2013 Pre-Season Preview: Wisconsin Badgers

2012 Record: 8-6 (4-4 in Big Ten)

Head Coach: Gary Anderson (first year at Wisconsin, 26-24 at Utah St)

Last Bowl Game: 2013 Rose Bowl: lost to Stanford 20-14

Stadium: Camp Randall Stadium in Madison, WI (capacity = 80,321)

Home Field Advantage: ranked 17th out of 69 BCS teams

Schedule Glimpse:

2013 Schedule Link

Out of Conference: 8/31 vs UMass, 9/7 vs Tennessee Tech, 9/14 at Arizona State, 11/9 vs BYU

Toughest Home Games: 10/12 vs Northwestern, 11/30 vs Penn St

Toughest Road Games: 9/28 at Ohio St, 11/2 at Iowa

Statistical Snapshot:

2012 Statistics Link

Stats to Fear: had just 15 takeaways in 2012 (11th in B1G), converted on just 35.57% of third downs (11th in B1G)

Stats to Cheer: had 31 sacks in 2012 (2nd in B1G), had just 12 turnovers in 2012 (2nd in B1G)

Advanced Stats (Football Outsiders 2012 FEI Ranking): 15th out of 124 teams

Personnel:

Phil Steele’s Returning Starters: Offense: 8, Defense: 6, Special Teams: 2

Key Defensive Returnees: LB Chris Borland (104 tackles), LB Ethan Armstrong (93 tackles), S Dezmen Southward (93 tackles), DT Beau Allen (37 tackles, 7.5 TFL)

Key Offensive Returnees: QB Joel Stave (1104 yds pass, 58.8% completions, 6 TD, 3 INT), RB James White (806 yds rush, 6.4 ypc, 12 TD), RB Melvin Gordon (621 yds rush, 10.02 ypc, 3 TD), WR Jared Abbrederis (49 rec, 5 TD), TE Jacob Pedersen (27 rec, 4 TD)

Top 2013 Recruits: RB Corey Clement, DE Chikwe Obasih, QB Tanner McEvoy, ATH Austin Ramesh

Inside Scoop with Andrew Coppens of Madtown Badgers and The B1G Time:

CFBZ: There is a new sheriff in town as Gary Anderson takes over the Badgers. What differences do you think we will see from this team?

Madtown Badgers: I’m not sure if you’ll see a ton of difference on the offensive side of the ball, especially if you paid attention to what the Paul Chryst offense looked like the last three years in Madison. That offense was averaging over 30 points per game and Ludwig appears to be forming an offense based on the same system.

Defensively you’ll see a lot of difference as the 3-4 scheme is instituted (the only one in the Big Ten, btw). That means a more aggressive D and a lot more man coverage, something UW fans haven’t seen since the days of Jamar Fletcher.

CFBZ: Wisconsin played three QBs last season. Who gets the rock this season?

Madtown Badgers: Who gets the rock? Well, that’s a good question whether you’re talking football or basketball this offseason in Madison. However, that said it’s hard to count out the guy who looked like a Wisconsin QB last season and was the standout this offseason and that’s Joel Stave. He can throw an accurate deep ball and for whatever reason this team has responded to him since he stepped foot on campus. That said don’t count out JUCO transfer Tanner McEvoy who’s got the arm and the wheels. If he doesn’t pick up the offense fast enough that’ll likely be the only issue holding him back.

CFBZ: Wisconsin suffered all of their six losses in 2012 by one score or less. What was the missing ingredient last year and what is the biggest weakness heading into 2013?

Madtown Badgers: The missing ingredient last year was consistency. Whether it was on the offensive line (O-Line coach fired after week 2), at QB (3 players made starts in 2012), or at wide receiver – this team had about everything thrown at them in 2012 and yet they still found a way to win a Big Ten championship.

If there is a weakness on this team heading into 2013 it’s a lack of a proven 2nd wide receiver. Don’t get it twisted though, it’s not for a lack of talent, it was for more of a lack of experience last year. If the WR corp. puts it together consistently the UW offense is going to be hard to stop.

CFBZ: What will make the 2013 season a success in your eyes?

Madtown Badgers: Success this season is hard to quantify. I mean, how do you top 3 straight Big Ten championships? Especially considering the only other teams to do it in B1G history are OSU and Michigan…. That said I think success would be showing a clear vision for what this team will be under Andersen. Coaches that fail to establish their identity early on aren’t successful.

If you are a Badger fan, the good news is that the players are saying the right things and their actions are backing that up. There’s just something different with this team.

However, if you wanted to nail me down for a record as success you’d have to say anything short of a 9 or 10 win season wouldn’t be considered that. The schedule really sets up nicely after the OSU game on Sept. 28th and if they can win that don’t be shocked to see the Badgers in Indy once again.

Verdict:

In a “down year” for Wisconsin they went 8-5 but once again represented the Big Ten in the Rose Bowl for the third straight year. Gary Anderson takes over after a four year stint at Utah State where he took the Aggies from 3-9 to 11-2. The Badgers got some breaks last year on their way to a win in the Big Ten Championship Game as both Ohio State and Penn State (both teams finished ahead of the Badgers in the Leaders division) were ineligible.

Joel Stave looks like he’s got the edge to start at QB for the Badgers in 2013. Stave was impressive during the spring game as he went 15 of 20 for 161 yards and a TD. At RB, the Badgers lose Montee Ball and his 1,800+ yards but they return James White and Melvin Gordon and as usual they look to be stocked in this area. What they might miss is what a workhorse Ball was. Can White or Gordon take the pounding that Ball took game in and game out? The Badgers look good at receiver as Jared Abbrederis (seems like he’s been there for a long time) and Jacob Pedersen both return and they did not lose anybody of note. The OL loses it’s two most experienced linemen but they do return four players with starting experience and this Badgers OL reloads as well as any other in college football.

The defense has been consistently good for the Badgers over the recent past and new DC Dave Aranda, who coached with Anderson at Utah State, isn’t looking to change that. Aranda ran a 3-4 defense at Utah State and it will be interesting to see how quickly they shift to that defense this year but you will definitely see some them moving towards it depending on how the current personnel takes to it. The DL loses DE David Gilbert but returns everybody else of note. The LB corps loses Mike Taylor but return Chris Borland and Ethan Armstrong. The secondary looks like the big question-mark as they must replace three of their top four players.

From a scheduling standpoint, the Badgers hit the B1G jackpot. No Michigan, no Michigan State and no Nebraska. They do have a couple of tough out of conference games as they travel to Arizona State in their third game of the year and then they host BYU in November. The conference games look to boil down to three or four games as they will have to travel to Ohio State and then turn around two weeks later and host Northwestern in what will be their toughest back-to-back games of the season (but they do have the bye week built in). The other two games to keep an eye on are the trip to Iowa on Nov 2nd and the finale against Penn State on November 30th. Vegas has the Badgers win total set at 8.5. I do like that number.

Prediction: 9-3

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