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Badger Bits: Football team wraps up summer conditioning
by drumbum2011 on Jul 30, 2010 5:00 AM CDT
in Badger Bits
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Here are your Badger Bits for Friday, July 30th:
The Wisconsin football team wraps up its summer conditioning program today, and is set to begin their pre-season camp on August 9th according to Tom Mulhern at Madison.com. The article contains some interesting quotes from UW's strength and conditioning coach Ben Herbert, which provide some insight into the mindset of the team as they move closer to the start of the season. Herbert seems quite intent on making sure his players don't take their national standing for granted:
"I put it on them since day one and they haven't missed a beat since," Herbert said. "The detail and the work ethic. They have talent, do they get sloppy? Do they think they are too good? Do they think they have arrived? Do they think, because a magazine may say they're 12th or eighth or sixth (in the nation), that they are?"
Herbert also mentions that running back John Clay has recovered well from having surgery in the off-season on both ankles, and is getting closer to being physically ready for the opening game against the UNLV Rebels on September 4th. Clay has also worked hard in the summer to trim off some excess weight according to Jeff Potrykus at the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. Linebacker Mike Taylor is also feeling better after tearing his ACL against Iowa in 2009, but will get time off during camp on days with more than one practice.
Mulhern has a shorter interview with Herbert up on Madison.com as well.
More Badger news after the jump!
Coble's departure a bummer for Big Ten
by Adam Hoge on Jul 29, 2010 1:57 PM CDT
in UW Men's Basketball
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When news broke Tuesday that Northwestern forward Kevin Coble was leaving the Northwestern basketball program, I think the entire Big Ten was a little shocked.
Imagine if Jon Leuer suddenly announced he would forgo his senior season to concentrate on his degree.
What?
There's more to this story that just academics, however. Coble hasn't had an easy ride in college. He missed some time early in his career while his mother battled breast cancer and he missed all of last season to a foot injury. The Chicago Tribune's Teddy Greenstein reported Wednesday that "his rehabilitation caused an apparent conflict that led to multiple meetings among Carmody, Coble and Coble's mother, Carlys."
Greenstein also reported that Coble "rarely socialized with teammates or even sat with them for meals."
Still, the decision comes as a shock when you consider he was still one of the best players in the Big Ten and had Northwestern poised for its first NCAA Tournament berth ever. He had the ability to score 20 points per game and make the jump to the next level.
SBN Wisconsin Hall of Fame Nomination #4: Pat Richter
by Adam Hoge on Jul 29, 2010 1:22 PM CDT
in Columns/Features
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"He restored the UW football program to national prominence."
That's the common phrase used to describe what Pat Richter did for the University of Wisconsin and it's not really accurate.
Other than a few scattered successful seasons, the UW football program had never been anywhere near the national radar as far as prominent football programs were concerned. What Richter really did was take Wisconsin athletics to that level for the first time. Today, every aspect of the UW Athletic Department can be traced back to Pat Richter.
Richter was arguably the most versatile athlete Wisconsin has ever seen. He won a total of nine letters in football, basketball and baseball and was a two-time All-American tight end. He helped lead Wisconsin to the 1963 Rose Bowl.
Richter moved on to the NFL where he played eight seasons for the Washington Redskins after they drafted him in the first round of the 1963 draft.
He returned to Wisconsin in 1989 and started transforming the UW Athletic Department into what it is today. Obviously his single most important decision was the hiring of Barry Alvarez, but Richter always had a plan and when the football team started to succeed, he knew what to do with the money. When he took over, the UW Athletic Department had a $2.1 million deficit. When he retired in 2004, it had a $6.4 million reserve.
Badger Bits: Is this the year of the Badger?
by drumbum2011 on Jul 28, 2010 5:00 AM CDT
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Here are your Badger Bits for Wednesday, July 28th:
The buzz about the Wisconsin Badgers continues to grow by the day, with several college football pundits thinking out loud that the Badgers have what it takes to appear in their first BCS game since the 2000 Rose Bowl. ESPN's Bruce Feldman has named the Badgers as one of his top BCS sleeper teams, along with the Florida State Seminoles and the Virginia Tech Hokies. Feldman lists the home game against OSU as one of the biggest reasons Wisconsin might surprise people this season.
