Wisconsin Football 2025

[LouisEly]

The whole "develop" model that UW was successful with is dead, and for several reasons.

1. It's much harder to find "hidden gems".  There's so much more high quality video available on kids now versus ten years ago.  From games, from camps, social media.  Kids are putting out their own video and tagging coaches, recruiters, columnists for recruiting rating services.  The "overlooked" kids now are few and far between.
2. The portal - if a kid feels like they should be starting and they aren't, they hit the portal.  (See: Nolan Rucci - he didn't want to sit behind Nelson and Mahlman for another year, so he left).  And pretty much every kid who is being recruited by a top school thinks they should be starting (key word - "thinks"). 
3. Poaching by schools with bigger NIL funds.  (See: Xavier Lucas)  If a kid does show something, other schools with bigger budgets come sniffing around.  (Or the kid starts putting himself up for auction - I know for a fact that back as early as January agents for kids were reaching out to Greg Gard telling him that if UW was interested their kid would hit the portal after the season was over.  There's a ton of that going on.)  Some schools have eliminated public access to practices to try to stop "scouts' for other schools from seeing who looks good in practice.
4. Potential walk-ons are taking scholarships elsewhere due to cost of school.  With the state of WI funding less and less of tuition and costs at UW, the cost of attending UW has skyrocketed.  That, coupled with inflation and the cost of everything going up (housing, vehicles, vehicle insurance - do you know how much it costs to insure a teenager now?) has made it much more financially hard to walk on when they can get scholarships or partial scholarships at a Northern Illinois, Central Michigan, South Dakota State, etc.  And, going back to #2 and #3, they think that if they can start earlier at a smaller school and show something then they'll get offered something in the portal.  And they usually do.

We cannot compare anything of the sport/business of college football today to pre-2020.  It's just a completely different landscape, and much of the way things were pre-2020 is dead now.

[BrewerFan]

59 minutes ago, nate82 said:

No they definitely didn’t maybe one or two players here or there but it wasn’t all that many.  

Now THIS is an absolutely insane take and a ridiculous one.

Some of their best players were 2-3 star. Taylor not exactly a blue chip recruit. He was a 3 star. Their LBers, OL.

 

Tell me who were all the 4 and 5 star recruits when they were winning 10-11 games or... going 13-1 with a 6 point loss in the B1G Championship game?

Hell, AJ Taylor was their big recruit when they brought in Jonathon Taylor. 

Guys like Connely, Van Ginkel, even TJ Watt, they weren't highly ranked recruits.

AJ Taylor and Vince Biegal were more highly touted recruits. It's wild how people remember the PC era and are making these excuses or claims that it takes 4-5 years to recover. You have the wrong coach if that's the case. It's just that simple. 

[BrewerFan]

Just now, LouisEly said:

The whole "develop" model that UW was successful with is dead, and for several reasons.

1. It's much harder to find "hidden gems".  There's so much more high quality video available on kids now versus ten years ago.  From games, from camps, social media.  Kids are putting out their own video and tagging coaches, recruiters, columnists for recruiting rating services.  The "overlooked" kids now are few and far between.
2. The portal - if a kid feels like they should be starting and they aren't, they hit the portal.  (See: Nolan Rucci - he didn't want to sit behind Nelson and Mahlman for another year, so he left).  And pretty much every kid who is being recruited by a top school thinks they should be starting (key word - "thinks"). 

There was plenty of tape on kids before 2020. It's not just about seeing tape, it's about projecting how a kid will develop and actually working to develop those kids.

 

Rucci, we keep pointing to this small handful of 4-5 star recruits that... isn't at all who we've talking about. 

And Rucci was a 5 star on 247 and 4 on ESPN or... the other way around, but, he's not at all the type of kids we're talking about. He's more like Oglesby.

 

[LouisEly]

Last night ESPN had their 30 for 30 on about "The U Part 2".

After the 1994 season, Dennis Erickson left and Butch Davis was hired.  Miami's foundation was already crumbling - they were banned from participating in a bowl game in the 1995 season and had 31 scholarships revoked over the next three years - but it hadn't shown up in their record yet.  They were 10-2 in 1994.

