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The Holiday Bowl is always one of the best NCAA football betting battles of the year in the bowl season, and this year shouldn’t be any exception. We have a real David vs. Goliath situation here in San Diego on Thursday night, as the Washington Huskies are taking on the Nebraska Cornhuskers in a game that really should be hot and heavy. Will U-Dub be able to exact some revenge from an early season loss to Big Red? Our Holiday Bowl keys to the game have the answers that you need to know before making your Holiday Bowl picks.

Key #1: Washington has to just forget about Round 1 against Nebraska
Sometimes, you just get blown out of the water in games. The Huskies were three point dogs at home earlier this year against the Cornhuskers, and they just never stood a chance. QB Taylor Martinez ran all over the place, the defense was stifling for Big Red, and by the time the dust settled in this one, Nebraska had scored a dominating five TD victory. The task for Head Coach Steve Sarkisian here is to make sure that his team’s psyche is still rock solid. He needs to turn that blowout loss into a form of motivation instead of being a reason for intimidation. Still, there is a lot that physically needs to change for U-Dub to even be able to compete in this one, and the biggest thing that really needs to happen is that it just needs to get tougher. Don’t be afraid to step up and smack the other guy in the mouth a little bit. Nebraska is like the big bully on the schoolyard, while Washington, which doesn’t have a single player on its roster that has every played in a bowl game before, looks like the little kid that just got his lunch money taken away. If the Huskies don’t stand tall and really believe that they can win this game, they’re going to get slaughtered.

Key #2: Jake Locker needs to look like a first round pick in the NFL Draft for a change
We’re calling you out, kid! Locker really doesn’t look like a man that is capable of leading a team at the NFL level even though he has all of the raw abilities to get the job done. Sometimes, you just need a winner. Sure, we know that the Huskies never really did surround Locker with type of talent he needed to be able to compete in the Pac-10, but there is really no excuse for this four year starter to never throw for 3,000 yards and to never have a winning season. This is his first bowl game, and he needs to make it count in front of a nationally televised audience. Locker threw for 2,209 yards and ran for 302 more this year, accounting for 22 TDs against nine picks. Of course, he had three games this year in which he didn’t throw for even 100 yards in the game, one of which came against these Cornhuskers. Big Red held him to just 4-for-20 passing for 71 yards with a score and two picks, and if Locker can’t shake those cobwebs off, there is no hope for the Huskies. Nebraska’s defense held teams to just 294.8 yards per game this year, just 159.9 of which came through the air. Needless to say, the Black Shirts are licking their chops once again.

Key #3: Washington can’t let Nebraska’s trio reach milestones
Of course, we’re talking about the rushing threesome of QB Taylor Martinez, RB Roy Helu, and RB Rex Burkhead. These three are all within striking distance of the 1,000 yard barrier this year (Helu is already there), and if that happens, they’ll become the second trio in the history of college football, joining the Nevada Wolf Pack’s QB Colin Kaepernick, RB Vai Taua, and RB Luke Lippincott to all reach four digits in yards on the ground in the same season. These three all rushed for 100+ yards on the Huskies the first time around, and Washington just can’t let that happen again. U-Dub allowed a very questionable 200.9 yards per game to opposing ground attacks this year, and it was one of the few teams in the land that allowed at least 200 yards per game both passing and rushing. This is why the Huskies are one of the few teams in the bowl season that averaged allowing more points per game (31.2) than they scored (22.1).