Nagging Badger worries

I'm missing this week's home game against Indiana (as I'll be watching my brother get married), but I'm starting to have some nagging worries. It's starting to look like Wisconsin might be without both John Clay and James White this week. That said, they were without both of those players in the second half of last week's Purdue game and the Badgers took care of business, so who knows what will happen. My big worry is that the team will write off this game much as I have been doing for the past few weeks and will be surprised by a team that came within a dropped pass of beating Iowa last week. Here's hoping the home-field advantage shows up for the team this week, and the coaches continue to show the preparation, motivation skills, and general adjustability we've seen in the past three games.

Wisconsin 34 - 13 Purdue: Badgers take care of business (eventually)

Wisconsin turned what was a close game in the first half into a blowout.

The team looked flat on both sides of the ball coming off their bye week, especially the defense. Purdue was moving the ball easily in small chunks of yardage and Wisconsin was having a tough time stopping them, despite the fact that the Boilermakers were starting their third string, true freshman QB due to a rash of injuries. John Clay and the running game had a tough time getting going early, and the offense clearly missed the different look of James White. I was shaking my head on several plays, most notably a sweep to the left where Clay seemed to dance back and forth for about 5 seconds before being tackled behind the line of scrimmage instead of trusting his blockers. Clay is a great between-the-tackles back but it seems like we've been seeing a little too much of this hesitation from him in general this season.

Clay and Watt were both knocked out of the game for a good spell - Clay with a knee problem and Watt with some sort of shoulder injury and the team just looked lost heading into the locker room at halftime. I wouldn't have believed I was saying this a month ago, but big props to the coaching staff for making adjustments at halftime and absolutely crushing Purdue 28-3 in the second half. Wisconsin's defense stiffened and managed to pick off the Purdue QB three times, including a blowout-sealing Pick Six from Antonio Fenelus.

Game ball: Montee Ball and the offensive line for producing the best executed play I've seen all season, by any team. Midway through the third quarter, with Wisconsin clinging to a 13-10 lead, Ball rushed to the left for a 31 yard touchdown and had five or six blockers ahead of him on the way to the end zone. Wisconsin went up 20-10 but you knew the game was over at that point.

Next week UW takes on Indiana at Camp Randall, but I'll miss the game. My brother was smart enough to schedule his wedding for a weekend when UW takes on IU at home and there's no Packers game (laughing).

Wisconsin 27 - 14 San Jose St.

This was a classic UW preseason game, and is also dashing my (already small) optimism that UW will have a shot at a 1-loss season and a BCS bowl. Once again they dominated the stats but generally looked flat. I've seen this many times before in the preseason - where they dominate the other team but make a bunch of stupid mistakes (White's fumble into the endzone, turning it over on downs inside the 5, Tolzein's pick). I missed some of the second have but was less whelmed than I was last week, when UW played a slightly better opponent.

This kind of stuff comes back and burns you in the Big Ten season. I have no doubt that UW can and will hang with teams like Iowa, OSU, etc. (and play largely mistake-free football), but where they will get into trouble are the medium to lesser teams like Northwestern and MSU. This kind of thing just shows a lack of focus and they'll get burned when they play a half-decent squad. My biggest issue with the program over the years is its tendency to sleep on lesser teams, and I see no reason not to believe it's different this year.

Clay and Tolzien both had big games, though my lack of understanding of QB rating shows through when I goggle at Tolzein's numbers. He was a (seemingly) predestrian 15 for 22 with a TD and an INT, which somehow translates to a 147 QB rating? Clay got a much bigger share of the carries today, and rushed for 137 yards (6 yds/carry) and 2 TDs, which I like to see.

Keeping my fingers crossed for Gilreath, who has a concussion after a nasty, nasty collision on a punt return. No word yet on how he's doing - media reports say he was NOT moving when they took him off the field, despite some of the announcers' initial reports.

The biggest news so far today is JMU beating Virginia Tech. Holy crap. I'm going to be rooting against VT (and Oregon State) the rest of the year so we don't see BSU in the National Championship game. I'm currently rooting for (ugh) OSU in this game vs Miami. They're still the most likely (though not by much) B10 team to make the championship game. PSU-Bama should be a great game tonight, but I think Bama wins by double digits. I'd feel differently if PSU's freshman QB had a few more games under his belt.

UNLV 21 - 41 Wisconsin

A decent start for UW. It was a classic non-conference Wisconsin game, in that they dominated the other team but still made enough mistakes to make you nervous at halftime. Tolzien threw a pick 6, and Nick Toon fumbled in the red zone, which led directly to 14 of UNLV's 21 points.

However, aside from that one bad throw Tolzien looked really good. I think I heard the phrase "game manager" half a hundred times during the broadcast, and generally when the Badgers needed a completion he and the wideouts came through. But of course, Wisconsin's calling card is the running game and holy crap did it look good. The only negative I can say about it is that they have so many great backs that Clay might not get enough carries to win the Heisman. Clay had several of his trademark runs where he was hit and then ran another 7-8 yards with a guy on his back, and Ball looked good too. But the player who impressed me the most was freshman James White, the 'speed back'. He got 11 carries and looked great, and what especially pleased me was that the Badgers put him back for a few kick returns, though from the stat sheet it looks like he didn't get a chance to run with any of them. Despite all the love the announcers were giving Gilreath I've never thought that he was an especially good returner.

The offense in general was in good form, starting from the first drive where they marched down the field, eating a ton of clock on the way (~7:30 on the opening drive). Wisconsin dominated the TOP by 17 minutes and it felt like a LOT longer.

The special teams have looked better so far, and the best news I saw all game was that Bielema is no longer coaching the special teams himself this year. There was lots of criticism in the media the past few seasons that Bielema's handling of the ST unit was weak due to his other responsibilities, but that could just be a correlation = causation fallacy.

The defense looked great, but of all the team's units I can't really say much about them until they face a real offense at ASU or MSU. Watt still looks great, and Borland looks just as dominant as he did last year. The Badgers were also all over the Rebels backfield early in the game, which was great to see. Valai got beat on one of UNLV's touchdowns but that happens sometimes (that's what the play action is for anyway). The safeties are good but I don't have any clue about the cornerbacks this year.

My memories of the second half are a lot hazier after the Badgers pushed the score up to 41. We were watching it on DVR (to skip commercials) and it was after 1 in the morning at that point, so I was nodding off. I put on the rest of the game in the morning but already knew that not much else was going to happen.

Final stats:
Total Yards: UW 475, UNLV 217
Rushing Yards: UW 278, UNLV 112
Passing Yards: UW 197, UNLV 105
Fumbles: UW 1, UNLV 1
INT: UW 1, UNLV 0
TOP: UW 38:19, UNLV 21:41