Big Ten Media day

[MgoBlue-LightSpecial]

A reporter called out Brett Bielema on Wisconsin's out of conference schedule. He took a pause and then started to sugarcoat the strength of each opponent, starting with Akron. I thought he was going to do the same with Cal Poly until he openly admitted that he replaced Va Tech with Cal Poly because he didn't want to play Va Tech right before the Big Ten opening stretch of Michigan, Ohio St, and Penn St. I find this pretty sad; one reason being, that stretch appears more daunting than it actually is. This is a total rebuilding year for UofM and Penn St will straddle the line of mediocrity and slightly above average. Most likely...

Wisconsin is a stepping stone away from being a national major player and they're doing all they can to keep themselves from making that next step by avoiding the big games. Simply put, Bielema went on national tv and openly admitted to being afraid of playing Va Tech. Then, with a wry smile, he said "We've been successful because we schedule good." Gee, ya think? What an asshat to say something like that...joking or otherwise. If nothing else, at least he was honest about being afraid. He could've given some as-per-usual fluff-filled response about scheduling complications.

Also, I finally figured out who Jim Delany resembles

[TheJON]

Like I've said the last few years, Wisconsin is a fraud. They were a fraud in 2004, they were a fraud in 2007 and they're going to be a fraud again in 2008. They almost never beat anyone good, they play a cupcake non-conference schedule and they are overrated. Not only that but the poster with the worst takes in the history of internet message boards happens to be a Wisconsin fan (Goober McDouchebag).

[Left Seater]

Like I've said the last few years, Wisconsin is a fraud...they play a cupcake non-conference schedule

Uhhh, hello, Maine?

[Screw_Michigan]

I caught the Tressel interview yesterday. Even if it was the just the MAC Media Day, those days were good times.

[TheJON]

Uhhh, hello, Maine?

Exactly where has Iowa been ranked the last couple of years? No where. Wisconsin has been playing cupcake schedules for years and they never beat anyone. Iowa's non-conference schedule is no lighter than most BCS schools. Pittsburgh on the road is not going to be easy as Pitt is in many people's Top 25's. And Iowa State plays their best game every year against us so that won't be easy. I can't even remember who Wisconsin plays but I know it's 4 teams that Mike Leach probably has scheduled to play in the future.

[Left Seater]

Just like you they have one non D1 school.

[buckeye_in_sc]

I love the line from one of the writers...the Big 10 is Ohio States world everyone else is living in it...good times...

[M Club]

wisconsin

[King Crimson]

always seemed to me, from afar, that Barry Alverez was about as national media inflated as anyone i can remember. guy finishes 12th in the AP and gets talked about like he's sandwiched between Bear Bryant and Knute Rockne as an alltimer.

[MgoBlue-LightSpecial]

Just scored some decent tix to the Wisconsin game. Should be a good'un.

[Danimal]

I like Wiscy and Biliema but admitting that you were flat-out ducking VaTech looks pretty damn bad, especially for a team that has aspirations of being a natioal power.

[Degenerate]

always seemed to me, from afar, that Barry Alverez was about as national media inflated as anyone i can remember. guy finishes 12th in the AP and gets talked about like he's sandwiched between Bear Bryant and Knute Rockne as an alltimer.

He single-handedly revived a program that was dead for 25 years. He didn't just take Wisconsin to the (Big Ten) promised land in Pasadena, he did it three times in less than a decade and won all three. If not for a fluke loss at Minnesota in '93, when Bevell threw it right into the arms of an LB for what turned out to be the losing margin, Wisconsin was playing that Rose Bowl with a legit claim for a piece of the MNC. The guy he replaced went 1-10 in consecutive years and ran the veer offense fer chrissakes.

I'm sure being on Holtz's staff pumped up the guy's image a bit, but still...people incorrectly assume Wisky was just another B10 program before he got there. They were a shade above NW but otherwise, an embarrassment to the conference, much like the rest of their athletic dept sans hockey.

[MgoBlue-LightSpecial]

Like I've said the last few years, Wisconsin is a fraud. They were a fraud in 2004, they were a fraud in 2007 and they're going to be a fraud again in 2008.

