Badger fans better hope the country-and the competition-continue to chalk UW's perfect record up to its defense. That way the offense can keep a low profile while offensive coordinator Brian White weaves spread formations into a ball-control offense and goes so deep into the playbook that he breaks the bindings.
All of a sudden, the Wisconsin offense is flying high and sophomore quarterback John Stocco's aerial attack is emerging as less of a surprise and more of an inevitability. This aspect of the Wisconsin offense-much like senior defensive end Erasmus James' \surprise"" season-has been no more than a well-kept secret destined to be discovered.
""It was a matter of time before he started playing this,"" junior wide receiver Owen Daniels said.
""We knew the talent John had and his ability to throw the ball and we knew about the ability of our receivers, and it just takes awhile for someone to see the game in a slower speed.""
If that adjustment is the key to quarterback success, game speed in Stocco's eyes must be slower than the traffic leaving a Phish concert.
He has lit up defenses with a cerebral approach, precision passing, and a little help from his receivers. With his improvement of late, the offense has left itself no choice but to be described by the vague but unavoidable clich??, ""they just clicked.""
Perhaps such a simple phrase will suffice since it hardly matters whether this all comes from mechanical adjustments he may have made as a result of good coaching, or perhaps new-found confidence-all that matters is that he is making the team around him better.
""It just makes you smile,"" senior wideout Darrin Charles said. ""You see a bunch of different guys out there making plays and it makes you want to go out there and get one too-we just feed off each other.""
""I'm loving it,"" Charles added. ""The more balls that are put up, and the more guys that are catching them, the better the offense looks, the better the wide receivers feel, and it just makes the whole offensive chemistry better.""
This synergy may be enough to keep UW's offensive machine well-oiled, considering their strength of late-the passing game-is still no more than something to provide variety or as a fallback if the running game stalls. The Badgers still feature one of the country's best running backs in senior Anthony Davis and a dominant offensive line. Coming into this weekend's matchup with Michigan State, the Badgers will still try to run the ball and will likely do so with as much efficiency, if not more, knowing they have the threat of the pass.
""If you want to stop us, you have to be able to stop the run first, I think that is what [Michigan State] is going to key in on-trying to stop Anthony and [Matt Bernstein] and challenging us to pass and make us make plays in that area,"" Daniels said.
The Spartans-like their ancient namesake-will have to resort to something of the Trojan horse variety if they want to stop Wisconsin's now-dynamic offense. But even a deceptive tactic of epic proportions may not be enough to stop Wisconsin. Even though the defense did not allow more than one touchdown in the first five games, the last four games have seen the Badgers give up an average of 14 points per game. Quietly, the offense has picked up where the defense-marginally-left off, scoring 106 points in the last four contests and making the offense as much of a concern for opponents as the defense.
UW enters this Saturday well-aware of the fact that they have targets on their chests. They expect Michigan State to relish the opportunity of playing the spoiler, and hope to stick to what they have done all season to get to this point. The scouting report for the Spartan defense could give White a late night, but is nothing that Wisconsin can't neutralize by looking at film.
""We know what kind of looks we are going to get in certain situations and how we want to attack those,"" Charles said. ""We have seen game plans that they have prepared for other teams so we have an idea of what to expect, but they will try to mix it up so we will have to continue to adjust.""
""They are just a bunch of real athletic guys, they're well-coached, and I don't think we are really going to do too much differently that we've done in the past,"" Daniels said. ""We are going to try to stay balanced, run the ball mostly and pass when we need to.\
