Nebraska's Matt Rhule Describes Dylan Raiola's Reaction to Dana Holgorsen as New OC

Rhule says Nebraska football's true freshman quarterback is trusting his head coach to make the right call.

Oct 19, 2024; Bloomington, Indiana, USA; Nebraska Cornhuskers quarterback Dylan Raiola (15) performs his pregame celebration before a game against the Indiana Hoosiers at Memorial Stadium. / Jacob Musselman-Imagn Images

It was a surprising development last week when it was reported that Dana Holgorsen was joining Nebraska football's offensive coaching staff. Then on Monday, the surprise was taken to another level when head coach Matt Rhule revealed that Holgorsen would be serving as offensive coordinator.

That is quite a change for a head coach to make in the middle of the season. Marcus Satterfield had been the play caller since Rhule arrived in Lincoln last season. Now he has been demoted in favor of Holgorsen and his vast experience coaching offense for several different successful programs.

One of the players who this move affects the most is true freshman quarterback Dylan Raiola. Satterfield is the only offensive coordinator Raiola has had in his short college career. Making a change this drastic in the middle of the season could be tough on a young quarterback. However, Rhula says that Raiola is handling the change well.

“Dylan trusts me and trusts the program,” Rhule said. “He just took it as ‘hey what are we doing today.’ He’s trying to get his back healthy. All the guys had a really positive reaction to it. It goes back to what I said last week, players need to play, players need to go make plays. If you watch on Saturdays, players have to go make plays. Dana and the staff will give the players the best opportunity to go make plays so we need the guys to make them. The whole play calling thing, we’ve tried to handle that, now go make some plays. Football is a game where players win games. We’ve got good players, we expect them to go win some games.”

Raiola is hoping to be able to play on Saturday against USC after injuring his back in the Huskers’ loss to UCLA. If he can play, it will be his first opportunity to run Holgorsen’s offense and see how well they can work together on such short notice. 

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