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I went to the Wisconsin Badgers vs #4 Notre Dame Fighting Irish game at historic Lambeau Field on Sunday for the Shamrock Series game. Before I dive into my thoughts on the game itself and the Wisconsin Badgers, I will say that the atmosphere at the game was incredible!
I wanted to wait a few days to let the emotions pass before writing this.
The outcome of the game was about as I expected. The only saving grace for Wisconsin from how bad that second half was, is that the first half they played well. A football game unfortunately is not 30 minutes. It was incredibly discouraging.
There are a couple positives. Malachi Coleman had a good game and showed glimpses of what could happen with him. I think Eugene Hilton Jr. will be good.
Punter Sean West, who I suspect will get a good amount of work for the Badgers this season, had a few extremely good punts – including one of the best punts maybe in college football history in the first half.
I think Colton Joseph is definitely an upgrade at the quarterback position. It will be interesting to see how he plays against a team that’s not Notre Dame. Joseph gives me hope for this season. But his interception was bad – you could give him the benefit of the doubt saying it was a route issue, but that’s just who he is, he’ll throw an interception or two a game – you gotta live with the good and the bad.
I thought the game plan on both sides of the ball was a solid game plan in the first half.
There were moments of positivity for Wisconsin in the first half.
Now that I’m done with the positives, that second half was the Luke Fickell tenure in a nutshell. The DNA of this team I’m convinced has not changed. All of the issues that this program since Luke Fickell took over, they reared its ugly head in the second half. This team is a long ways off from “closing the gap” on the elite teams – which was their mantra all offseason.
I get that the offensive line is banged up right now, but that unit didn’t look right. Granted, I know Notre Dame is very good. But that unit is a work in progress.
The defense, which was one of the worst in NCAA football a season ago at producing turnovers, had another goose egg in the turnover department. You gotta make a play, especially against the top teams.
The secondary, the talent has been upgraded, but the way they were deployed was one of the issues on Sunday. Way too much cushion and way too passive. And if you feel the need to be that passive, then that’s an indictment on the talent and experience in the room.
Most disturbingly for me was when Wisconsin was down 21 points with 8:03 remaining, Badgers had the ball 4th-and-7 from the 50 and it was pretty clear the Badgers had to make some noise and do it fast. Luke Fickell punts from the 50. That is the signal to me that he had quit and waived the white flag and he was playing to have the score not be bad and not to win a game, which we have seen countless scenarios of Fickell doing this in his tenure. And no, the chances of the Badgers winning that game or even tying the game in that moment were not high, but what kind of message are you sending to your team when you punt from the 50 trailing by three scores with eight minutes left – and I can tell you what kind of message that sends – and I’m telling you that the defense lost their fight that next defensive series when Notre Dame went 88-yards for a touchdown, you could see it in their eyes.
When your leader, your coach, your CEO is saying “I don’t have enough confidence to try to win this game,” what the hell are you playing for?
There are plenty of criticisms of Luke Fickell’s first three seasons and one of them was him waiving the white flag, him not being engaged in moments when things weren’t going well or the game was over. You need to set an example to your team to fight for all 60 minutes of the game (60:01 if you play Michigan)!
I would have been fine with Wisconsin losing 60-13 if I felt that they were fighting for the entirety of the game.
The optics and message that Luke Fickell sent was awful.
There were some positives in the game, but there were a lot of red flags I saw in that game that go well beyond a really good team taking them to the woodshed in the second half.
The Badgers have the FCS Western Illinois Leathernecks on Saturday at Camp Randall. Western Illinois lost a home game to Illinois State 41-10 this past weekend.
This will be Wisconsin’s easiest game of the season.
The Badgers need to dominate this game from the get go. If there’s more of this 10-6 halftime leads in these games that we’ve had in the Fickell era, they’re going to lose people real quick.