Three years later in 1997, Davis' team went 5-6.  Fans were calling for his firing.  People hired airplanes to fly over the stadium with banners that said, "From national champs to national chumps".  To many fans, Davis "ruined the program".

Three years later in 2000, Davis' team went 11-1 and finished #2 in the polls.

Obviously a different era, different rules, but lots of similarities.  The foundation was crumbling even though it hadn't shown up in the record yet.  Didn't bottom out until year 3.  Yes, there is the portal and NIL now, but that's no different than recruiting back then - you're still competing with everybody else for recruits, every other big school has NIL and can use the portal too, and many schools have more resources.  Sure you can bring guys in via the portal, but they can leave via the portal just as well if they don't like being a backup or if someone comes along and offers more money.

Point being, there are examples where it took more than three years to build a program.

[JosephC]

Kind of a followup to LouisEly's post...  The negativity here in Madison is now at a ridiculous level.  Ever since Alvarez got this program back to being good, this is still a program that occasionally, loses and looks really bad in a game that they had no business losing.  Sure, that doesn't happen to Alabama, Ohio State and Georgia, but Wisconsin will never be one of those programs because the recruiting area just isn't as fertile.  Outside of maybe 10 programs, it happens to everyone else.

Even in an up year they were always likely to lose against Alabama at Alabama.

Maybe the Badgers really are a 3 wins team, but just maybe they are a lot better and just dropped a hard turd against Maryland?  Don't think Alvarez had these types of losses, go back and look at the history and you will find many of them.

Yeah, I'm not backing off my previous statement that I would put their win cap at just four this year.  But all this crap in Madison like Fickell must be fired now (firing him in September is going to accomplish exactly what?), the Badgers are by far the worst team in the Big 10, Michigan will win by at least four touchdowns...give it a rest.

[homer]

I don't think they can fire him given the cost. But I also have a sinking feeling that he will be unable to turn it around.

[LouisEly]

The 80% buyout might not kick in until after his third year, this year.  I've heard that the buyout "drops" to $25M in December, and the payout is then $334K/month through March 2032, or ~$4M/year.  That would be offset by any salary he gets in FBS or the NFL.  For reference, the Toledo head coach makes $1.1M, so that would only bring Fickell's annual buyout down to ~$3M/year.  With $70M+/year in TV revenue, that shouldn't be an issue.

The issue is more that if they have to wait until December, will they be able to get a coach in place by signing day and have enough time to sell kids on staying?  Being a state employee, they have to follow state law in posting the position, so they can't interview behind his back and have a candidate ready to go the day after they fire him.  And with the elimination of the spring portal window, they only have December and early January to bring in players.

 

[BrewerFan]

22 hours ago, LouisEly said:

Obviously a different era, different rules, but lots of similarities.

No... not really. 

The 1990s Miami Hurricanes and the Badgers? 

If the Badgers and Fickell had gotten hit with significant penalties(Bowl game AND loss of scholarships)... then sure, it'd be similar. That is quite the difference though. The Badgers have gotten better facilities, more financial support and... they've gotten worse and it looks worse when you look at 2026, 2027 classes. 

 I don't see any correlation between those two situations... AT ALL. I mean, they were both good and then got bad. That's it. 

[BrewerFan]

19 hours ago, homer said:

I don't think they can fire him given the cost. But I also have a sinking feeling that he will be unable to turn it around.

Same here... but I REALLY want to be proven wrong. 

[owbc]

20 hours ago, homer said:

I don't think they can fire him given the cost. But I also have a sinking feeling that he will be unable to turn it around.

My hope is that he gets some assistants around him that can coach, similar to what he had in Cincinnati. It seems like that has been recognized and possibly rectified...I like to think that this season is at the low point now and will get better. We'll see. 

I don't buy some of the other arguments in this thread. You rarely get hired as a coach in a good situation. Either you're replacing some legend who retired (impossible shoes to fill) or you're coming into some problematic situation that caused your predecessor to get fired. 

