Cole Tollison

Wisco Wednesday: New Badgers

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How many new players are on the roster in 2024? What’s the positional breakdown of the new guys? Did the Badgers bring in more Freshmen or Transfers?

New Faces in Madison

There are 85 scholarships on an FBS football roster. How many of those 85 weren’t in Madison last year?

There are 2 categories of new guys here: Freshmen, and Transfers.

Let’s start with the ones who are unlikely to play, but are the future of the program: The Freshmen. Wisconsin brought in 22 scholarship freshmen in 2024. That’s pretty close to the pre-transfer portal standard of 25ish new freshmen per year. Wisconsin is sticking to traditional recruiting, even in the portal era. 

The breakdown by position. 

5 – Offensive Lineman
4 – Defensive Backs
3 – Running Backs 
3 – Linebackers
3 – Defensive Lineman
2 – Tight Ends
1 – Wide Receiver
1 – Quarterback

Wisconsin likes to handle the development of Offensive linemen themselves. They brought in 5 freshmen in 2024, and 5 freshmen in 2023. We’ll get to transfers shortly, but you’ll notice they only took one O-Lineman from the portal this year.

Running Back is also a position where the Badgers are quite …

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Tolly’s Top 25 – Preseason

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My ballot for the AP Top 25 – If they let me have one

Is it too early to talk about the top 25? Absolutely. But AP ballots are due on Thursday August 1st. So if I’m going to have my ballot ready in time, I have to do it now. 

Top 5

1 – Ohio State
2 – Oregon
3 – Georgia
4 – Texas
5 – Alabama

I think these are the only 5 teams that can win a National Championship this year. The top 2 are the best of the B1G, and the next 3 are all SEC programs with loaded rosters. Unsurprisingly, these are also the 5 most likely teams to win the natty according to Vegas. As you can see, I’m leaning B1G over SEC at the top right now. 

6-10

6 – Penn State
7 – Notre Dame
8 – Ole Miss
9 – Michigan
10 – Utah

Penn State at 6 will be high for some, but they are one of very few teams with a proven QB and an elite run game. 

QB Riley Leonard transferred from Duke to Notre Dame. I expect him to elevate the golden domes who already …

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Thirsty Thursday: Turn Up Camp Randall

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A Wisco Wednesday Special on a Thursday. Just what this week needed. 

Camp Randall to Sell Beer, Wine, and Seltzer

The drought is over on Friday August 30th, 2024. Wisconsin will become the 16th Big Ten team to sell beer to general seating at football games. The fact that most of the conference had this figured out before the Badgers is a little disappointing. At least they got it done before Northwestern and Nebraska.

The press release said they plan to use the same policies that the Kohl Center adopted last year. So that means getting carded at the register if the cashier thinks you look “under 40,” 2 beverages max per customer per sale, and $9.50 for a 16 oz domestic. 

Proceeds from alcohol sales at Camp Randall will contribute to programs across campus aimed at assisting individuals with alcoholism or preventing alcoholism. There will also be an increased police presence at games compared to previous years. Overall not too much had to change for beer to finally be allowed. 

The biggest positive I see coming out of this is the stadium environment. Most of the fans not in the student section have had tickets for a while and …

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Wisco Wednesday: Where Does Wisco Finish in the New B1G?

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The B1G Media has medium expectations for the Badgers in 2024. What does that mean for Wisconsin’s record, and how do they think the rest of the B1G will shake out?

Badgers Expected to finish 7th in the B1G

Big Ten Media Days is this week. That means a lot of press conferences, announcements, and polls. The B1G beat writers for every team plus some national writers all put out their expected order of finish for the conference. 

Here are the results:

1 – Ohio State (21)
2 – Oregon (6)
3 – Penn State 
4 – Michigan
5 – Iowa
6 – USC
7 – Wisconsin
8 – Nebraska
9 – Rutgers
10 – Washington 
11 – Maryland
12 – Minnesota
13 – Illinois
14 – Northwestern
15 – UCLA
16 – Michigan State
17 – Indiana
18 – Purdue

 * Parentheses indicates 1st place votes

  • Ohio State 1st, and Oregon 2nd is expected; they are the favorites to win the conference.
  • The state of Indiana takes the last two spots. I guess they’ll be Notre Dame fans this year.
  • Washington played for a National title last year, but is expected to be 10th in the B1G this year.
…

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Wisco Wednesday: Defense Preview

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What do you know about Wisconsin’s defense? Safety Hunter Wohler is a beast. All the Linebackers are new. And Bucky picked up some of USC’s leftovers. 

Coaching Changes

What do you mean coaching changes? Mike Tressel is still the DC, right? That is correct, but his support staff has had a pair of shake ups. 

D-Line

In February the Badgers D-Line coach Greg Scruggs left Madison to join the Michigan Wolverines. The Badgers replaced him with EJ Whitlow, an up-and-comer from Air Force. Air Force had a very good defense the last couple of seasons, and Wisconsin is hoping Whitlow was the driving force.

The story doesn’t end here though. After Scruggs joined Michigan, he was arrested for an OWI in March. He is no longer with the program and is currently unemployed. Maybe Scuggs leaving wasn’t the worst thing for Mad Town.

