You are on a roll today. Great posts.Much more likely that we beat Iowa than Ohio St. We match-up well with Iowa and have basically been one play away from beating them each of the last three years. Ohio St. can "out-athlete" us, and they have handled us easily the past two years.
As best I can tell, the differences between 7-0 Iowa and 3-4 Nebraska are...
* schedule: give Iowa credit for edging Penn St., but I don't think they play another ranked team in the regular season)
* forcing turnovers: somehow, Iowa comes up with about 4 INT's every game; probably a combination of skill and good fortune
* one-possession games: Iowa wins them, we lose them; it probably helps that they are usually at least +2 in turnovers
I don't think there is much - if any - of a talent gap between NU and Iowa. NU and Ohio St. is a different story.