You do need the support of the program, the AD, the facilities, the NIL money, the fans, etc. Does Wisconsin support its football team to the level needed to be in the upper quartile of the Big Ten? Surely it does. 

 

[BrewerFan]

8 hours ago, owbc said:

My hope is that he gets some assistants around him that can coach, similar to what he had in Cincinnati. It seems like that has been recognized and possibly rectified...I like to think that this season is at the low point now and will get better. We'll see. 

I don't buy some of the other arguments in this thread. You rarely get hired as a coach in a good situation. Either you're replacing some legend who retired (impossible shoes to fill) or you're coming into some problematic situation that caused your predecessor to get fired. 

You do need the support of the program, the AD, the facilities, the NIL money, the fans, etc. Does Wisconsin support its football team to the level needed to be in the upper quartile of the Big Ten? Surely it does. 

 

To the first part, sure, coaches who can coach similar to what he had in Cincinnati would be preferable... 

Just as important(more important IMO) is rebuilding the in-state infrastructure. I know of at least 3 D1 Recruits in the SE Conference who will be playing D1 and had little to no contact from the program. At LEAST one from an affluent family who... wanted to go to Madison, but they aren't really looking at the schools like Arrowhead, Mukwonago... Muskego, Memorial(no longer Classic 8). It's back to what I'm saying, I KNOW there are kids who are 2-3 star recruits who want to play at Wisconsin(just as there are kids who want to play for Iowa or Michigan, Nebraska, home state kids), but... they're just not as active as the Badgers have been for the last 2 decades. I was speaking to an AD for a school that's produced several Badgers who said they were at least in communication regularly... even though, obviously there's not going to be a recruit from those schools every year, but when you have Badger alum on the HS coaching staff and you're talking about the top programs in the state and they aren't around nearly as much...it doesn't help. And the thing is, Fickell started out on this big run around the state. Going to most of the top programs, having a whole day getting to know everyone, he was active at Wrestling events, just getting his face out there. Seems like that honemoon faded quickly.

 

They also had one of the best strength and conditioning staffs in the Country and they decided to change that was one of the area's Wisconsin really excelled at was getting those kids in their program, build them up and give them a chance.  You're recruiting a LOT of guys who are 6'4-6'5 215LB ATH and you don't know what they'll be yet. That's half the job. Not just recruiting talent, but finding the talent that has not yet peaked physically and developing them... their old Strength and Conditioning Coach(or one of them). Costigan from Muskego. We Wrestled him. No clue what he was doing, just a great athlete, but he weighed on at 255. He completely transformed his body in a yar in Madison. He was a middling recruit, recruited for depth and he became a staple on the offensive line.

Kevin Zeitler... He was not a real agile guy coming out, he was hardly a top recruit. a 3 star recruit. I got to know his family. He was offered by some mid-majors, but they were Wisconsin all the way.

 

Keanu Benton, another kid who was a 3 star, had only one other big school offer. You're telling me Chryst could get all those guys(in the 19th ranked class), but they can't now? We could go all day, but these are the TYPES of talent that's just leaving the state for mid majors who are offering little or no NIL and we're just not going after them very aggressively. Those are just three that came to my mind because someone said Leonhard didn't really count because he played right away... but even with Leonhard, he was a skinny little kid. He spent his entire 1st year just working to build his frame. That was a little before my time.

 

 

And one more note on that, for those who said we can't get the walk on's anymore due to the cost of school, we can put those kids on scholarship now. They added 20 scholarships. 105 scholarships now vs 85 when Leonhard came in. There's no reason for them to be doing this bad other than... they're just doing a piss poor job.

 

As for the NIL money, I know they had a lot of momentum with Fickell. I was hardly Phil Knight, but I wrote some checks that I could have spent on other things, but specifically, I know two donors, one a former roommate who's made a few low 6 figure donations and another who... well, never told me, but they're wealthy-wealthy... and I speak to both regularly and it's two people and anecdotal, but they're not real enthusiastic to, but I have no idea how the the high profile and big money donors feel about paying that buyout or about giving to the program in it's current state.

