Last night’s brawl in Arlington is one of the toughest losses this team has endured under Bo Pelini. It hurts bad. Not the way being embarrassed under Loserhan hurt, that was an issue of wounded pride. The loss last night, along with the Virginia Tech loss earlier this fall, stand as testament to how good our team really is. A fact, which makes it all the more difficult to accept the outcome of these two one-point games.

While I accept there are no moral victories when you’re wearing a Nebraska uniform, this team does have a solid identity again, one that’s the direct result of football learned the Youngstown, Ohio way. In other words, Huskers near and far have every reason to hold their heads high again. We’re a tough football team, like we used to be, and that means things are right with the world, whatever the won-loss tally shows.

Now, to the part of last night’s game no one is ready to accept. We did not score a touchdown. I’m sorry, but you’re not going to beat Texas without scoring a touchdown. And last night one touchdown was all we needed to win, but it never came, not even after the amazing punt return to the 10-yard line by Niles Paul late in the game. The sequence of three runs up the gut that followed was hapless play-calling by Shawn Watson, no way around it. We played it safe, not wanting a turnover, thinking that all it would take to win was a chip shot by Henery. But we needed a touchdown to win, as we soon learned.

This team has lost three games by a total of four points. Only one team–Texas Tech–brought the heat this season. The reality is we’re a few bad bounces away from being 12-1 right now. But we’re not 12-1, we’re 9-4. And the reason for it is easy enough to see—we simply can’t score enough points. We now have three weeks and a few days to correct this before lining up to play another good team in our bowl game.

I don’t know if Shawn Watson is on the fence, or if he’s been looking for an out, but I do know that in a high-performance job like his, he needs to get it right and get it right, right now.