This Week in Badgers: Northwestern, Ugh
I’ve been trying to figure out the best way to handle the TWIB now that games are being played. Its hard doing a weekly thing during the season because the week is really broken up in two parts: Saturday and the day or two after the where the focus is on the game, and the rest of the week where we look forward (or not) to what’s next. I feel like I’m wasting my time writing on Tuesday about a game that happened Saturday, and sending a full Newsletter out on Sunday means we miss a lot of stuff that happens during the week.
So think I’ll try doing a quick game thoughts/recap following the game and then something more substantial in the days following. I hate copying or having the same takes as other people so I’ll try to get this out before I obsessively read about the game and end up stealing from others. It also helps that due to *all this* I’m forced to watch the games at home by myself and not able to drown my sorrows at a bar afterwards. This will be my outlet, sorry.
Also a good chance for you to drink 6 beers and leave a hot take below. We’ll highlight the best ones later in the week.
Lastly, I’ll just post this one online/Twitter so not to spam your inboxes.
Whew. With that preamble out of the way. 5 Things We Now Know about the Badgers
1. Northwestern is better than this version of Wisconsin.
When I think “bad Northwestern game” I usually think of the Badgers having an absurd amount of yards and having a few bad breaks, a snatch defeat from the jaws of victory situation if you will, but the Badgers offense just got dominated in this one and its hard to see a way it didn’t end in an L.
The Badgers offense scored just 7 points on 17 possessions, fumbled 3 times (losing 2) and threw 3 INTs. They did not have a possession inside the Northwestern 20 yard line all day. Honestly it felt like Northwestern was playing with 14 guys on defense and were being fed the play calls ahead of time. If anything, Northwestern is kicking themselves for not putting it away earlier by fumbling at the 1 yard line early in the game.
The Badgers had some success on the counters up the middle but outside of that it seemed like everything they tried was met with a brick wall. Deep passes covered, screens went nowhere, jet sweeps stuffed and on and on. Northwestern having the perfect blitz called on the 4th and 6 in the beginning of the 4th Quarter was the purest sign that it just wasn’t going to happen today. I hated it.
2. The Defense is fun
I felt bad for those guys, they played their asses off and did what they could to keep Wisconsin in the game. Sanborn and Chenal were all over the place and I thought the DBs were also really good. The Pass Interference penalties were a joke but also sort of a sign that the Badger DBs were in position on nearly every play. When Northwestern did make a play in the passing game it was usually a really good throw or a WR making a great play. Almost all their good passing plays were contested stuff near the sideline. Tip your hat.
If I had to have one quibble is that the Badgers never did get home on Ramsey, who dropped back 44 times without taking a sack until he gave himself up on the last drive. This is of course unfair to put on a unit that kept the Badgers in the game, but they weren’t able to sack him or get a game changing turnover that would have set up a struggling offense for points.
3. I’m an idiot Part 1: They needed Davis and Pryor
Last week I halfheartedly made the case that Chimere Dike was the best WR on the team. In texts and DMs before the game I wondered if maybe Davis/Pryor missing the game would allow one of the younger guys to show they belong.
I’m an idiot.
Dike is the most promising true Freshman WR they’ve had in a long while, but he’s probably better as a complimentary piece at this point. There is nothing behind him, and when Ferguson got hurt (did anyone else feel awkward watching him struggle his way through the 4th Q?) they showed they didn’t have any pass catching options at TE behind him either.
Obviously they’re going to need Davis and Pryor if they want to win what’s left of their schedule. And of course the difference between the Badgers and the recruiting juggernauts is depth, and that showed up today with the receiving options.
4. I’m an Idiot Part 2: Berger is #RB1
Merely 5 days ago I said they wouldn’t have a main RB, would be a rotation and everyone would give about the same production. Berger clearly showed he was the guy. He’s got room to improve of course, but he’s clearly a step ahead of the other options.
If we want to take a positive development out of this one its certainly him. They’ll have a good RB for a while.
The announcer also mentioned that Berger didn’t play against Illinois because he was hurt? This was news to everyone watching. I’ve said my piece about how UW is with information about the team, that would have been nice to know.
5. Mertz is good, he’s not magic
Obviously an abysmal game from him today. Inaccurate, bad decisions, the whole thing. I hated all of it.
Also not reading into it much past tonight. They put the game on his shoulders and gave him deep depth chart options to throw to and as mentioned above, pretty sure Northwestern had 14 guys on defense and access to the Badgers plays.
He’ll learn from it but also a reminder that he’s not the Badgers’ version of Aaron Rodgers. He will be part of the reason the Badgers win games but can’t do it by himself.
Two other things that are obvious but I’m mentioning anyways
It wasn’t the reason they lost, but the officiating was about as bad as I’ve seen. Sometimes one call can swing a game (not thinking of an OPI from a recent Bowl game, certainly not) and that’s bad, but this was a trainwreck from start to finish.
It seemed like the ref on the Northwestern sideline (also where the parents were sitting) was the most flag happy. I wonder how much the empty stadium where those voices travel really well affected his baffling flag decisions. Also FWIW the bad OPI on Purdue from Friday was on the Minnesota side of the field as well. Maybe this is a thing. We need to get Chryst a megaphone.
Last year I thought Chryst had made some progress with punt decisions and he even went for it in Badger territory in the 1st Q, but the punt from the NW 36 yard line was inexcusable. Back to the drawing board. Thanks to literally everyone on Twitter pointing out that punting from the 36 is bad. Appreciated.
That’s about all I got with takes. We’ll preview Minnesota, look at a SORGI game and talk ILB recruiting next week. In the meantime if you’ve got some takes from the game feel free to comment below or @ me on Twitter.
Go Badgers.
2 points:
1) Your observation about recruiting and WR depth is spot on. When they got Mertz, people acted like that was the only missing piece between them and a championship run. It seems fairly clear that the gap between UW and elite teams is really more about depth at positions that tend to be more athletic (WR, DE and DB). Until they consistently pull in 4 star guys at those positions they will still be a long shot to be CFP contenders.
2) I realized that I've been myopic in focusing on UW being able to beat OSU as the final hurdle to overcome. While they certainly will need to beat OSU to get to the next level, it would be good to start with not losing one of these games to middling West teams every year.