar to what he had when he roamed the sidelines, but is that really fair?  College football is far more competitive than when he coached and Nebraska now has four new teams in their conference, and only Baylor is a scrub football program of the new four teams in their conference, and Kansas and Missouri have improved significantly since Osborne coached, evidenced by the Big 12 game of the year tonight. 

Osborne's vision is a bit off base.  From listening to him, I get the feeling he expects 9 and 10 win seasons every year.  That's just not feasible in today's college football landscape.  Look at the Gators this year, from national champs to a 8-3 record, and 3rd place in the SEC East.  Should Nebraska be more competitive?  Sure...will they?  I'm not so sure.

Getting kids to go to Lincoln will be more of a challenge with so many more competitive places to go and more appealing places to go.  Frankly, Lincoln doesn't sound that appealing when I could go play for Pete Carroll at USC, Urban Meyer at Florida, etc.  As for tradition, I get the feeling that high school kids care less about tradition and more about getting on TV every week and finding the best avenue to get to the next level.

With tougher competition in the Big 12 North with Kansas and Missouri on the rise, Colorado coming back from the dregs of their 2-10 season last year, Nebraska faces more obstacles than they did when it was just the Big 8, and frankly, the only competition for most of his regime was Oklahoma, and Colorado in the late 80s and 90s.  

Whomever takes the Nebraska job has some high expectations of him, and likely unrealistic ones...good luck...