Admittedly, Langsdorf said, it can be tough to go right back to a player after he's put the ball on the ground once in a game.

"Yeah, I think you start to wonder, you start to worry about it a little bit," the coach said. "That is something where you do want to get right back with him, but also you don't want to put the whole team in jeopardy, so you have to make sure that you know why he fumbled or how it happened. And then he's got to have a great focus on taking care of it."

Missed opportunities: Langsdorf liked the way the offense possessed the ball in the 31-16 win against Illinois, holding it for 38:01 of the 60 minutes.

But Langsdorf notes it could have been even better without two turnovers.

"I thought we could have had even more sustained drives and we could have had better red-zone production," Langsdorf said. "Settled for a field goal and then had the fumble. It wasn't great. ... We had some more opportunities there to score points."

Nebraska is tied for 57th nationally scoring touchdowns in the red zone, having put the ball in the end zone 16 of 24 times, which is a 66.7 percent clip.