I wouldn't go so far as to call them frauds. They've fared well in bowl games in recent years...so when matched up with quality OOC competition, they can hang. Hell, they're one of the few that has made the Big Ten look good in bowl games within the last decade. I just think they need to step up and voluntarily play some of the big boys.

[King Crimson]

They were a shade above NW but otherwise, an embarrassment to the conference, much like the rest of their athletic dept sans hockey.

pretty good at basketball over the last decade, better than Indiana. I'd take resurrection Bill Snyder over Alvarez any day of the week. and it's got nothing to do with conference homer type stuff.

[TheJON]

Alvarez and Snyder did 2 of the best turnaround jobs of the last 50 years in college football. I'd say along with Hayden Fry's job at Iowa and Jim Leavitt's job at USF, those are the best I can think of. There is no coincidence that Leavitt, Alvarez, and Snyder were all former Hayden Fry assistants.

Bob Stoops, Dan McCarney, and Kirk Ferentz (all former Fry assistants) also did excellent jobs rebuilding programs. Now we're just waiting for Mike Stoops and Chuck Long to get something going at their schools and they'll join that list

[King Crimson]

Alvarez and Snyder did 2 of the best turnaround jobs of the last 50 years in college football. I'd say along with Hayden Fry's job at Iowa and Jim Leavitt's job at USF, those are the best I can think of. There is no coincidence that Leavitt, Alvarez, and Snyder were all former Hayden Fry assistants.

Bob Stoops, Dan McCarney, and Kirk Ferentz (all former Fry assistants) also did excellent jobs rebuilding programs. Now we're just waiting for Mike Stoops and Chuck Long to get something going at their schools and they'll join that list

if what degenerate says is true: that BA revived a Wiscy program that was dead for 25 years then Snyder already has the win. K-State is historically one of the worst football programs in history....there's no "time period" like 25 years about it. there's some heinous stat about how KSU would have to win all their games for 13 years straight to reach .500 as a program.

we've all paid our love respects to the Hayden Fry tree....but being an assistant means about this much:

Barry Switzer had Jimmy Johnson, Mack Brown and Mike Shanahan as assistants...what's that 6 Super Bowls and 7 MNC's all credited to Barry and the Barry Switzer coaching tree? Pretty impressive. who's on board with that logic?

[King Crimson]

on the subject of Dan McCarney...Chizik was a great hire but i think Dan got jobbed. Clones disappoint with Meyer and Blythe (was at ISU for 8 years)...in 06 and then they dump McCarney and simultaneously re-do the unis and start spending money. McCarney made some inroads recruiting the B players from Texas.

give Dan the new unis and renewed commitment. guy was snakebit. the FG by Bama in the Indy Bowl was wide and his own guys couldn't win the North twice on some really bad chokes.

godspeed Danny McCarney. that domestic abuse thing wasn't pretty, but here's the guy getting a second chance.

[TheJON]

McCarney had to go. Jamie Pollard had no choice. His tenure had run it's course. He built ISU into a program that was no longer the laughingstock of the country, but the momentum had stalled and McCarney could no longer sell his program to the fans. Attendance was going on a downfall and that had to change.

The problem is if Chizik doesn't win soon, the program will completely die because Pollard has sold a fragile fan base a bill of goods and all of these promises and if Chizik doesn't deliver, they're finished. Pollard sold McDermott as a guy that's going to lead ISU to 600 national titles and 2 years later everyone wants him fired because they found out he's really nothing more than a mid-major coach. And so if the same thing happens with the football program it will kill that athletic department. Fans will only buy into what you're selling so many times. Eventually you have to actually deliver something to get fans to show up before they hop on board.

[SunCoastSooner]

McCarney had to go. Jamie Pollard had no choice. His tenure had run it's course. He built ISU into a program that was no longer the laughingstock of the country, but the momentum had stalled and McCarney could no longer sell his program to the fans. Attendance was going on a downfall and that had to change.

