Morning all, here are your Badger Bits for Wednesday, September 29th.
No matter what Wisconsin head coach Bret Bielema does, he can't seem to get away from questions regarding star junior running back John Clay, according to Tom Mulhern of Madison.com. The Wisconsin coaching staff had been limiting Clay's carries during the non-conference season, for the most part because he had been coming off surgery on both ankles during the offseason. Now that Clay seems to be back in game shape, Bielema has been getting more questions about if Clay was getting enough carries during the game:
"We’re going to do what we have success [with]," said Bielema, who seems to be growing tired of the question. "I understand it’s a story. ... I had this guy come up to me last Wednesday, we had a Mendota (Gridiron Club) meeting. It was a younger guy who thought he knew a lot and he came up and said, basically, ‘Are we going to get (Clay) involved more? He seemed to be really good at the beginning of the game, he seemed to be really good at the end of the game.’
"I said, ‘Exactly. You answered your own question.’ What we want to do is have John for four quarters in as many games as we can hopefully have. We’re guaranteed 12 (games). So, if that’s the case, then we’re doing all right."
More Badger Bits after the jump!
Make sure to check out the Badger Roundtable from the Journal-Sentinel in response to the Austin Peay game. Both Adam Hoge and Jake Harris represented B5Q at the roundtable.
Moving on to this week's Big Ten opener at Michigan State- The Only Colors, SBNation's Michigan State blog, has a preliminary team preview up for the Badgers.
UWBadgers.com has their Game Week Guide up on the website, check that one out for any stats or info you might need about the upcoming Big Ten opener.
Speaking of UWBadgers.com, they have hired longtime Badgers sportswriter Mike Lucas away from the Capitol Times. Lucas currently does the play-by-play for both Badger football and Badger Basketball TV broadcasts.
Don't forget- Wisconsin men's and women's hockey starts soon! the preseason rankings are out, and the men's team is ranked #13 in the country by USA Today, and the women's squad was given the #5 ranking.
3 days until the Big Ten opener!