“If we played an F.B.S. schedule, I think we would definitely make it to a bowl game,” said middle linebacker Grant Olson, a senior from Plymouth, Minn.

“I don’t think there’s a team in the country that would absolutely destroy us, 70-0, or anything like that. Obviously, there are teams that have more talent than we do. I won’t deny that either. But I think we could hold our own with a lot of teams out there.” Bohl starts by recruiting players like himself.

A walk-on defensive back at Nebraska, Bohl grew up in Lincoln, Neb., rooting for the Cornhuskers. He turned down an offer from Air Force to stay home. Injuries, mainly a gruesome broken leg sustained in practice, limited his playing time. But he asked Osborne if he could stay on as a graduate assistant.

That three-year gig led to full-time assistant coaching jobs at North Dakota State and four other universities before Osborne brought him back to Nebraska as linebackers coach in 1995, the year Osborne won the second of his three national championships. Osborne retired after the third, in 1997.

“Coach Osborne left a profound effect on me, as far as dealing with people, principles of football, how we structure the program,” said Bohl, who keeps a photo of Osborne and Charlie McBride, the former Nebraska defensive coordinator, in his office.

“I’m not saying we’re just like the old Nebraska teams in the ’90s,” he said. “But a lot of our principles are grounded on the things I experienced as a player.”