Safeties

Wisconsin lost Safeties coach and ace recruiter Colin Hitschler to Alabama this offseason. On one hand, that is a hell of a compliment to what Colin was able to do for Wisconsin in just 1 year with the new Fickell regime. On the other hand, it sucks to lose a great coach. His replacement is someone …

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Finding Florida State and Clemson A New Home

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Have you ever sold your house with the assumption you’ll find a place to live after you’re kicked out? That’s kinda FSU’s and Clemson’s approach to conference realignment right now.

Leaving The ACC

It’s a foregone conclusion that Florida State and Clemson are leaving the ACC. There are open lawsuits between the teams and the conference. There are some disputed record requests, and a lot of slander is being thrown around between the 3 parties. When they actually get out (sometime between 2025 and 2027 seems reasonable), how much they have to pay (well over 200 million each), and where they are going (TBD) are all just “details” at this point. 

But the “where are they going” detail is what I find most interesting. Florida State and Clemson believe they will get an invite from the B1G or SEC. But what if they don’t?

Why Not The SEC or B1G

The SEC is already in the states of South Carolina and Florida, so FSU and Clemson don’t add any new TV markets or recruiting territory. Most importantly, Clemson and FSU would each take up a piece of the pie of money that the current 16 teams split 16 ways. …

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Wisco Wednesday: 2 Byes and 2 Fridays

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We previewed Wisconsin’s opponents last week, but there are a couple of quirks with this year’s schedule worth talking about.

2 Bye Weeks? 

Question: Why do the Badgers have 2 bye weeks in 2024? 
Answer: Because the season is based on holidays, not calendar dates. 

The Badgers aren’t special in 2024, everyone has 2 bye weeks. 

About every  3 out of 10 years is a double bye week year. The college football season is based on the number of Saturdays from Labor Day to Thanksgiving. Because those holidays can move calendar dates from year to year, the number of Saturdays between them varies from 13 to 14. When there are 13 Saturdays, college football has 1 bye week. When there are 14 Saturdays, there are 2 bye weeks. Now you can sound smart when someone at work asks why the Badgers are off again in November.

Side note: there are teams that play in “week 0” this year too. They get 3 bye weeks. 

Friday Night Lights

If you don’t like B1G football on Friday nights, blame FOX. 

The Badgers have 2 Friday games in 2024

  • Week 1 vs Western Michigan on Friday 8/30 at 8:00 PM CST on FS1
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Who Can Win the Natty?

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There are 134 FBS teams. But let’s be honest, not all of them are capable of winning a national title. Who are the select few that could do it in 2024?

The Blue Chip Ratio

There is a metric used to determine who is capable of winning the national championship that has never been wrong since its inception in 2011, and would presumably be accurate going back to the inception of that national championship game.

This metric is the Blue Chip Ratio.
It’s quite simple. Over the last 4 recruiting cycles, a team must have over 50% of high school recruits be “blue chip” players. A blue chip player is a 4 or 5 star recruit. The transfer portal doesn’t matter. If the player plays doesn’t matter. If you have a bunch of 3 stars that are projected 1st round NFL draft picks, that doesn’t matter. Just acquire as much high school talent as possible.

As of right now, there are 407 blue chip players in the 2025 high school class. Teams generally add 20-30 high school recruits per year. When you consider that there are 68 Power 4 schools, that’s not a lot of talent to go around. …

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Wisco Wednesday: Badgers 2024 Schedule

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It’s July, college football is 8 Saturdays away, and you still don’t know who the Badgers are playing this fall. Let’s fix that. 

No More B1G West

In previous years, “Who do the Badgers play?” wasn’t really a question. 6 of their 12 games were against fellow B1G West schools: Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, Northwestern, Nebraska, and Purdue. This season the only guarantees from that group are the newly protected rivals Minnesota and Iowa. 

Well, even though everything in the B1G is different, for Wisconsin, not much has changed. They also have Northwestern, Purdue, and Nebraska on the schedule. So, the only B1G West school they miss this year is Illinois.

Any B1G East Schools?

Wisconsin plays Penn State at home and Rutgers on the road from the old B1G East. Penn State at home should be fantastic. At Rutgers will be… a football game.

The new Kids on the Block

With the collapse of the Pac-12, there are 4 new teams in the B1G (bringing membership to 18 members. Having a number in the name of the conference was not the best idea). The new teams are Oregon, Washington, UCLA and USC. 

Wisconsin plays 2 of …

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B1G Environments Ranked

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Where do the crowds actually affect the game in the B1G? What stadiums scare teams the most? 

EA College Football 25

The new college football video game comes out in a few weeks. Leading up to its release they have dropped a list. 

EA Sports College Football 25 toughest places to play.

#1 was Texas A&M. In my eyes, the list has already lost all credibility. It’s widely accepted that in college football the top 2 home environments are LSU and Penn State (EA has them at #3 and #6 respectively). Odds makers in the desert have given a home-field advantage bump to the point spread up to 6.5 points for those 2 schools. Things can change, but right now they are the best of the best.

The rest of EA’s list is fine. And you can check it out here if you’re interested. 

I will be talking about what I know. My list isn’t the toughest place to play in CFB,

it’s the…

Toughest Places to Play in the B1G

Tier 1

1 – Penn State

Penn State is in a tier all by themselves. Most weeks they have an environment as good as any of the schools in …

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