 

Plus, now with NIL, you have to justify your value to the clearinghouse(over 600 bucks) and outside of the 20.5M the school can allocate. It's capped a bit more than it was in the past few years... which in theory should be helping UW, but it's not.

 

It's small time in the scope of College Athletics the checks I've written relative to the actual donars is like the take a penny leave a penny...it's pocket change to a big program... but that's anecdotal. I don't know how they're doing compares to years past. I have a friend in the AD department who I don't really ask, but I do know you get to a point it becomes a Sisyphean type task in building a program the size of Wisconsin's with the lack of in-state talent... epecially when you're not even taking advantage of what talent there is.

Rather than building momentum like they once had...when they decided they were going to go to more of a spread offense and abandon pretty much everything that made the Badgers a successful program year in and year out, now EVERYTHING is more difficult. They don't have a foundation in place, they don't have an identity like they had at LEAST in their down years of just dominating the offensive LOS and keeping games close with an elite run game.

Fickell isn't the big time hire here to take us over the top anymore, he's the guy who came in and they gotten worse as they've "modernized" the offense...going from low 20 pass attempts/low 40 rush attempts to more pass attempts than rush attempts(despite Braelon Allen) with the new offense everyone'd clamored for.

You've lost that reputation for giving those guys at Kimberly or Black River Falls or wherever, a shot to come in and WIN a spot and EARN playing time you're not bringing in blue chip prospects because you don't have a program like Cincinnati did where you were proving to guys you could be competitive at the highest level and get guys to the NFL in droves. and again there doesn't even appear to be an emphasis on keeping Wisconsin kids in Wisconsin. That was Barry's entire theme when he came in and we've carried that on for ~30 years until we just decided to tear that wall down.

And you can talk ad nauseum about how hard it is to recruit kids and how "insane" it is and how wrong I am that the lower level recruits, the ones who Central Michigan right now, but in the past were staying home, how they're the ones who end up in the portal, but they're not. Jim Leonhard didn't leave because he didn't get any run as a Freshmen before earning a spot and he wouldn't be leaving now(and using Leonhard as a fill in for any of the other guys I named). 

 

Those kids WERE the kids who got on campus, got into the strength and conditioning program Wisconsin had... which was 2nd to none in the Country, they took a RS, they got some run as core STers and then they became contributors in the 2-deep.

Then you'd add a few studs from Minnesota, some NJ kids, some St Louis and then dip into Florida and take the leftovers and hope you hit on a couple guys AND THEN you'd take some big swings and go after the 5 star recruits that you've built connections with. But it should NEVER take years to build connections when you're THEE D1 program in your own state.

 

And now, as has been pointed out, your start with a new coach... and those HS kids, they haven't seen a good Badgers team since 2021? When you were a QB away from probably winning every game you lost. Wisconsin. A year when you lost 4 games, but had a LOT of NFL talent on that team.

And all 4 of the games you lost, you were VERY competitive going into the 4th. Tied vs Penn State, down down 13-10 at ND, I believe you were also down just 3 vs Michigan at Half and you were tied with Minnesota. That was the Graham Mertz years. 

Or the 2019 team(I don't care about the 2020 team, though, even then our 3 losses were to the #10, #12 and #16 team in the Country EOY).

 

You got beat bad by Ohio State(though in the B1G Championship game, you were up 21-7 at Half on them, lost 34-21). You put one on Michigan, and, you were up 9 at half when you were ranked 5th vs Illinois, then the first OSU loss.

And your final loss of the year was a 28-27 loss vs the Jake Herbert led Oregon Ducks when he couldn't throw on your defense, led by a whole spate of those 2 and 3 star recruits at LB/DL and you held him to ...like 130 yards passing on a couple picks, but he ran 3 in.

 

Those were the types of years that led to this big swing they took... and I don't blame them, but we took those years for granted... and those are the types of years that feel... a VERY long way away. And I wish i saw some reason for optimism, but I'm just not.

