Team Rivalry reviews the 2023 schedule for the Wisconsin Badgers
Our old friend Luke Fickell who, back in 2011embarrassed Ohio State, but didn’t stick around to wallow in that embarrassment. He moved on to Cincinnati where he had a fantastic record, 57 and 18. Which is pretty awesome. He’s turned Cincinnati into a very strong team.
He’s no stranger to the Big Ten. He comes out of OSU. Not directly necessarily because he went to Cincinnati first and he’s picking up Wisconsin which is a beast of a team. Wisconsin is essentially the Ohio State of the West Division, or at least they have been in the past because they’ve always been a very strong very, very tough team, very skilled, very precise.
Except for 2014, when they lost to Ohio State 59 to nothing in the Big Ten Championship.
Paul Crist was fired earlier in the 2022 season, the interim coach is gone, Jim Leonhard, I expect Wisconsin and Illinois are going to be our teams fighting for the West Division, fighting to dominate the West Division to get to the Big Ten Championship.
Between Luke fickle and Brett Bielema, you’ve got two fantastic coaches here that are building programs. Well, Luke fickle I assume is going to be building a program. He’s going to return Wisconsin to dominance and show the West how to play football. Bielema also being the former coach of Wisconsin who made it one of the good teams that it is.
Minnesota is probably going to be, you know, the Penn State of the West Division and hold that third place. Of course, Ryan Walters and Matt Rhule are the wild cards; also, being brand new coaches. Ryan Walters being a fresh brand-new coach in that he has never been a head coach anywhere and now he’s the head coach over at Purdue.
With all that in the equation, what is Wisconsin looking at this year?
They’re looking at Buffalo, Washington, and Georgia Southern. I’m going to call that three wins for Wisconsin right out of the gate and then Purdue so right back to Ryan Walters.
Can Wisconsin beat Purdue? I’m going say yeah, I think the experience is on the side of Luke Fickell and I think they’re going to win that one.
Rutgers yeah.
Iowa? Now here experience is going to be on the side of Iowa, but as we said in the Iowa video, Iowa is just that middle of the road team, maybe upper middle of the road team, so they can be beaten. Especially by someone like Luke Fickell who is probably kind of a take no prisoners kind of Coach.
Illinois is going to be tough.
Ohio state is going to be tough.
Indiana, Northwestern, Nebraska and Minnesota? Yeah, they’re probably going to ride that one out with Minnesota probably giving him the most trouble.
I’m going to say the key games for Wisconsin are going to be Ohio State and not…oh, you know what, I thought, I apologize, I thought Wisconsin was going to play Michigan this year but they don’t. So, their key games then are really, I think, Ohio State and Illinois.
If Wisconsin can beat Illinois, then I’m betting Wisconsin is going to take the West this year, but I don’t know if he can. I think Brett Bielema is going to win out on that one because he’s got more experience and he is a tough-as-nails coach as well.
Ohio State, man, I don’t know if anybody beats Ohio State this year either except for Michigan. Well, I’m hoping Michigan beats Ohio State this year.
So key games are Illinois. If they lose to Illinois, can they bounce back because they’ve got Ohio State the following weekend. They have to bounce back. If they do then I think they will take the West Division. If they don’t then I think they would have already lost the West at that point anyway.