The problem is if Chizik doesn't win soon, the program will completely die because Pollard has sold a fragile fan base a bill of goods and all of these promises and if Chizik doesn't deliver, they're finished. Pollard sold McDermott as a guy that's going to lead ISU to 600 national titles and 2 years later everyone wants him fired because they found out he's really nothing more than a mid-major coach. And so if the same thing happens with the football program it will kill that athletic department. Fans will only buy into what you're selling so many times. Eventually you have to actually deliver something to get fans to show up before they hop on board.

It scares me as to how much I agree with this. In a time frame not so far away I can see the current Big 12 not existing and Iowa State being a leading factor in its demise.

[M Club]

Like I've said the last few years, Wisconsin is a fraud. They were a fraud in 2004, they were a fraud in 2007 and they're going to be a fraud again in 2008.

I wouldn't go so far as to call them frauds. They've fared well in bowl games in recent years...so when matched up with quality OOC competition, they can hang. Hell, they're one of the few that has made the Big Ten look good in bowl games within the last decade. I just think they need to step up and voluntarily play some of the big boys.

the idea that they're frauds is because when they "win" the big ten so have four other teams. in 93 they went to the rose bowl only b/c it had been a million years since their last visit [awesome tiebreaker] and in 98 it was that same stupid tiebreaker + the fact they weren't anally raped by osu only because they didn't play each other. they, osu, and michigan all ended up 7-1. osu beat michigan, michigan handled wisco quite easily, and wisconsin beat....? then quite a few publications call wisco the team of the 90s because of their three rose bowls even though they didn't win a single outright big ten title nor did they get around to scheduling anyone for ooc who could provide players with actual arms and legs. that's why they're fraudulent.

[TheJON]

I was talking more recent Wisconsin. In the 1990's they weren't a fraud in the 2 years they won the Big-10 because they did prove it by winning both Rose Bowl's. But the rest of the 1990's was actually very mediocre. The last few years they've been good, I just don't think their team was as good as some people thought as they always seem to manage to play a weak OOC schedule and the Big-10 has been down lately and they've taken advantage of that.

[Goober McTuber]

A reporter called out Brett Bielema on Wisconsin's out of conference schedule. He took a pause and then started to sugarcoat the strength of each opponent, starting with Akron. I thought he was going to do the same with Cal Poly until he openly admitted that he replaced Va Tech with Cal Poly because he didn't want to play Va Tech right before the Big Ten opening stretch of Michigan, Ohio St, and Penn St. I find this pretty sad; one reason being, that stretch appears more daunting than it actually is. This is a total rebuilding year for UofM and Penn St will straddle the line of mediocrity and slightly above average. Most likely...

Wisconsin is a stepping stone away from being a national major player and they're doing all they can to keep themselves from making that next step by avoiding the big games. Simply put, Bielema went on national tv and openly admitted to being afraid of playing Va Tech. Then, with a wry smile, he said "We've been successful because we schedule good." Gee, ya think? What an asshat to say something like that...joking or otherwise. If nothing else, at least he was honest about being afraid. He could've given some as-per-usual fluff-filled response about scheduling complications.

Michigan is hardly in a total rebuilding mode and Penn State has been picked to finish 2nd in the league by a number of egg-spurts. Good chance that's 3 top 25 teams back-to-back-to-back. So they moved Va Tech back a few years.

You also glossed over the other two OOC opponents. Fresno State at Fresno State, a top 25 team that some are saying is BCS bowl bound this year. And Marshall: Bielema made the point that when Marshall was scheduled, he was coaching at K-State and that Marshall knocked them off when K-State was #5 nationally. Back then, Marshall was one of the better mid-majors.

I'd like to see Wisconsin schedule a little stronger non-conference. There's going to be times when a team they scheduled 5 or 6 years ago is a weaker team today. I understand his decision to move the Va Tech game, and I don't believe the Big 10 schedules out far enough in advance for them to have known about this when Va Tech was originally scheduled.

Botton line is that overall I'm happy with the direction Wisconsin has moved since 1990. 9, 10, or 11 wins is a good thing, as are New Year's Day bowl games. If we can manage to get some people's knickers knotted up in the process ('sup JON, Mgo, M Club), all the better