 

We HAD an identity. From EVERYTHING I understood, we were going to be supplementing that with more emphasis on the pass game game... not abandoning our identity. 

 

But we're headed for Purdue territory and we desperately need to pull up or we're going to find ourselves in the bottom 5 of the B1G year in and year out.

 

And finally, the thing I REALLY don't understand... there are some who have made it sound like it's just outrageous to even suggest Jim Leonhard. Someone who understands the state, how the program ws run, how to get the most out of those guys who weren't highly touted.

 

Someone who WANTED to be here, who was pursued by several NFL teams as well as big time CFB programs and argued, VERY clearly correctly to me(particularly in hindsight) that there was FAR more they needed to keep doing the same rather than how much differently they needed to run the program.

 

Short of that... hell, I don't know... how about the ONE guy who NEVER should have been let go or coaching ANY other position... Indiana OFFENSIVE LINE COACH-BOB BOSTAD.

 

Make him co-head coach if you need. That's an area of this team that has been bad Fickell's entire tenure(as well as the end of Chrysts).

Hell, if you could JUST get back to getting the big ugglies in there and a dominant OL... it'd at least buy you some time and be a START. 

[Samurai Bucky]

1 hour ago, BrewerFan said:

Short of that... hell, I don't know... how about the ONE guy who NEVER should have been let go or coaching ANY other position... Indiana OFFENSIVE LINE COACH-BOB BOSTAD.

@BrewerFan -- I could simply give an "Amen" to everything you outlined.  There were guys that wanted to stay at Wisconsin because, as you stated, there was unfinished business.  I truly believe they need to bring in a Wisconsin guy to rebuild the program.  That would be somebody who was "raised" within the program.

That obviously doesn't guarantee success.  Chryst was a good coordinator -- he was even being recruited to be a coordinator at Dallas.  For whatever reason, Chryst either lost the passion, or was seriously incapable of continuing the tradition and the brand. 

What Wisconsin needs is somebody who believes in Wisconsin.  When I brought up "putting a wall around the state," people said there wasn't enough talent in the state.  Putting up a wall around the state isn't only about making sure the talent stays in the state, but it is about building up pride or the brand in the state.  That takes hard work, too.  The results might not be immediately tangible.  

I am also disappointed by what Barry said, but understood why he said it.  Yes, the players are negatively affected by the boos.  However, that can be addressed by Fickell by getting kids who want to play at Wisconsin because it is Wisconsin.  I know that is tough, but you build up additional relationships with schools in, say, New Jersey.  Many kids may come from Wisconsin, but you will get additional players -- high talent guys -- to come because it is Wisconsin.

When Fickell talked about his "300 mile radius," he should have prefaced it with, "The state of Wisconsin is still the program's top priority.  Along with that, I want to strengthen the relationships with coaches within a 300 mile radius."

Oh well...

[homer]

one theory about keeping guys in state is that they are less likely to transfer 

[LouisEly]

4 hours ago, BrewerFan said:

Just as important(more important IMO) is rebuilding the in-state infrastructure. I know of at least 3 D1 Recruits in the SE Conference who will be playing D1 and had little to no contact from the program. At LEAST one from an affluent family who... wanted to go to Madison, but they aren't really looking at the schools like Arrowhead, Mukwonago... Muskego, Memorial(no longer Classic 8).

Anecdotally I'm sure this is true.  

Fickell was hired in late November 2022.  The 2023 in-state class, which he didn't have much of a shot at anyway, wasn't good.  Nate White was ranked #1 and Will McDonald #2 and they got both of them.

The class of 2024 was signed in December of 2023 which means that Fickell likely started recruiting them in 2022 (or earlier) when he was at Cincinnati.  That's the main reason why there are few in-state players - they had already built the relationships with out of state kids.  From what I've heard, the staff wasn't real high on Sexton, Roy didn't grow up in WI (moved to WI in high school) and was indifferent and they tried to keep him but the history and relationship wasn't there, Corey Smith and Donnie Harbour were indifferent to UW and liked Franklin's "swagger", and they got Jensen (but he left), Rob Booker (medically retired), and Landon Gauthier.  You've brought up Leibfried, but he was the #12 player in WI and the #69 OT overall and of the five OL they brought in the lowest ranked one was Cubberly as the #43 OT and he's starting.  There just wasn't room for Leibfried with the other five OL they had.

