Jared Abbrederis went rock. Joe Schobert went scissors. And that was how the Badgers kicked off their 2016 season.
It was perfect football weather in Madison Saturday, and for over 9,000 fans at Camp Randall and many more watching at home, today was also the perfect opportunity to get a first look at next year’s Wisconsin Badger football team, as it hosted its annual Spring Game.
The game started off unconventionally, as the honorary captains, Abbrederis for the offense, and Schobert for the defense, decided to face off in a best-of-three rock-paper-scissors match instead of the standard coin toss. Abbrederis pulled out the victory, a sign of things to come, as his team also won the game, 28-22.
But the score matters little, as the real joy in spring football lies in trying to find the answers for how the team will look next season, and this Badger team still had some question marks coming into the day.
The biggest question is easily at the quarterback position, where the two-man race between redshirt senior Bart Houston and redshirt freshman Alex Hornibrook doesn’t look like it will be resolved any time soon. But head coach Paul Chryst is happy with the strides both QBs have made in spring.
“I think they took advantage of the practices and the meeting times, and I think that—I told them the other day, we're not where we want to be, but I don't think they're behind schedule,” Chryst said. “With that being said, I think—and I think this is for our whole team, we've got to have a great summer and be ready to go, and we've truly got to take advantage of fall camp and those 29 practice opportunities before we open up, but I think both Alex and Bart did do a lot this spring, and with that I think they've grown, and I think they're in a good spot, but we've got a ways to go.”
While the race is still up in the air, today certainly belonged to Hornibrook, as he threw two 40-plus-yard touchdown passes to junior George Rushing and completed another near-40-yard pass to redshirt sophomore Peter Roy.
“It went pretty well,” Hornibrook said of the game. “We had George [Rushing] make a few good plays, there was a couple like at the end that I could’ve got the ball out a little quicker, could’ve got it to Kyle [Penniston] to get a touchdown there. There’s still some things we have to do but it was a good day.”
The battle will continue to drag on well beyond Saturday, but Houston believes the healthy competition is good for everyone.
“It’s going to be a competition from the spring, to the summer, to the fall, and you can’t look at it like you want to be better [than the other player], you want to be better and beat yourself each and every day,” Houston said.
One position where there is no question who is on top is running back, as senior running back Corey Clement showed in limited snaps that he is back to full strength and ready to make up the time he lost last year to injury.
“It felt great, I think if anybody understands, I just want to get out there and just run around,” said Clement, who rushed for 36 yards and a touchdown on just five carries. “It didn’t matter where I ran, be it forwards, backwards, I just wanted to get out there and feel fresh legs again. I needed that.”
Clement and the other backs were running behind an offensive line that is finally coming into its own. After a season marked by inconsistency and inexperience, the line has emerged from last year into a much more solidified group, something Clement appreciates dearly.
“[The consistency of the offensive line] is better, there’s more chemistry shared with both the running backs and the line itself, and you still have to consider that [senior center Dan] Voltz is out, when Voltz comes back it’s going to be even better. There’s going to be that senior leadership, so I think everything is going to be so driven on how hard they want to push each other.”
Even though the line was missing two likely starters, in Voltz and redshirt sophomore tackle Jacob Maxwell, plenty of depth has been built up through last year and the emergence of players that have yet to play a game, including redshirt freshman guard Jon Dietzen and junior tackle Ryan Ramczyk.
Ramcyzk has been the talk of spring camp, as the transfer from Stevens Point has already locked in the starting left tackle spot despite being in his first year of eligibility, and coaches and players have raved about his abilities.
“[Ramcyzk] is a beast, man,” redshirt junior linebacker T.J. Watt joked. “It’s hard to beat him, and he’s going to be one of the biggest and best guys in the Big Ten this year. He’s a beast and he obviously showed it today.”
Sitting out last year due to transfer rules, Ramcyzk believes he has made a lot of progress in his short time here.
“I think I’ve come along ways since I first stepped foot on campus,” Ramcyz said. “I feel a lot more comfortable with the offense we’re running and as well as the chemistry with the offensive line.”
On the defensive side of the ball, one of the biggest areas of strength on the whole team is the front seven, which lost a key player in Schobert, but returns plenty of depth and talent that will make them dangerous in the fall.
Watt is one of the players who is primed to have a much larger role this season with Schobert off to the NFL, and he thinks this linebacker corps has a lot of potential.
“I think we can do great things this year,” Watt said. “There’s no limit to what we can do, and I think we are just gonna keep gelling as a group and just keeping working over the offseason so we can bring it in the fall.”
The uncertainty in the defense comes in the secondary, especially at the safety position. After graduating last year’s starters, Michael Caputo and Tanner McEvoy, two new starters need to be identified for the Badgers, and although injuries and other commitments have limited some of the potential starters’ opportunities, spring camp has been critical in getting reps for the younger safeties.
“I think that the safety position is probably the one defense that is still to be determined,” Chryst admitted. “Now, I say that and every guy is going to come back in fall camp and be who we think they can be, but certainly the different factors with D’Cota getting injured, with Moose missing decent amounts of practice because of class, gave great opportunities—I thought Arrington [Farrar]—it was really good for Arrington to take advantage of that, and certainly Joe Ferguson and Evan Bondoc got a lot of work because—it's easy right now you look at it and you say, Vince [Biegel] and T.J. [Watt] on the outside, we know who the inside backers are, we know who the D linemen are, so front seven is pretty well set so they'll just play a lot of football, but the safety positions, the one on defense, is the one 'to be determined' and it will be a true camp.”
With spring camp coming to an end today, the team will reconvene in the summer, the next step in preparing for one of, if not the, hardest schedules in recent Badger football history.
Redshirt junior wide receiver Jazz Peavy is another player whose role is likely to increase this season, and he and the rest of the team are ready to jump into the summer and prepare themselves to make the upcoming season a successful one.
“[The summer] is very important, the last thing we want to do when we come into fall camp is start over where we were in spring ball,” Peavy said. “So we just want to make sure we can stay on top of everything and come into fall camp and have things rolling the right way.”
The 2016 Wisconsin Badgers are a long way from being a finished product, but the spring camp has shown early signs that this team will be very dangerous come fall.
