This Week in Badgers: Indiana aftermath, 2021, 1894
Season 2, Episode 11
Welcome to This Week in Badgers, the #6 ranked Newsletter covering a leisure or sporting activity in the Great Lakes Region. Today we spend way too much time on Indiana, what it means for 2021 and end with a quick look at Iowa both past and present.
Indiana
That was an agonizing 3.5 hours, to put it mildly. I can’t stop thinking that it seemed like the Badger coaching staff got worked in this one.
Its always hard to assign blame when stuff goes bad. We don’t know how much to put on the coaches, the players, the other team, random luck or officiating. There’s also the enormous 2020 variable of COVID that throws a wrench into everything. But with all those qualifiers aside, it seemed like the Badgers coaching staff had a tough day.
I’ll briefly complain about play calling, which I really, really do not like to do. It is such low hanging fruit and bitching that you didn’t like the play calling in a game the offense put up 6 points, well yeah. I would have loved for them to have called plays that resulted in more points.
Matt Belz at B5Q had a quick take on play calling that I thought was good. He mentions the 2nd quarter possession that ended in a FG which also stuck out to me. Berger ripped off a 19 yard run to get the ball down to the 14, then they went 3 yards with Stokke, Groshek up the middle for 1 yard, then left Mertz a 3rd and 6 where he stared down Pryor and threw into double coverage. With the offense struggling the margin for error on this stuff is so thin and two wasted plays in the red zone is just a killer.
The second and long rushing plays with Groshek have become an annoying theme. He has 12 carries for 40 yards (3.3 ypc) on 2nd down this year. I understand they need to use him on 2nd down to show that he is a running option and not just in because its a pass, but most of the time all the 2nd and long run does is put them in an obvious passing situation on 3rd down.
Related, stop punting from the other team’s 40. I really thought Chryst had turned a corner with this stuff last year, I did a whole Newsletter about it! He’s obviously regressed this year and I feel betrayed.
I didn’t really mind the 4th Quarter punt. The offense had been trash all day, it was 4th and 7 at the IU 46 with 8 minutes left. Not getting it on 4th down (high probability) means Indiana would have to go about 25 yards for a FG that would effectively end the game. I thought I was done complaining about play calling but that drive was killed when a Groshek 2nd and 10 run went for 3 yards. WHY.
Anyways, the really annoying punt was the first quarter one from the IU 44. This time Groshek’s 2nd and 10 run actually got 7 yards and instead of running it twice on 3rd and 4th down they tried to pass and then punted.
Moving on.
Not being able to get the signs in. I enjoyed Eric at Buckyville’s take on this one:
Simply put, on a scale of 1-10 level fuck-ups, what we witnessed yesterday was a 10.
I’ve got nothing to add, that sums it up perfectly. A QB running over to the sidelines to get a play felt like Junior High stuff.
Special Teams were obviously a mess, and I’m willing to give this more of a pass. Weird season, lots of young guys in there, mistakes happen. With the offense struggling it would be nice to get some “bonus points” out of that unit but doesn’t seem to be happening this year.
Lack of player versatility
Hard to explain this one but a few examples:
Its December and they don’t trust Jalen Berger to be in the game on passing downs
They found themselves in a situation where they had a True Freshman center struggling in all parts of the game and Josh Seltzner on the bench.
They were unable to get to the QB on blitzes, in part because Chenal and Sanborn play every single snap and they have no depth and/or flexibility with the LB group.
Benton can’t play in Nickel
The Jalen Berger usage one was the most glaring on Saturday. The “just give Berger the ball stuff!” reminds me a little bit of the why don’t they just make the entire plane out of the black box logic. He’s young, you don’t want to burn him out, diminishing returns with more and more carries, etc. But when he only comes on the field when he’s going to get the ball on a hand-off, its not only letting a team that already figured out your signals know what’s coming, it takes him out of the passing game as well.
Is it on the coaching staff that Berger isn’t comfortable in the passing game? On Berger? On the odd COVID schedule? Probably a combination of all of the above, but they have a guy who would help them and they can’t use him. Whatever the cause is, it hurts.
Benton feels like a similar story. They have an exhausted Loudermilk and Rand out there in the 4th Quarter trying to get pressure on Tuttle and a rested Benton standing on the sidelines. Same questions as to the cause that were raised above, but at the end of the day it is a very good player they can’t use.
I feel uncomfortable criticizing the Center situation, just because the timeline of the Sampson injury matters. They only have so much practice time and spending reps getting Dietzen or Seltzner up to speed as a 3rd string Center might not be the best way to spend that time, but it was very unfortunate that they have 3 capable guards in Bruss, Seltzner and Dietzen and had to use a True Freshman at Center over one of them. Having to use a True Freshman OL seems like something the Badgers should be above.
I realize these are all extremely hard to criticize because they rely on knowing at least something that goes on with the team during the week and we all know that information is a State secret, but they are a few things that jumped out that I was thinking about on Sunday.
