B1G

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 …

Wisco Wednesday: Badgers 2024 Schedule Read More »

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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A Season of Change

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A lot has changed in college football in the last year. Thankfully you’ve found this article that will catch you up to date with the biggest changes. 

The Big 10 (18)

  • The Big Ten has dropped divisions. At the end of the season, the 2 teams with the best conference records will play in the B1G Championship game. (This means Ohio State vs Michigan could happen in back-to-back weeks).
  • 4 new schools have been added to the B1G, bringing membership to 18 schools. The new teams are Oregon, Washington, UCLA, and USC.
  • B1G Friday Night is now a thing. There will be a Big Ten Friday night football game every week this season except week 3.
  • Channel flipping. The “top 3” B1G games each week have locked in TV times and networks. FOX at Noon, CBS at 3:30, and NBC at 7:30 (all times EST). Sometimes NBC will put their “best” game on Peacock. It is what it is. 

The ACC 

  • They have also done away with divisions like the B1G.
  • They have added 3 new schools to the conference bringing membership to 17 schools. SMU, Stanford, and Cal are in the ACC now.
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Walk On Fan is Back

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Walk On Fan, your favorite place for college football news and opinions, is back.

June isn’t too early to start talking about football, right?

This will be our second season covering everything to do with college football that we find interesting. Hopefully you find it interesting too. 

The plan is to write shorter pieces than last year, and hopefully be a little more consistent with our upload schedule. In the summer that won’t mean much, but in-season we’re shooting for 3 articles a week. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

Wednesday of course means…

Wisco Wednesday isn’t going anywhere

As unapologetic Badger fans, we will return to Wisco on Wednesday, 7/3/24, with a short preview of the Badgers 2024 schedule. As the season gets closer, we can dig into what makes individual games interesting and what’s different about this year’s Badger football team compared to last year. 

B1G focused… Kinda

There are a lot of college football teams to talk about. Right now, there are 134 FBS schools. That’s 134 teams that, theoretically, could win the college football playoff and take home a natty. (Even though it’s really a 5 team race this year between Ohio State, Oregon, Georgia…

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Wisco Wednesday… On A Thursday: Free Agent QB Arrives in Madison

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Free Agency in CFB. Does anyone sit anymore? Who is QB #1 in Madison? 

Wisconsin fans, you’ve seen this story before. You were just on the other side of it.

Graham Mertz was a 4* QB fans thought would elevate the program. He showed promise in year 1, regressed in years 2 and 3, and eventually became a turnover machine that Badger fans couldn’t wait to run out of town. His time in Madison ended with him transferring to Florida to salvage his college career.

This is Tyler Van Dyke’s story… except he’s going from Florida (Miami) to Wisconsin. 

Why Tyler Van Dyke?

Okay, so Mertz and Van Dyke aren’t exactly the same, but they are very comparable. Tyler Van Dyke was actually better in 2021 than Mertz ever was. In the 2021 season, Van Dyke averaged over 300 ypg, and threw 25 TDs to 6 INTs. That was good enough for him to win ACC Rookie of the Year. A lot of the credit for his success, in hindsight, has gone to the up-tempo, air-raid offense Miami ran in 2021… you see where I’m going with this. 

In 2022: he had a new offensive coordinator (…

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Wisco Wednesday: Transfer Portal Open Season

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The Transfer Portal is Open. A Camp Randall Update. Fullbacks are People Too. 

WR Exodus

The transfer portal is open, and that means some Badgers are leaving.

The top 3 WRs from 2022 all entered the portal on Dec. 4th

  • Chimera Dike
  • Skyler Bell
  • Kiontez Lewis

While I’m not thrilled about losing these guys, a lot of it has to do with a loss of playing time. Transfers that Wisconsin brought in last year are just getting the majority of the snaps (particularly Pauling and Green). I also expect Wisconsin to go get more transfer WRs this cycle. 

A Few Other Loses

  • Braelon Allen is going to the NFL draft
  • LT Jack Nelson and C Tanor Bortolini may enter the draft (currently undecided)
  • Myles Burkett (QB3) has entered the transfer portal
  • A couple of previous walk-on guys have entered the portal

Yes, these are losses… but they are not major losses (except Braelon) or big surprises. It won’t take much for the Badgers to be net positive in the transfer portal this offseason. 

Tearing Up Alvarrez Field

Camp Randall’s turf is being torn out. It’s been through 2 football seasons, and now it’s done. …

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B1G Bowl Games Announced

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Dates, Locations, and Opponents Are Set.

In a normal year, there are a lot of B1G vs SEC bowl games. This year, there are even more. College Football is racing towards a Power 2 and all other conferences are becoming less relevant. See, 13-0 FSU missing the CFP as proof. Of the 12 teams playing in the NY6, 10 of them will be in the SEC or B1G next year (5 a piece). 

I have the Pac-12 members who are joining the B1G in August 2024 listed as “Bonus” B1G bowl matchups. All 4 of the new B1G members (USC, UCLA, Oregon, Washington) have at least 6 wins this season, which is more than B1G West was able to muster. 

  • Odds listed were taken from FanDuel at the time of writing.

SEC vs B1G

Rose Bowl: 1 Michigan vs 4 Alabama (+1.5) – CFP
Jan 1, 2024 – Rose Bowl Stadium – Pasadena, California

Cotton Bowl: 7 Ohio State vs 9 Missouri (+3.5)
Dec 29, 2023 – AT&T Stadium – Arlington, Texas

Peach Bowl: 10 Penn State vs 11 Ole Miss (+3.5)
Dec 30, 2023 – Mercedes-Benz Stadium – Atlanta, Georgia…

B1G Bowl Games Announced Read More »

Tolly Predictions: B1G Bowl Games

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Who Goes Where? Who Plays Who? 

These predictions are based on 4 things.

The B1G has a bowl draft structure where the bowls pick in a specific order, but the conference has to approve the pick. There are also back door deals for teams, certain bowls want a certain team, and the B1G has a loose no repeat rule so a team doesn’t go to the same bowl year after year.

Here are my B1G Bowl predictions listed in the order they get to “draft” B1G teams.

1 – Rose Bowl

Michigan vs Oregon – CFP Semi-Final

One last traditional Rose Bowl. Pac-12 vs B1G. I predict Michigan will be ranked #2 and Oregon will be #3. Michigan gets the Rose Bowl because #1 Georgia gets their preference between the Sugar and the Rose… they will pick the Sugar.

2 – Orange Bowl

Ohio State vs Florida State – ACC vs SEC/B1G/ND

The Orange Bowl gets the top ACC team that doesn’t make the playoffs. Well, I have the ACC missing the playoffs completely because of a Louisville win over FSU. BUT, I think the committee …

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