As for 2025, Flanigan and Strebig are from Catholic families and went to Catholic schools and when ND comes calling that's like a dream (plus Flanigan is a legacy at ND).  Poteat wasn't coming to UW after they fired his dad, but they got Roeske (Wautoma), Grant Dean (Neenah), Cooper Catalano (Germantown, and already playing as a true FR), Torin Pettaway (Middleton), and Emmett Bork (Oconomomoc), so yes, they are giving kids from Wautoma, Neenah, Germantown, and Oconomowoc chances to earn a starting spot.

As for 2026, they took Wenzel (Appleton).  They weren't going to take many OL having taking a combined 10 in the last two classes.  Maybe they missed on Meier, maybe he didn't want to go to a situation where there were 10 guys taken in the two classes ahead of him.  Walk-ons are kind of going away with scholarship expansion to 105 and a hard roster limit of 105, so maybe that's why they aren't putting as much effort into a walk-on class.

[yourout]

Heard an add on the radio for UW football that said something about leaving it all on the field and I could not help but laugh. 

They certainly have been "leaving it all on the field"

[yourout]

Gruesome looking knee injury for Braelon Allen.

[Jim French Stepstool]

On 9/27/2025 at 9:30 AM, Samurai Bucky said:

@BrewerFan -- I could simply give an "Amen" to everything you outlined.  There were guys that wanted to stay at Wisconsin because, as you stated, there was unfinished business.  I truly believe they need to bring in a Wisconsin guy to rebuild the program.  That would be somebody who was "raised" within the program.

That obviously doesn't guarantee success.  Chryst was a good coordinator -- he was even being recruited to be a coordinator at Dallas.  For whatever reason, Chryst either lost the passion, or was seriously incapable of continuing the tradition and the brand. 

What Wisconsin needs is somebody who believes in Wisconsin.  When I brought up "putting a wall around the state," people said there wasn't enough talent in the state.  Putting up a wall around the state isn't only about making sure the talent stays in the state, but it is about building up pride or the brand in the state.  That takes hard work, too.  The results might not be immediately tangible.  

I am also disappointed by what Barry said, but understood why he said it.  Yes, the players are negatively affected by the boos.  However, that can be addressed by Fickell by getting kids who want to play at Wisconsin because it is Wisconsin.  I know that is tough, but you build up additional relationships with schools in, say, New Jersey.  Many kids may come from Wisconsin, but you will get additional players -- high talent guys -- to come because it is Wisconsin.

When Fickell talked about his "300 mile radius," he should have prefaced it with, "The state of Wisconsin is still the program's top priority.  Along with that, I want to strengthen the relationships with coaches within a 300 mile radius."

Oh well...

As I mentioned, Chryst appears to be one of those guys who should've just stayed an OC---and while I'm sure he didn't know it at the time, would've been happier had he done so.

NIL makes this almost a necessity, but you've wound up with a number of what are supposed to be key players being from elsewhere. Bad football is bad football no matter where the kids are from, but the new coach & staff and the early Longo-driven hype COMBINED with the makeup of the roster gives (I think) a mercenary-type feel to the whole thing & contributes to the propensity to boo if unsuccessful. Barry took the high road. Knowing his willingness to straight shoot, it probably wasn't easy for him.

Leonhard is once again on a few peoples' lips. I don't know if that'll ever be revisited, but there would need to be a different AD for it to happen.

[JosephC]

10 hours ago, Jim French Stepstool said:

Leonhard is once again on a few peoples' lips. I don't know if that'll ever be revisited, but there would need to be a different AD for it to happen.

I'm not hearing Leonhard's name at all.  Not a peep.

There appears to be two favorites among the boosters/donors/grads, and by a pretty wide margin.

