The Wisconsin Badgers played a near-perfect defensive first half against the Ohio State Buckeyes on Oct. 26 in Columbus. Saturday night in Indianapolis, in the 2019 Big Ten Championship Game, the Badgers played a near-perfect half, period.
Whereas the Wisconsin defense played brilliantly in the first 30 minutes against Ohio State in late October, the whole Wisconsin TEAM played an excellent first 30 minutes in Lucas Oil Stadium. The Badgers’ first Big Ten title in seven years seemed very close and attainable. Up 21-7 at the intermission, Wisconsin had created a cushion to the extent that the Badgers didn’t need to be PERFECT in the second half. They needed to be good, and make the routine plays they had made in the first half.
Uh-oh. That’s where the Badgers lost hold of this game.
Yes, Ohio State dominated the second half in Indianapolis, much as it dominated the second half of the game in Columbus, but that first game was a game in which Ohio State never trailed. Wisconsin’s outlook was bleak at halftime. That gray day was always an uphill battle. Jack Coan didn’t have his fastball, and he wasn’t throwing strikes.
This game was not that game. Coan was outstanding in the first half, and while he lost a measure of accuracy midway through the second half, he kept making impressive throws until the very end of the game, when he was stopped by a hard hit at the Ohio State 3-yard line. Coan’s performance was good enough to beat Ohio State. Coan’s development late in the season was hugely impressive and a testament to the good work this coaching staff has done in 2019.
All Coan needed was some help, and some of those routine plays from his teammates on both sides of the ball. He didn’t get them.
In a game Ohio State ultimately won by 13 points, imagine a second half in which Wisconsin didn’t botch a punt; was able to make a field goal; and stopped Ohio State’s 3rd and 18 play on a 14-yard out route which easily should have been contained to force a Buckeye punt. We can go on and on with all the plays Wisconsin didn’t make in the second half, but let’s simply take those three.
Just three plays, folks. Three plays. If you take them away — no botched punt, a made field goal instead of a miss, and a 3rd-and-18 stop to force an OSU punt — that’s a 13-point shift. Wisconsin scores 24. Ohio State scores 24.
We’re still playing. Heck, we might have had the second overtime of the day, after Oklahoma beat Baylor in OT in the Big 12 Championship Game.
Would Wisconsin have beaten Ohio State in the event that those three plays had gone the other way? We don’t know… but that’s the point: Wisconsin would have had a chance to win, and that’s why this game — this Big Ten title — slipped away in Indianapolis.