GT: Bucky at Bama - 9/13/25 - 11:00 - ABC

[TroyD92]

It's not really me saying this team can never be competitive, but the ceiling is pretty clear and the floor year to year is a lot lower.

[MickeyDavis]

T.E.A.M.

[MVP2110]

Fwiw Illinois lost 38-9 to Oregon last year, and by 2 TDs to Penn St. The only ranked teams they played. Indiana lost by 23 to Ohio St & 10 by Notre Dame. They got easy schedules last year and took advantage of it

[PintSizedBox10]

Can they forfeit for the sake of player health

[Kerb Hohl]

Oh for ****’s sale I don’t want to hear we don’t have NIL money and we’re in Wisconsin and all that garbage. UCLA looks like garbage in Southern California. A recruiting hot bed with endorsement possibilities galore. Texas Texh, Iowa State, Illinois, Indiana and Utah are ranked off the top of my head. Those are far less desirable locations than Madison without huge NIL budgets and histories far worse than Wisconsin.

Tuscaloosa sucks as a city but is close to a bunch of NFL talent.

It’s not a knock on the state of Wisconsin’s livability. It’s the fact that Georgia, Ohio, Florida, etc have literally thousands more college football players than the state of Wisconsin’s HS programs and it’s not like Minnesota or Iowa or most of Illinois has much else if we poach from there.

Indiana, Illinois, etc in your list would get their dicks kicked in by most of the juggernauts on our schedule. The key is trying to avoid facing such teams. Illinois is our hope for the next decade. Get a favorable schedule randomly, be an OK team, win some close games, have 9 wins, pretend you’re actually kinda good.

[TroyD92]

Oh for ****’s sale I don’t want to hear we don’t have NIL money and we’re in Wisconsin and all that garbage. UCLA looks like garbage in Southern California. A recruiting hot bed with endorsement possibilities galore. Texas Texh, Iowa State, Illinois, Indiana and Utah are ranked off the top of my head. Those are far less desirable locations than Madison without huge NIL budgets and histories far worse than Wisconsin.

Tuscaloosa sucks as a city but is close to a bunch of NFL talent.

It’s not a knock on the state of Wisconsin’s livability. It’s the fact that Georgia, Ohio, Florida, etc have literally thousands more college football players than the state of Wisconsin’s HS programs and it’s not like Minnesota or Iowa or most of Illinois has much else if we poach from there.

I was going to bring up Notre Dame or Ohio State as counter examples, but Ohio produces an insane amount of football players and Notre Dame has built inroads at basically every Catholic private school in the country.

[Ryan5UW]

T.E.A.M.

I have an irrational amount of hate for that **** vest

[humanrefutation]

Too many missteps at key junctions got us to this point.

Chryst collapsing our recruiting division.
Fickell picking Longo as OC.
Fickell/Longo collapsing our previous recruiting networks to chase talent we didn't have in Wisconsin to play a system that ultimately didn't work.

While we also had bad luck with our transfer QB injuries, we were unable to develop an effective QB program here because we relied on transfer QBs and had to pivot to three different offensive systems in four years.

Of course, the cardinal sin may be hiring Fickell. He had an excellent reputation coming here, and it was a widely celebrated hire. But while you can pin many of the offensive struggles on Longo failing, I'm not sure we can say that Fickell/Tressell has developed a brilliant defense, either. And that's their alleged forte.

To be fair, I'm not sure Leonhard or Rhule would've been the right guy, either.

[Kerb Hohl]

I was one of the people with the lowest excitement about the Fickell hire when it happened but still was good with it. About the only blame there is imo is that maybe hiring a cheaper coach might’ve left more booster money for the roster.

Otherwise, I’m a broken record - nobody is winning these games with our talent available.

Iowa was Wisconsin Lite and kept legendary Kirk Ferentz on staff. When they face OSU and the like these days, they also look like they shouldn’t be on the same field. I think Fickell could get them to Iowa/Illinois/Minnesota territory where an easy schedule and some luck may get them 8 wins…I don’t think anybody is going to care.

The QB/OT injury luck and schedule have made things look even worse.

[tski1972]

Fickell can take McIntosh with him. Both stink.

[MikeIsGood]

T.E.A.M.

I have an irrational amount of hate for that **** vest

It's so **** corny. It would be corny 13-0 or 0-13. Row the boat bull.

[MickeyDavis]

Read on Twitter

[Iheartfootball]

Read on Twitter

Inspiring/green

[MickeyDavis]

Read on Twitter

[Kerb Hohl]

I don’t think he’s done a masterful job with the roster or anything but it really sucks we can’t even tell because the guy never gets his QB, this year the OT.

[midranger]

I’ve come to the realization that the program was in shambles when he took over. So I’m willing to give some time. I like a lot of the guys he’s recruited out of HS, but they’re still just RS or true freshmen (or JR in the case of Alliegro)

I don’t think he’s done a great job or anything, but you can only fix so much each year.

We had no scholarship QB (literally zero) left and the guys he brought in to start have gotten hurt early now 3 years in a row.

Zero impact DL. Zero depth behind a couple JAGs.

LB were a couple UDFA ILB, zero edge talent. No depth.

Secondary was weak at CB, but S was set.

OL had a 7th round OT, a couple JAGs, and zero depth.

RB was Brae (very good, usually hurt), Mellusi (okay, always hurt) and zero depth.

WR was actually a solid room. They chased all those guys off and spent significant resources on some JAGs. Huge mistake in year 1.

Not a single good TE on the roster. Certainly no depth.

It was a **** show. The schedule stiffening up doesn’t help. I don’t think many coaches were coming in and having us compete with elite programs in true road games in year 3. If we’re getting completely thrashed by Maryland, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Washington, and Minnesota in the coming weeks, that’s a huge problem. Heck, I’d even like to see us keep it close vs Michigan. But this bama road loss doesn’t change my perspective too much. Nor will the ensuing OSU and Oregon beat downs. They have almost always been at a different level than us.