It's Tuesday but actually Wednesday in Husker world, since Friday is the new Saturday.

Let's hit on the injury report first, starting with some (maybe?) encouraging news for the Huskers. Yes, that was senior cornerback Chris Jones dressed in his practice uniform for the first time all fall. He didn't have pads on, and obviously there is still plenty more work to do and rust to shake off. But it was good sight to see the guy in uniform again. Mike Riley hasn't seemed to think a return was imminent. We'll keep tracking that one.

Also dressed for practice during the stretching period media witnessed was wide receiver Stanley Morgan, linebacker Tyrin Ferguson, offensive tackle David Knevel, center Cole Conrad. Safety Aaron Williams, who Mike Riley seemed to think likely to play, was practicing but in a green no-contact jersey.

Players who were held out were Joshua Kalu, Marcus Newby and Bryan Reimers. We didn't noticed Tre Bryant out there either.

Here are some quick hits:

— Defensive coordinator Bob Diaco was as excited as many players to see Jones walk onto the practice field for the first time this fall. "It's great to see Chris feeling better, and doing well, and being engaged with the team. Like everybody knew, he was one of the best players in the league, one of the best players in the country at his position. To be without him, everybody has rallied and circled the wagons, but it sure is nice to see him more engaged. For him."

— Diaco feels like junior linebacker Luke Gifford has gone from a guy who hadn't played much college football "to someone we really don't want to bring out of the game." Gifford is "a multi-jobs" player, the coach said, with really good football intelligence. Diaco referred to him as "a stalwart" who is also "contact tough."

— Having played at Iowa, Diaco is familiar with playing football games at Illinois. "I remember playing in the Illinois game as a player, and they were always very talented, strong, tough-minded team, and this team is no different."

— Illinois uses multiple quarterbacks. Asked about it, Diaco briefly hit on another subject first: "One thing, I don't know how much is good with the incredible disparity as it relates to equity, with a short week and then the other team has a bye week. That's a little bizarre. But one thing that's good is we don't get to overthink anything. So we don't get a lot of time painstaking on what to do here and there. We just got to go. We just finished playing, it feels like, 48 hours ago. The other part to that is their system doesn't change that much, it doesn't seem. They do what they do. They run what they run."

— As for young outside backers, Ben Stille got his first game snaps this past week and Diaco said redshirt freshman Collin Miller "is getting a ton of reps" in practice now. "I don't say this in a bad way, but we're down in the depth, and that's not a bad thing for a developing group, a developing defense."

— Right tackle Brenden Jaimes said he graded out as a 72, which was tied for the worst, or among the worst grades, of the offensive linemen. But he felt like he held his own.

— Jaimes said he had some nerves, but felt he settled in as the game went along.

— The freshman was working mostly at left tackle, but moved to the right side as the injuries over there started to rack up. He hadn't really planned on playing as a true freshman, but seems satisfied he did now.

— There was a talent show at the beginning of the summer in which freshmen had to perform. Jaimes performed "Despacito."