Badgers to enter season No. 23 in coaches poll

The 2013 Wisconsin Badgers will enter the season ranked No. 23 in the country, at least in the just released USA Today Coaches Poll. UW entered last season ranked No. 12 in the nation following back-to-back trips to the Rose Bowl, however we all know how that panned out as UW ended the season 8-6 and unranked in the final polls released following the season. 

Alabama is the No. 1 team in the nation, receiving 58 of the first place votes, and are followed up in the Top 5 by Ohio State, Oregon, Stanford, and Georgia. Rounding out the Top 10 are Texas A&M, South Carolina, Clemson, Louisville, and Florida. 

Wisconsin earned 172 points in the poll and are just 14 points behind fellow Big Ten team and Oct. 12th opponents Northwestern. 

On the whole the Badgers are one of just five Big Ten teams to be ranked in the polls with it shaping out like this: Ohio State (No. 2), Michigan (No. 17), Nebraska (No. 18), Northwestern (No. 22), and Wisconsin (No. 23). That's just one less team than the SEC, however 5 of the SEC's 6 teams start the season in the Top 10 compared to just the one for the Big Ten. 

No doubt that starting the season ranked at all is a huge advantage come BCS rankings time, especially if you keep winning football games before the first BCS ranking comes out. Hard to argue with the ranking Wisconsin got by the Coaches Poll this time around. 

Here is the full poll: