• Video Below: See this week's Big Red Today Show and the Big Ten Preview, as well as Tuesday's Husker practice report
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LINCOLN — Nebraska's Alfonzo Dennard stood 5 yards deep in the end zone with his body tilted toward the Michigan backfield, his eyes aimed right at the quarterback.
No way, he figured, was the football coming his way.
He was wrong. By the time Dennard recognized the play-action fake, his man was four steps into a crossing route. Not even Dennard — the Huskers' lockdown corner and a potential first-round NFL draft pick — could recover from that.
Touchdown.
First one he's given up all year.
"My eyes were in a bad place," he said. "I was staring at the quarterback the whole time."
It's a bad habit he's been trying to break since the start of the season. Just like he's working on adequate hand placement. And proper alignment. And clean, crisp backpedaling. And mental fortitude.
"I mess up a lot, man," he said Tuesday. "My technique? Sometimes that'll be off. I know there are some plays, a lot of plays, I'll be beat. ... I guess the respect they've got for me, they're not going to throw it."
The Wolverines did. They got Dennard twice during a 45-17 NU loss Saturday, a humbling reminder for one of the nation's top cornerbacks that he still has plenty of room to grow. And Dennard knows it.
"I never play a perfect game," he said.
This is why he decided against entering the NFL draft as a junior.
Dennard said the biggest benefit to staying at Nebraska has been working daily with first-year secondary coach Corey Raymond, a former NFL cornerback. They've tweaked Dennard's style a bit, so he's not as reliant on physically combative tactics to win one-on-one battles.
"When he's going to get a guy the same as him athletically and physically — then it goes back to, who's got the best technique," Raymond said. "It's going to take all the little things when you're covering a great guy."
Cue Iowa's Marvin McNutt. The 6-foot-4, 215-pounder has 74 catches and 12 touchdowns, averaging 112.7 receiving yards per game for the Hawkeyes this year.
Nebraska typically doesn't assign its corners to cover one particular player for an entire game — the last time Dennard guarded the same guy for 60 minutes was against Texas A&M last year when he held Biletnikoff finalist Jeff Fuller to one reception.
McNutt's game-changing ability could alter NU's strategy when Iowa and Nebraska play Friday in Lincoln.
"Different coverages, different ways of approaching it," defensive coordinator Carl Pelini said. "The kid's a great receiver. Maybe the best we've faced to this point. As much as possible, we'd like to have Alfonzo on him. There are ways to attack it, maybe a little help over there."
That's no knock on Dennard. Just schematic preference.
Coach Bo Pelini has said repeatedly that he wouldn't trade another cornerback in the country for Dennard.
He's in the top tier of college DBs that Raymond's seen.
Asked what it's like to face Dennard in practice and game-like scrimmages, NU receiver Brandon Kinnie had a simple response: "It's hell."
Dennard spent the nonconference portion of the season recovering from a quad injury. He doesn't have an interception this season. He has been credited with five pass break-ups so far. Of the 161 total pass attempts by Nebraska's Big Ten opponents this year, 31 have gone to the receiver covered by Dennard (20 percent). Thirteen of those have been completed.
Dennard expects to be better than that, though.
Against Penn State, he allowed three short completions on one particularly fast-paced scoring drive — he was protecting against a deep route the entire time because the defense's calls never got communicated to his side of the field. Dennard endured an earful from Bo Pelini on the sideline for that sequence. Then, with both hands, he slammed his helmet off the turf in frustration as he walked away.
He doesn't like to get beat.
"If stuff doesn't go my way, I think about it a lot," he said.
But that's another one of his self-critiques. Don't ride the mental roller coaster.
In fact, Dennard said, had he not been pondering what went wrong on a 46-yard completion against him two plays before that Michigan touchdown last weekend, maybe he wouldn't have been fixated on backfield trickery. Maybe he jumps the route. Maybe he gets a pick.
No reason to second-guess now. He's over it.
McNutt and the Hawkeyes are up next. And Dennard has improvements to make.
"You're going to get knocked down and adversity's going to come," he said. "You've got to overcome that."
Contact the writer:
402-473-9585, jon.nyatawa@owh.com
twitter.com/JonNyatawa
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• Video: The Big Red Today Show, Nov. 22:
• Video: The Big Ten Preview, Nov. 22:
• Video: Carl Pelini after practice, Nov. 22:
• Video: Husker football practice, Nov. 22:
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