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Overly Close?

Wisco's ten point victory over the Fightin' Fibs was fraught with a little too much drama for me. Illinois has been in a bit of a swoon, which is attributable to a temporary (unfortunately) dearth of talent and some injury problems. As a brief aside, their recent struggles are not due to coaching or some other problem. I may dislike (intensely) the University of Illinois, but Weber is a native son of Wisconsin and a fine, fine coach.

Anyhoo, since the Illini had been struggling (losing to Penn State and Miami of Ohio at home) the hope was for the Badgers to deliver a semi-serious beatdown. But it was not to be, at least not until about four minutes were left in the game. Though Wisconsin had several leads of 8 or more points, Illinois played a plucky game, with guys like Trent Meacham and Calvin Brock hitting bit shots. Plus, Wisconsin had two serious issues that kept Illinois in the game: the Hoft and Flowers got into foul trouble; and Bucky got beat, badly, on the boards.

Flowers and Krabby are the teams' two best defenders and its secondary and tertiary ballhandlers. They're probably the two headiest players on the team, and two huge leaders. So understandably, if you go back and watch, Illinois made their runs toward leveling the score when Michael and Joe were out of the game. Neither guy fouled out, but both got two whistles quite quickly and sat a large chunk of both halves; Michael got four pretty early as well.

Krabby's absence exacerbated the second issue-- a poor rebounding performance. Joe is one of the best rebounding guards (if you can call him a guard) in the nation, and probably the second best rebounder on the team, after Butch. But even when he was in the game, Bucky just got straight out beat on the boards, in embarrassing fashion, something that hasn't happened in quite a while. The stats bear this out-- Illinois missed 34 field goals, and the Badgers only garnered 20 boards. That means Illinois got 40% of its own misses. Conversely, the Badgers missed 23 field goals, but pulled down only 4 offensive boards, getting less than 20% of its missed shots. Those are terrible percentage to give up. And what's odd about this, is that the Badgers have been one of the best rebounding teams in the nation. Their calling cards have been playing good defense and holding teams to one shot, and following their own misses to get second chance points. Maybe they missed the physicality that Gullickson could have provided, had he not been benched for underage drinking (only six more weeks to 21, Kev).

I guess it was good that the Badgers could fail to do something that they've been doing well all season and still come out with a win. That seemed to be due to three things-- they shot very well, over 50% for the game, Hughes especially nailing jumper after jumper; they continued to play solid defense, though they didn't rebound well; and they didn't turn the ball over-- only 9 times on the game. The shooting percentage and the turnovers are impressive stats considering that Illinois is a solid defensive team. Butch's performance (16 points) was impressive as well, coming against Illinois center Shaun Pruitt in large part, who was the best returning low post threat in the league.

Also, as the media has made clear, this was definitely Hughes' best game of the year. He had six steals, shot lights out, made several great passes and played under control,
giving up only two TOs, one of which was Butch's fault. Plus, he played a ton of minutes with Flowers in foul trouble. It was interesting to hear Weber, after the game, differentiate between Hughes and the rest of the Badger team, talent-wise. He said something like "Hughes has what we're missing, and the rest of the guys are just good, solid college players."

Well Deserved

Joe Thomas, who is already the best Badger alum playing in the NFL, made the Pro Bowl after a guy ahead of him dropped out due to injury.

Peter King had this to say about Thomas earlier this week:

"All I Can Say Is Wow Dept.: Left tackle Joe Thomas started every snap in 2007 for the Browns at the most important line position. He allowed one sack all season (of Charlie Frye in the first half of the first game; some say Frye held the ball too long). Len Pasquarelli reported the other day that Thomas allowed two. My Browns guy said one. Whatever, it was miniscule for a team whose quarterbacks had 564 pass-drops.

Thomas was the keystone to the NFL's third-highest team in sacks allowed last year becoming the third-lowest this year. For having one of the best years in the league among all offensive linemen, Thomas received 3.5 of 50 votes for the Associated Press' Offensive Rookie of the Year award. Nothing against Adrian Peterson, who's one of the best backs to come along in years. I just think Thomas getting 7 percent of the vote was pretty light."