Michael Hunt at the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel also thinks that 2010 could be a special year for the Badgers, as well as the Green Bay Packers. 1962 was the last year that the Badgers appeared in the Rose Bowl and the Packers played in the Super Bowl, and Hunt believes that there's a decent chance of that happening again. He invokes comparisons to UW's 1993 offensive line as well as having a returning starting quarterback in Scott Tolzien as reasons that the Badgers may have one of their best seasons in school history.
More Badger news after the jump!
Report: Moore a candidate for UIC job
I have to be honest, when news broke last week that Jimmy Collins was retiring as UIC's head basketball coach, the first thought that popped in my mind is that Wisconsin might lose assistant coach Howard Moore.
Moore is a perfect candidate for this job. His Chicago roots have resulted in a number of great Illinois high school prospects at Wisconsin and those numbers are only increasing in the coming classes.
There will definitely be more to come with this story.
Badgers Position Breakdown: Quarterbacks
by Adam Hoge on Jul 27, 2010 12:33 PM CDT
in UW Football
1 comment
The Badgers enter 2010 with its first returning starting quarterback since John Stocco finished his three-year run as the starter in 2006. It's been a while since Wisconsin could rely on one player to consistently get the job done at the game's most important position, but barring injury, it looks like that will be the case in 2010 with incumbant starter Scott Tolzien.
Still, camp hasn't even opened and UW is already battling depth problems at quarterback after backup Curt Phillips suffered a knee injury in the spring. The redshirt sophomore's misfortune is a startling reminder that while Tolzien appears to be headed toward a breakout senior season, anything can happen in football and the Badgers must be prepared.
Badger Bits: Wisconsin One of Five Super Schools
by AdamT on Jul 27, 2010 6:10 AM CDT
in Badger Bits
3 comments
On the strength of a football program who has played in a bowl game for eight straight seasons and a basketball program who has made it to 12 consecutive NCAA Tournaments, the Wisconsin Badgers have been named the #4 super school in the country by CBSSports.com. The website is counting down the top five schools who have excelled in both basketball and football- and yes, Wisconsin would have been number one if hockey was part of the equation. The University of Pittsburgh came in at rank number five, and although the top three have yet to be revealed, you have to assume that Texas and Ohio State will probably find their way into the rankings. On the same page as the article is a video including a phone interview with Bret Bielema, and here is a link to the basketball-focused companion piece.
There was the likely backlash of comments on the story asserting that Wisconsin is undeserving of being called one of the "Flourishing Five", as posters declared the Badgers no more than above-average in both sports. This is not an unreasonable accusation, as fans of either Florida or West Virginia will be able to generate a decent case for why their team should have been ranked when this is all over. But I think it's important to note that the article was focusing on both present and future success, and I think we can all agree that Wisconsin football and basketball both have bright futures ahead of them.
With football season slowly creeping up on us, I'm going to introduce a new Badger Bits segment to accompany the countdown to kickoff. Check it out...after the jump!
SBN Wisconsin Hall of Fame Nomination #3: Bo Ryan
by Adam Hoge on Jul 26, 2010 11:46 AM CDT
in Columns/Features
0 comments
This is the third of 10 posts revealing the Wisconsin Badgers' 10 nominees for possible induction into SBN Wisconsin's Hall of Fame. The nominees are revealed in order of most votes from the B5Q readership.
Hall-of-Fame inductions rarely happen for players and coaches who are still active, but with Bo Ryan's 217-82 record at Wisconsin in nine seasons, it's not surprising the UW men's basketball head coach received the third most votes and will see his name on SBN Wisconsin's Hall of Fame ballot.
Ryan has led the Badgers to the NCAA Tournament in all nine of his seasons at UW and won three Big Ten titles. But as impressive as his numbers are at Wisconsin, Ryan is just as deserving for his work at UW-Platteville where he won four Division III National Titles and won 82 percent of his games.
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Badgers Football Schedule
| @ UNLV | Sat 09/04 | 10:00 PM CDT |
| San Jose St. | Sat 09/11 | 11:00 AM CDT |
Arizona St.
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Sat 09/18 | 2:30 PM CDT |
| Austin Peay | Sat 09/25 | TBA |
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Michigan St.
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Sat 10/02 | TBA |
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Minnesota
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Sat 10/09 | 11:00 AM CDT |
| Ohio St. | Sat 10/16 | 6:15 PM CDT |
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@
Iowa
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Sat 10/23 | TBA |
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@
Purdue
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Sat 11/06 | TBA |
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Indiana
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Sat 11/13 | TBA |
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Michigan
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Sat 11/20 | TBA |
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Northwestern
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Sat 11/27 | TBA |
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