Penn State offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki.  Went to school at River Falls and then coached there for 6 years.  Was hired by Leipold and coached under him at Whitewater, Buffalo and Kansas.  This has been his second year at Penn State.  Never has been a head coach, but has about 20 years of offensive coordinator experience and is only 45 years old.

And the other is Lance Leipold.  Kind of surprised his name is in the mix but apparently there were some "powerful" people that wanted him the last go-around and those people are still here.  Doesn't seem like a favorite of McIntosh, as he was given an interview the last time but it was heavily rumored that it was a courtesy interview and he wasn't under serious consideration.

Other names are Jason Eck (New Mexico) and Matt Campbell (Iowa State).  Local media is talking about Tulane coach Jon Sumrall, but I haven't heard any talk from the donors/grads about him.

Personally, I'd be surprised if Fickell is let go after this season.  McIntosh won't want to do it, and the buyout is prohibitive.  I just don't see Mnookin telling McIntosh, you must fire him AND we must pay him 25 million dollars.  So IMO, this is all pretty good chatter, but it's likely all meaningless.

[CheezWizHed]

I'm thinking that Badgers need to take the GM/HC approach to college football.  The NFL has split "talent acquisition" from "team development" for a long time.  And there have been several clear "that didn't work" moments when they tried combine the roles - Holmgren in Seattle, Sherman in GB.  

So why does college FB require that?  Go hire someone to be the recruiter and another to be the head coach.  Of course there are still roles for the HC in recruiting, but you have someone else (with a different skillset strength) dedicated to the recruiting and scouting processes. 

Frankly, I'd rehire Chryst if we had someone else doing the recruiting. 

[LouisEly]

7 hours ago, CheezWizHed said:

I'm thinking that Badgers need to take the GM/HC approach to college football.  

 

They already have:

https://uwbadgers.com/sports/football/roster/staff/marcus-sedberry/983

[CheezWizHed]

6 minutes ago, LouisEly said:

They already have:

https://uwbadgers.com/sports/football/roster/staff/marcus-sedberry/983

He sounds more administrative than active recruiting.  

[LouisEly]

7 hours ago, JosephC said:

Personally, I'd be surprised if Fickell is let go after this season.  McIntosh won't want to do it, and the buyout is prohibitive.

Agree, but I think there is another reason.  Someone on the outside is going to look at this and see that a high-profile hire was only given three years and wasn't even given three full recruiting classes to rebuild the program.  On top of that, the high-profile hire had to play backup QBs in most of their games because the high-profile transfer QBs they brought (bought?) were injured most of the time.  Add to that being a head coach during basically the Wild West of college football with players going to the highest bidder...

Is a prospective coach going to feel like he will "get a fair shake" at UW?  Is a prospective coach going to feel like there is extra risk in taking the job and will have a really short leash? 

Increased risk needs to be countered with increased reward.  A prospective coach is going to have to really want to come to UW, or is going to need to be paid more to account for the perceived increased risk of a very short leash.  You don't get a better job after you get fired.  Since UW has never competed for national championships, they will be on the same level as Oklahoma State or Stanford as far as program prestige and then it comes down to security and support.

(Stanford's coach was fired after a short period of time, but it was for cause - bullying and belittling female staff members.)

[Jim French Stepstool]

11 hours ago, JosephC said:

I'm not hearing Leonhard's name at all.  Not a peep.

There appears to be two favorites among the boosters/donors/grads, and by a pretty wide margin.

Penn State offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki.  Went to school at River Falls and then coached there for 6 years.  Was hired by Leipold and coached under him at Whitewater, Buffalo and Kansas.  This has been his second year at Penn State.  Never has been a head coach, but has about 20 years of offensive coordinator experience and is only 45 years old.

And the other is Lance Leipold.  Kind of surprised his name is in the mix but apparently there were some "powerful" people that wanted him the last go-around and those people are still here.  Doesn't seem like a favorite of McIntosh, as he was given an interview the last time but it was heavily rumored that it was a courtesy interview and he wasn't under serious consideration.