Turmoil in Buckyland

It's only been a week since the Outback Bowl, but the UW football program is already undergoing some serious changes. Those are--
(A) Jackie I's apparent declaration to go pro, if he's not found guilty of residential burglary;
(B) Purdue courting Badger offensive coordinator Paul Chryst to be its successor to head coach Joe Tiller, though Tiller hasn't even retired yet and may not this season;
(C) Badger offensive line coach Bob Palcic leaving the program to go back to UCLA and coach with Rick New-weasel, ahem, Neuheisel;
(D) Badger defensive coordinator and sexagenarian Mike Hankiwitz getting laid off, allegedly for "performance reasons;" and
(E) one of the Badgers' top recruits, a St. Louis wideout, changing his mind and going to Mizzou.

Here are the takes--
- If Jack runs a 4.4, he'll likely be a pick somewhere in the top two rounds, so sure, he should probably go. He also redshirted his first season, so he's been at UW for four years. What's worrying is that his residential burglary case is going to trial on January 14, in less than a week. If he's convicted, and if he signs with an agent before then, he's in serious trouble, and may be totally screwed career-wise. If I was him, I might wait on signing with an agent until after the trial. That would leave him at least one year of eligibility, in case he, I don't know, goes to prison for two years. Then, after prison, he could go to a JC for a year or something to try to make a case for getting back to the NFL. Grim, I know.

- Chryst's leaving would be unfortunate, although I wasn't impressed with his play-calling against Tennessee, or the offense's preparation for that game (four timeouts wasted, several illegal procedure penalties). He's usually been a good playcaller, someone who does a solid job of playing to his team's strengths, and he looks like a good developer of quarterbacks. He was definitely a huge step up over Brian White. What makes his pursuit of a college head coaching job a little odd is that he doesn't seem like a guy who's a particularly enthusiastic or effective recruiter. In this day and age, unless you're at some huge traditional power, I really feel that you need to have that trait to be a successful head coach. With his head for strategy and development, Chryst is probably better suited to be a pro assistant.

- Palcic was a solid coach, but with UW's traditional plethora of excellent linemen, Bielema should be able to find a capable replacement. Remember, only two years ago Palcic replaced Coach Hueber, who left to be the Vikings O-line coach.

- As a fan, it's hard to judge Hankwitz's performance. Last year's defense was excellent, and, as everyone knows, this year's was far worse. How much of that is due to player turnover, and how much can be pinned on coaching, we can't really know. That said, last season the defense nearly always made good halftime adjustments. This year, the bleeding often got worse in the second half. (The bowl game being a notable exception.) Also, Hankwitz doesn't appear to have been a particularly effective recruiter. (He was responsible for Colorado and the surrounding area, and UW didn't pull in anyone of note from that region during his tenure.) This also may be viewed as a move to keep linebackers coach and co-defensive coordinator Dave Doeren around. He seems to have done a good job with his players, and is noted as a top-notch recruiter. He should get the promotion to full d-coordinator now.

- Finally, the defection of the St. Louis wideout, Wes Kemp, is unfortunate. Scout.com had him rated as one of UW's top recruits of the 20 or so "verbal commitments" the school has lined up for national signing day. If anything, this "defection" highlights the absence of Henry Mason, who coaches and recruits wide receivers. Coach Mason's been on leave since late summer, recuperating from a terrifying spinal injury. He's a fine coach, an outstanding recruiter, and, by every account I've read, a great person. UW needs him back pronto.

Meeeechigan in Disarray

UW men's basketball had their first win of the Big Ten season, 70-54 over the struggling Michigan Wolverines last night, in Ann Arbor, though the stadium was half empty, probably due to three factors-- (A) Michigan got over a foot of snow yesterday, (B) it was still winter break for UM students, and (C) Michigan was 4-8 (now 4-9).

For those of you who didn't see the game, UW won because of their solid defense, particularly in the first half, Wolvie's own bumbles and defensive lapses, and John Leuer playing lights out offense from everywhere except the free throw line. (The most accurate game synopsis is written up here, I think, since it accurately focuses on Michigan's own shortcomings.) "Loo-er" finished with 25 points and nailed 5 threes, including four in the first half. He was unconscious, though nearly all of this threes weren't contested, which was odd, even after he made his first couple. And they all came off of passes, finding him standing alone and open just behind the arc. Not great defense there, Michigan.

