2019 Badger Football - Rose Bowl Lead Up

[Treebeard]

We’re in the **** Rose Bowl y’all. Enjoy it.

I'm pretty excite.

This could be a game to remember for a long time. Two explosive offenses and good defenses

[coolhandluke121]

Did I miss Taylor officially declaring for the draft?

The offensive line was a much bigger problem than Coan this year. Taylor literally could have run for 3,000 yards behind the line Montee Ball had. Ron Dayne had it pretty easy too.

Play-calling was easily the #2 issue with the offense. Coan is a distant 3rd.

Taylor is about 99% to go. He is answering the question, "will you play the bowl game" and it sure as hell seems like, "yeah, I know I'm going pro but I'm going to do it." I think everyone including people that know what the coaches believe assume he's gone.

The line had a bit of a rough patch in the middle of the year, they did hit their stride late.

Tough crowd as always. Badgers finished with the #6 overall efficiency in offense this year (along with #8 defense) and they do not have the luxury of guys like Justin Fields or Joe Burrow and only have one fringe-ish NFL WR...but if Paul Chryst called a few more jet sweeps or something they would've overtaken Ohio State or something like that. Rinse, wash, repeat.

I'm not being a tough crowd or complaining. I'm not dissatisfied with the season either. Just pointing out that it's silly to blame Coan when he wasn't even the worst part of the offense. He proved in the Minnesota and OSU game that he deserved a lot more chances to diversify the offense. They did not have to be so one-dimensional, and they didn't have an o-line that can dominate even when everyone in the stadium knows what's coming. The offensive line didn't "hit their stride" until Chryst opened up his play-book a little more - and even then, I've never seen a UW RB have to get so many yards on his own, and I'm not sure I've ever seen any college RB do so. Taylor hid a lot of flaws up front.

That doesn't mean I think they would have beaten OSU or should have competed for a national title. It doesn't mean I don't think they had a good offense. It just means if you're asking "how can we be better next year?" I'm looking at the o-line and the conservative play-calling before I look at Coan.

I think the bolded part was a pretty obnoxious way to respond but thanks for pointing out that I was saying things I had no idea I was saying.

[Kerb Hohl]

Again, maybe I'm taking out some of the trash of what I was reading from a large chunk of fans on Twitter and maybe everyone just had time to cool down. There was definitely a vibe from part of the fanbase that calling a few run plays in their 3 series in the early 2nd half basically stole defeat from the jaws of victory.

Chryst was better at being aggressive on 4th down and there were points later in the season where, yeah, maybe they used the jet sweep and a few early down passes to their favor...but they weren't as bad as people make it out earlier in the year.

The only 3 not great/bad offensive games were:
-Home vs. Northwestern
-@Illinois (they basically left 10-14 points in the red zone on turnovers/not finishing drives)
-@Ohio State - in the rain, Coan was getting eaten alive by Chase Young

The offense will probably have to be more diverse by default but I think the NW game was the only one that really was bad. They threw the ball a ton against Illinois.

Anyways, I think I am truly arguing with myself and maybe some soft dissent so I will say yes, ready to enjoy the Rose Bowl.

[Kerb Hohl]

I always forget how **** expensive it is to fly into LA around the Rose Bowl. I went through Vegas as a just-out-of-college dude last time around. I don't do many live sporting events anymore but always will do a Rose Bowl, Final Four, may be willing to overpay once for a Super Bowl if my team is in it. Gonna watch this one from the couch. Not worth $1500/person (at least) for flight/ticket/lodging.

[Mags FTW]

Barry is #90 on ESPN's Top 150 All-Time coaches list.

[ReasonablySober]

Barry is #90 on ESPN's Top 150 All-Time coaches list.

I thought that was a joke.

[midranger]

Has anyone ever done a badger huddle tailgate?

It’s expensive, but wife and I have no one else to tailgate with. Just wondering if it’s a good time or a bunch of 70 yo alum in sweater vests

[Kerb Hohl]

Barry is #90 on ESPN's Top 150 All-Time coaches list.

I didn't see the list but I'm pretty sure this guy is #1, right?

Read on Twitter

[chuckleslove]

lol why is Minnesota celebrating his coaching career at Western Michigan?

That's probably even worse than the co champs nonsense.

[Kerb Hohl]

lol why is Minnesota celebrating his coaching career at Western Michigan?

That's probably even worse than the co champs nonsense.

They've sold their souls to an egotistical maniac that is just running his marketing campaign through their athletic department.

[Iheartfootball]

Bringing College Gameday to campus is a thing to put on your resume? Huh.

[humanrefutation]

I hated that dude the moment he stepped on campus. A shameless self-promoter who thinks he's above his program. You know he's going to leave Minnesota in the next couple years to take a big job somewhere.

[humanrefutation]

Barry is #90 on ESPN's Top 150 All-Time coaches list.

I thought that was a joke.

As in he should be higher ranked or lower ranked?

If you look at some of the names ahead of him on that list, there's no way he should be ranked that low. He's obviously not in the top tiers of all-time coaches, but he should be higher than that. Get some of those old bums from the 1920 and 1930s off the list, IMO.

Amazingly, Barry isn't even the highest ranked coach of a Wisconsin School. Lance Leipold is ranked 12 spots higher for his work at Whitewater, though his stint at Buffalo is still a work in progress.

[Kerb Hohl]

I don't really take much issue with where Barry is rated.

On one hand, he is responsible for building an extremely good program from nothing that is not in a place where good programs this good should be.

On the other hand, there are a lot of other coaches with multiple national championships or whatever. Just depends on the criteria, I guess.

[Mags FTW]

If you hate Fleck, Patrick Reusse is a must follow on Twitter. He is an old curmudgeon sportswriter in the Twin Cities who doesn't like Fleck, and takes jabs at him all the time. Gopher fans hate him. This was right after Fleck ran onto the field in Iowa:

Read on Twitter

[Treebeard]

If you hate Fleck, Patrick Reusse is a must follow on Twitter. He is an old curmudgeon sportswriter in the Twin Cities who doesn't like Fleck, and takes jabs at him all the time. Gopher fans hate him. This was right after Fleck ran onto the field in Iowa:

Read on Twitter

Reusse's favorite local targets are some U of M coaches and administrators and some Vikings coaches and owners, and he can really stick the knife in. A lot of it gets to be Gery-like flamebaiting, but Reusse usually knows when he's got some real meat to chew on. He's been there a thousand years and has always had the last laugh on his own critics.

[MikeIsGood]

Holy **** ****, Minnesota. This is a new low.

You love to see it.

[BUCKnation]

Kansas needs to put out a banter counter tweet with Les Miles

[Kerb Hohl]

I've always generally liked Reusse in my time in MN. If you come in not loving all of the teams (especially the University of) you can see where he's coming from on his pessimism. For a guy in his 70s (or is he even older now?) he "gets it" more than almost anyone else that age commenting on sports.

[coolhandluke121]

Has anyone ever done a badger huddle tailgate?

It’s expensive, but wife and I have no one else to tailgate with. Just wondering if it’s a good time or a bunch of 70 yo alum in sweater vests

Those are synonymous.