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How many will we lose in the portal?
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<blockquote data-quote="Thirteen Below" data-source="post: 1051247" data-attributes="member: 18006"><p>And I see us in the middle bracket, with a greater likelihood of sliding down to the bottom with Northwestern than clmbing to the upper level with Michigan and Ohio State. Whereas just a year ago, I thought the opposite. But honestly, I don't have any idea what to make of this team right now.</p><p></p><p>When Fickel first got here, it seemed as though our days as a 2nd-rate recruiting school were about to come to an end. It was exciting to see how many good players he was bringing in with his first class, and we also seemed to be doing really well in the portal.</p><p></p><p>In his first season with the program, Fickell coached the team to a respectable 7-5 - and then in a New Year's Day bowl against the 13th ranked team in the nation, played a very respectable game right up until the last 3 offensive plays. 9 point underdogs, they very nearly came away with an upset win on New Year's Day with a national auidience.</p><p></p><p>It was the lead game on national TV, the first kickoff of the day, and you gotta figure half the high school kids in America watched pretty much that whole game. It was the biggest audience for a Reliaquest bowl in 7 years, and the most watched ESPN2 event since 2018. By the time the other two early afternoon games started an hour later, the underdog Badgers had controlled the first half, and were taking a 21-15 lead into halftime. The entire country watched the first hour of the game, because it was the only one on, and not many people turned away at 1 PM except Tennessee, Oregon, and Iowa fans.</p><p></p><p>Those people who stayed saw Tanner Mordecai play the game of his career; in the 1st half, he was 14/20, 219 yards, 3 TDs, no interceptions. He posted an NCAA passer rating of 211 in the first half, and 171.63 for the game (by comparison, the NFL rating for the same stats would have been 145.62 for the 1st half, and 122.71 for the game), with 378 yards in the air. Mordecai rocked in a marquee game on one of the biggest national stages in college football that season.</p><p></p><p>Everybody watching that game came away thinking that Wisconsin had finally taken the next step, and the 2024 recruiting class was ranked 23rd in the nation. The Badgers had turned the corner, and the future was very promising.</p><p> </p><p>And then the wheels just came off. Everything that was going right last year seems to be going wrong this year. We flip from 7-5 to 5-7, break a 22-year string of bowl eligibilty, fire two coaches, and 20 players announce they're leaving the program (some of them complaining about at least one of the remaining coaches). The top 2 quarterbacks on our depth chart are among those who jumped over the side.</p><p></p><p>From a team that less than a year ago appeared to be making a breakthrough to another level, they look today like a program in complete confusion. I don't know what to make of this team right now, or what to expect for the future, but heading into this year's bowl season it's awfully hard to feel the same optimism a lot of us felt at the beginning of this year.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Thirteen Below, post: 1051247, member: 18006"] And I see us in the middle bracket, with a greater likelihood of sliding down to the bottom with Northwestern than clmbing to the upper level with Michigan and Ohio State. Whereas just a year ago, I thought the opposite. But honestly, I don't have any idea what to make of this team right now. When Fickel first got here, it seemed as though our days as a 2nd-rate recruiting school were about to come to an end. It was exciting to see how many good players he was bringing in with his first class, and we also seemed to be doing really well in the portal. In his first season with the program, Fickell coached the team to a respectable 7-5 - and then in a New Year's Day bowl against the 13th ranked team in the nation, played a very respectable game right up until the last 3 offensive plays. 9 point underdogs, they very nearly came away with an upset win on New Year's Day with a national auidience. It was the lead game on national TV, the first kickoff of the day, and you gotta figure half the high school kids in America watched pretty much that whole game. It was the biggest audience for a Reliaquest bowl in 7 years, and the most watched ESPN2 event since 2018. By the time the other two early afternoon games started an hour later, the underdog Badgers had controlled the first half, and were taking a 21-15 lead into halftime. The entire country watched the first hour of the game, because it was the only one on, and not many people turned away at 1 PM except Tennessee, Oregon, and Iowa fans. Those people who stayed saw Tanner Mordecai play the game of his career; in the 1st half, he was 14/20, 219 yards, 3 TDs, no interceptions. He posted an NCAA passer rating of 211 in the first half, and 171.63 for the game (by comparison, the NFL rating for the same stats would have been 145.62 for the 1st half, and 122.71 for the game), with 378 yards in the air. Mordecai rocked in a marquee game on one of the biggest national stages in college football that season. Everybody watching that game came away thinking that Wisconsin had finally taken the next step, and the 2024 recruiting class was ranked 23rd in the nation. The Badgers had turned the corner, and the future was very promising. And then the wheels just came off. Everything that was going right last year seems to be going wrong this year. We flip from 7-5 to 5-7, break a 22-year string of bowl eligibilty, fire two coaches, and 20 players announce they're leaving the program (some of them complaining about at least one of the remaining coaches). The top 2 quarterbacks on our depth chart are among those who jumped over the side. From a team that less than a year ago appeared to be making a breakthrough to another level, they look today like a program in complete confusion. I don't know what to make of this team right now, or what to expect for the future, but heading into this year's bowl season it's awfully hard to feel the same optimism a lot of us felt at the beginning of this year. [/QUOTE]
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