So really, the Badgers didn't play that well, it's just that Michigan struggled even more, and Leuer was on fire. Sadly, the funky Beilein zone that Wolvie threw at UW, mixed in with some other defenses, caused some problems, to the tune of an ugly 17 turnovers (though they did manage a decent 1.06 points per possession). In addition, Butch, Landry and Flowers played limited minutes due to foul trouble. So not a pretty win, but again, one that came on the back of generally great team defense.

What was encouraging was how even with three starters in foul trouble, the team played excellent defense, letting Meechigan manage only .83 PPP. Bohannon seems to be growing up on the defensive end, and is far removed from the individual liability he seemed to be at times last season. The Hoft was his warrior-like self on D and on the boards (though his offensive game, except for a nice nearly behind the backboard floater to end the first half, was U-G-L-Y). The Stiemer had a nice double shot block possession. And Leuer played pretty solid team D and rebounded decently. That's excellent news, since he certainly has the offensive skills to merit a lot of playing time.

Anyhow, this generally excellent team D will probably be enough against questionable teams like Michigan (at least this season's Michigan). But if UW wants to compete with the big guys, and make a run at the Big Ten, they need to play better offense and be more careful with the ball. Random guys aren't going to go 5 for 5 from beyond the arc for you every night.

Illinois Fans-- Still Racist

Jay Mariotti (the best "kick 'em while they're down" sportswriter in the business) accurately relates the moronic redneck hysteria of Illinois fans:

"Hey, at least Illini Nation had a chance to chant 'CHIEEEEEEEEF!' If all else fails on your biggest football stage in a quarter-century, why not show your rubeness by paying homage to a banished mascot? The band launched into its familiar routine at halftime, prompting fans to see an imaginary Chief Illiniwek and repeatedly chant 'CHIEEEEEEEEF!' Look, people, Chief is gone, buried by the NCAA. And nobody in California seemed especially impressed by your post-death embrace, including Los Angeles Times columnist Bill Plaschke, who noted, 'You can buy his memorabilia in school-sanctioned bookstores, see his resemblance on oddly painted fans outside home games, cheer his supporters as they march in the school's homecoming parade and feel his presence at the university's highest reaches.' Way to stand there, in your full-throated fury, and use New Year's Day in Pasadena to perpetuate mass Illiniwek denial."

This is the Plaschke column, also hilarious, that Mariotti mentions. In it, the 2nd Chief of the Peoria Tribe says, "I don't know why a university has to keep alive something that speaks of racism. It just fascinates me that people have to hold onto something that is so hurtful to others." The real Chief also says, "I love it when they say they are honoring us, yet they never ask us how we want to be honored." Ah what typical Fib behavior, nonchalantly offending everyone.

Two Initial Reactions to the Bowl Loss

That bowl game was encouraging (fighting back from a two touchdown deficit) but ultimately disappointing. There's a ton of stuff to talk about, and we'll get to it eventually I'm sure, but I have two things I want to get out there.

One, thank goodness that the defensive coaches finally wised up, benched Aubrey Pleasant and put Jay Valai in at strong safety. By all accounts, Pleasant tries hard, is a good teammate, and a nice guy. But the only thing he's exceled at this season is the safety blitz. Otherwise, his game is adequate to poor. Valai is a smaller guy, but in that one half, he made more instinctual plays than I've seen out of Pleasant all season. In short, Valai for Pleasant replaced an almost total liability with a solid player. Notice that UT scored zero points after Valai came in. What took the coaches so long?

Second, I'm relieved that the Tyler Donovan era is over. Tyler is a tough, tough kid. But he's no more than an adequate quarterback, especially when, like in the second half, he's hobbled and/or afraid to run. I think an un-shell shocked Donovan would have taken off early on that fourth and two and gotten it. That last interception, thrown almost directly to a defender, seems symptomatic of his issues. He has problems going through progressions, he's not particularly accurate, and his timing with receivers (particularly anyone not named Swan) is poor. UW needs better quarterbacking if it wants to beat OSU and the top tier SEC teams.