Wolverine247 Board

I agree to an extent. If Gardner was able to play like he has been, then obviously it's a blown chance. I'm concerned that he wouldn't have been able to, though. In between games he had a full week to shake the rust off, take all the practice reps, etc. I don't know if he could have come in completely cold at Nebraska and played as well as he has been. Hindsight is 20/20 i guess.

From what I've gleaned from "insiders" at other sites, the staff was actually surprised at how poorly Bellomy played at Nebraska after how he's looked in practice all season. You'd have to think he had been looking good to feel comfortable enough with him to basically stop giving Devin reps at the QB position.

If Gardner hadn't taken any or very little reps at QB during practice then he still would've struggled a little. Our running game was terrible and they had a decent pass rush. And if he has a bad game then what does that do to his confidence or the coach's confidence?

I think we could've won, but look at the first few drives against Minnesota while Devin was adjusting. They were horrible up until he had the miracle play to Dileo on 3rd-and-17 that just flipped the swagger-switch on him it looked like.

And that was with a full week of first team reps. Had he been thrown in against Nebraska with minimal reps, he likely would've still done better than Bellomy, but can't say it would've resulted in a definite win.