Other names are Jason Eck (New Mexico) and Matt Campbell (Iowa State).  Local media is talking about Tulane coach Jon Sumrall, but I haven't heard any talk from the donors/grads about him.

Personally, I'd be surprised if Fickell is let go after this season.  McIntosh won't want to do it, and the buyout is prohibitive.  I just don't see Mnookin telling McIntosh, you must fire him AND we must pay him 25 million dollars.  So IMO, this is all pretty good chatter, but it's likely all meaningless.

I meant on this board, a few people have brought up JL. And the only chance of it going anywhere beyond that is if Mac was jettisoned.

Yeah, some well-heeled people---many of them---would have to have a lot of disdain for Fickell for him to be in his last year. I also don't see that happening. And in that case, it would be futile to put together any kind of serious candidate list at this time. But if the unlikely occurred, Kotelnicki & Campbell would currently be my favorites. I've been a Leipold fan for awhile now, but he'll be 62 next spring.

[BrewerFan]

On 9/27/2025 at 12:08 PM, LouisEly said:

The class of 2024 was signed in December of 2023 which means that Fickell likely started recruiting them in 2022 (or earlier) when he was at Cincinnati.  That's the main reason why there are few in-state players - they had already built the relationships with out of state kids.  From what I've heard, the staff wasn't real high on Sexton, Roy didn't grow up in WI (moved to WI in high school) and was indifferent and they tried to keep him but the history and relationship wasn't there, Corey Smith and Donnie Harbour were indifferent to UW and liked Franklin's "swagger", and they got Jensen (but he left), Rob Booker (medically retired), and Landon Gauthier.  You've brought up Leibfried, but he was the #12 player in WI and the #69 OT overall and of the five OL they brought in the lowest ranked one was Cubberly as the #43 OT and he's starting.  There just wasn't room for Leibfried with the other five OL they had.

No, I didn't bring him up, someone else did.

The only players I brought up specifically in this thread was Pribula... a kid who wanted to come to Wisconsin from Penn State and is now running the offense in Columbia, Missouri... for a 5-0 team. So I'm also questioning their ability to identify the right players as well. 

 

I've also been pretty clear, I'm not focused as much on the FIRST year here, I'm looking at next years class... and he has ONE of the top TWENTY from Wisconsin... and it looks like he's going to finish with ONE of the top 20.

On 9/30/2025 at 7:50 PM, LouisEly said:

Agree, but I think there is another reason.  Someone on the outside is going to look at this and see that a high-profile hire was only given three years and wasn't even given three full recruiting classes to rebuild the program.  On top of that, the high-profile hire had to play backup QBs in most of their games because the high-profile transfer QBs they brought (bought?) were injured most of the time.  Add to that being a head coach during basically the Wild West of college football with players going to the highest bidder...

Is a prospective coach going to feel like he will "get a fair shake" at UW?  Is a prospective coach going to feel like there is extra risk in taking the job and will have a really short leash? 

 

How long should they wait? Things are moving in the wrong direction and they're getting worse. 

And the "highest bidder" thing has been significantly curbed with the latest ruling. 

 

You go to a program like Wisconsin... and you can't even get most of the IN-STATE talent, while moving away from the ONE thing that made the program successful for nearly 30 years and I think you may be underestimating these coaches ability to piece those things together. 

Quote

 Since UW has never competed for national championships, they will be on the same level as Oklahoma State or Stanford as far as program prestige and then it comes down to security and support.

Yeah, except for the fact that Wisconsin has consistently been a much better program than either school and in the B1G while they're ACC and B12. I don't buy for a second Football coaches are going to say 'well, Stanford or Wisconsin, neither were regularly in the CFP, so same level.' 

Wisconsin dwarfs both those programs both in resources and money spent on the program. 

 

 

 

[JosephC]

Michigan is a 17.5 point favorite this morning. 

Have to think with the beatdown that this team has received from the fans and media these last two weeks, that if they have any pride and guts at all, that we are going to see the best they have.

I'll predict the Badgers lose, but it will be a closer game (and in general, pretty ugly).  Maybe something like Michigan 22, Wisconsin 17.