BLACKSBURG, Va. — Nebraska had its safeties in two-deep coverage and Virginia Tech quarterback Tyrod Taylor appeared to be hemmed in once again.

Everything would seem to be right for a Husker defense that had all but throttled the Hokies for 58-plus minutes Saturday.

“That's what we wanted to be in,'' NU defensive coordinator Carl Pelini said. “That's our best call for that situation.''

The solemn way in which Pelini discussed it later told of what happened: It didn't get executed.

Danny Coale got behind Nebraska coverage and caught an 81-yard pass from Taylor with 1:11 left. Safety Matt O'Hanlon caught Coale at the Husker 3-yard line to save a touchdown, but Hokies scored three plays later to net a 16-15 win at Lane Stadium.

“It was a lack of discipline,'' Pelini said. “He scrambles, and we need to stay in coverage. If anything, go deeper. That's all.''

Taylor had danced around to buy himself some time. The junior hadn't run for more than 4 yards all game. Any scramble likely would have been better than what became the alternative, especially with Virginia Tech facing more than 80 yards of turf with no timeouts remaining.

Coale first released behind cornerback Anthony West, then headed further down the Hokie sideline. O'Hanlon scrambled to try to catch up to Coale because he wasn't playing deep enough.

Defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh was getting to Taylor but not until the fateful pass already was headed for Coale.

“I hit him,'' Suh said. “I don't know what happened. I'd have to go back and look at film to see what happened to the coverage. I'm sure it was something.''

What was it, exactly? NU head coach Bo Pelini didn't care to break it down in his short postgame press conference.

“I don't know, did you watch it?'' Pelini said. “You saw what happened. Let's go to the next question. It's pretty obvious what happened on that. I'm not going to sit there and belabor the point.''

Nebraska tried to overcome the gaffe as O'Hanlon sacked Taylor on first-and-goal and Taylor threw incomplete on second. But his 11-yard touchdown pass to Dyrell Roberts with 21 seconds left punctured all the satisfaction that would have come from the Huskers holding the Hokies to 195 total yards before the game-winning drive started.

“It doesn't matter,'' Pelini said. “You can play as good as you want. That's not a good game. They scored more than we did. That's a bad difference in the game, as far as I'm concerned.''

Carl Pelini said NU had a chance to overcome the 81-yard play by getting to Taylor on the TD pass. But after rolling left and coming back to the right, Taylor got pass-rushers to hesitate momentarily and found Roberts just as Suh started to grab Taylor's jersey.

Pelini said he wished the Huskers had been more aggressive on the scoring play. That was echoed by Bo Pelini.

“You have got to go make the sack,'' Bo Pelini said. “You have got to go get them. We didn't do it.''

Carl Pelini said the game plan wasn't just to contain Taylor but to get after him and take some shots. The Huskers did sack him four times.

But Taylor made two huge plays in what Suh said could be considered a 50-50 split between Taylor's athleticism and Husker mistakes.

“I mean, he's a great athlete, but we had shots, we had opportunities to make plays,'' Suh said.

Virginia Tech started the game by converting five straight third-down plays, including a third-and-20 on its first series. The Hokies' offense then was bottled up and only able to add a field goal until the final minutes.

The final minutes were just all that mattered.

“We've basically just got to all man up and really not look to blame each other in situations and take the blame on yourself, and see what you could have done yourself to get it done,'' Suh said. “And just move forward.''

Contact the writer:

444-1042, rich.kaipust@owh.com