Badger fans might as well put on a v-neck sweater and listen to Guns N’ Roses because the Wisconsin football program has dragged itself back to the 1980s. The Badgers, who had a respectable run of success from the mid-1990s to last year, have reached a nadir not seen in a long time.
After a dismal 24-7 drubbing against arch-rival Minnesota on Friday, the Badgers lost everything that made the program proud in one day. All at once, they relinquished the cherished Paul Bunyan’s axe to the Gophers and lost their 22-year bowl streak.
The Badgers last missed a bowl game in 2001, marking the last time they finished the season with a losing record. That year was an outlier, however, because then-head coach Barry Alvarez immediately corrected course before handing the program off to Bret Bielema.
Bielema led the program to three Rose Bowl appearances between 2010 and 2012. Paul Chryst later led the Badgers to victories in the Cotton and Orange Bowls alongside a Rose Bowl appearance in 2020.
While the Badgers didn’t compete for a national championship, they won Big Ten titles and made it to the nation’s premier bowl games during this period. When UW Athletics hired head coach Luke Fickell from Cincinnati in 2022, he was expected to take the program back to the heights it had reached in the last 20 years.
Fickell’s first season was a bumpy ride, but ended with a victory at Minnesota and a competitive loss in the ReliaQuest Bowl against a strong LSU team.
Ideally, teams are supposed to continue progressing every year a new coach is around. This season started promising as the Badgers started 5-2 and played a competitive game against Penn State.
Then, the season quickly went off the rails. Wisconsin lost their third straight game to rival Iowa, this time 42-10 and in embarrassing fashion. A close game against Oregon was hopeful, but the Badgers failed to build off it. The Badgers still had a chance to close the season strong but failed miserably. They got blown out by Nebraska 44-25, giving over the Freedom Trophy to the Cornhuskers in their first loss to Nebraska since 2012.
Then came the abysmal showing against Minnesota. The Golden Gophers, who came in with a 6-5 record, ran the Badgers out of Camp Randall in resounding fashion. The game showed that the Badgers have a massive void at the quarterback position, but the team also displayed a shocking level of apathy against a bitter rival.
In year two of the Fickell regime, there is nothing to write home about. Wisconsin lost all of its rivalry trophies and gave up the precious streaks the program had been celebrating as a sign of its consistency. The Badgers went a meager 3-6 in Big Ten play, with wins coming against a dismal Purdue team and the others against middling programs in Rutgers and Northwestern.
Players like linebacker Leon Lowery and cornerback Amare Snowden have already announced their intentions to enter the transfer portal, and there will surely be more that join them in the coming days.
Wisconsin’s schedule was undoubtedly tough, but that does not excuse its performance in 2024. The Florida Gators faced an impossible schedule, but they still finished 7-5 with strong wins against LSU and No. 14 Ole Miss. If Florida could make a bowl game, so could Wisconsin.
While a lot of games on Wisconsin’s schedule were difficult, the fact that Fickell doesn’t have a marquee win so far is alarming. The Badgers have hosted Ohio State, Alabama, Penn State and Oregon in his tenure. While most of those games were competitive, Wisconsin came up short each time.
A quick autopsy of the team will show that in addition to poor quarterback play, the defense regressed well below Wisconsin standards. Gone are the days of TJ Watt and others wreaking havoc. This year's defense ranked No. 12 in the Big Ten and only forced eight turnovers.
The Badgers have gone from having reliable quarterback play, a dominant running game and a very strong defense to having nothing. Their identity in the Fickell era is still undefined, and they will have to figure it out quickly if the head coach wants to stick around Madison for long. Phil Longo and his “Air Raid” offense has been dispatched, and depending on the fate of defensive coordinator Mike Tressel, Fickell will get a mulligan at forging his team’s identity.
Fickell’s credentials are well understood. He has been successful before, and his accomplishments at Cincinnati prove he can build a program.
But this is not the American Athletic Conference. The new Big Ten is daunting.
Oregon has run roughshod through the conference in its first year. USC and Washington are strong programs that can get going at any time. The Badgers need to figure out how to compete in the new era of conference realignment and NIL. They must re-establish their identity by finding one that contrasts them with conference powers like Oregon and Ohio State.
Considering Indiana went 11-1 this season, Wisconsin clearly can still find its way. But if they can’t, the Badgers risk being reduced to a college football afterthought.