Out of Context Jaypo Tweet of the Week
On the Indiana side, I liked how their staff handled it. Their offense didn’t put up a ton of yards and had the advantage of playing with a lead, but thought they did a great job of getting Tuttle some easy, short completions and then taking deep shots against the Badgers. The ball was out of his hands quickly and with purpose. It wasn’t always pretty - it relied a lot on the refs calling PI and only netted 130 yards passing, but it was easy to see what they were trying to do and what their game plan was.
I just never got a feel for what the Badgers wanted to do and felt like they could never fully commit to anything.
If any year deserves a pass it’s this one of course. Indiana had played 6 games going in, the Badgers 3 and I feel like it showed. Even with the backup QB Indiana looked like a team hitting their mid-season stride and the Badgers were still figuring out what they had.
Did Mike Lucas tell us where Kewaunee was located in his Tweet recap of the game?
I’m not done with this season either but I’m also ready for all *this* to be over and something resembling normal college football back in my life so I’m good to go on 2021 talk.
I know its easy to be negative after a couple of rough games but I think they’ve got the good “bones” for a potent offense next year. They should start with their entire OL group minus CVL back. They’ll have a QB with some experience ready to take a jump (remember how bad Coan looked in 2018?), a WR (Dike) and RB (Berger) who have looked great this year ready to take a year 2 jump.
That’s pretty good! Of course depth is a huge question, especially at WR. It seems like they really need to have one of Chandler, Smith, Bell or Allen be ready to play a big role next year. Bracey should be able to be a better version of Jack Dunn, not that anyone was particularly worried about replacing him.
There’s a lot of question marks, especially at WR but right now we’re really seeing that position at its lowest - they’re down two Seniors they were counting on and relying on a True Freshman to be a difference maker. Give them a real off-season where they know what they have to work with and maybe it won’t be an amazing group, but I don’t think it will be nearly as bad as it looks right now.
I realize the fanbase’s focus is on Offense but I’m very curious about Defense next year. They’ve certainly been very good and you can’t really complain about their work in 2020, but it does seem like they have some room for improvement to reach previous levels. Jesse Temple pointed out they were having an all-time great season defensively which is technically true, but they’ve faced the 7th, 8th, 11th (with a backup QB) and 13th best offenses in the Big 10.
I kept thinking about was how every player on the defense is a solid, Big Ten level starter, but they just seem to lack the impact players of year’s past. I’m sure Sanborn and Chenal will get some All-Big 10 consideration but that’s about it.
Through 4 games against some pretty meh offenses, they’ve got 3 INTs: the pass Minton threw to Chenal, a garbage time Titus Toler pick against Illinois and a nice Nelson grab against Michigan.
Last year they averaged 3.6 sacks per game, this year they are at 1.5 (this includes a couple of garbage time ones). They’re holding the line fine, they just haven’t been as disruptive as in year’s past.
It does make sense - they replaced Zack Baun with a True Freshman and lost Reggie Pearson, Wildgoose and Orr from last year’s team. Orr was a guy I wasn’t sweating that much at the time and figured Chenal would be able to step in and perform fine. Which he has of course, but they really do miss Orr’s burst and speed at attacking the QB. Chenal and Sanborn are very similar players and it would be really nice to have a 3rd ILB option to both give them some rest and better get to the QB. The Badgers blitzed the hell out of Indiana and the only sack they got was on the Tuttle scramble late in the game.
So its another group with good “bones” but they could really use some of the younger players to develop into playmakers to take it from a good unit to a great unit.
Best Text Message I received over the weekend
Next Week: IOWA
Not feeling especially motivated to do a deep dive here, if the Badger offense gets it together it could be a game, otherwise its going to be another slog fest.
On paper it definitely has potential to be another 14-7 type struggle.
Iowa is good at:
Running the ball
Stopping the run
Stopping the pass
They are not good at:
Passing the ball
The Badgers should match-up very well with that on defense and hopefully be able to play a lot of base 3-4 with Benton in there to disrupt the run. As we’ve seen, the Badgers have not had any success against a defense with a pulse, which Iowa definitely has, so it will likely be tough going again with that unit.
Let’s Remember Some Games
This Newsletter has been a bummer so let’s end on a positive note. When I think Iowa/Wisconsin rivalry, obviously the first game that comes to mind is the first game they played, a 44-0 Badger win in 1894.
Iowa came into that matchup 2-1-1. They had played Chicago just two days before their matchup in Madison, so likely a bit fatigued. The Badgers started the season 2-2, though with a huge asterisk as one of the losses was the only forfeit in school history. The forfeit happened two weeks earlier against Purdue when the head referee (who was also Purdue’s coach), ejected the Badger QB right before halftime, prompting the Badger coach to pull the team off the field and head back to Madison.
Now I’m not saying Paul Chryst pulling the team off the field after the next Pass Interference penalty would be something that might work, but I’m also not, not saying it. If you know what I mean.
Anyways, the Badgers destroyed Iowa 44-0 and have been superior to the school and state ever since.
1894 Badgers vs Iowa, remembered.
That’ll wrap it up for this week. Hopefully next week is not as bitchy. Thanks for sticking with me, feel free to reply, comment or @ me on Twitter. Go Badgers, beat Iowa.