Tag: ohio state

The Big Ten Championship Game between the Wisconsin Badgers and the Ohio State isn’t really a Super Bowl, even though Lucas Oil Stadium is a domed venue and a place which has in fact hosted the Supe in the past. One can’t really call this game a Super Bowl because Ohio State can lose it and still make the College Football Playoff. A “Super Bowl-style” game can’t have that dimension.

What we CAN say about this Big Ten battle, however, is that it is a championship game. It isn’t a quarterfinal or a semifinal. It’s a final. It is a meeting of two champions — champions of divisions — for a trophy and regional bragging rights. Seems pretty important, right?

Here is a fact which the national press isn’t discussing very much this week, with Ohio State getting most of the national play before the playoff, in which it will surely participate: Wisconsin, for all the times it has made the Big Ten Championship Game, hasn’t won the Big Ten since 2012.

That statement might be surprising to some. Others might see Ohio State’s dominance under Urban Meyer and think that statement isn’t surprising at all. Regardless, this much is clear: Wisconsin is simultaneously a program which has made the most Big Ten title game appearances of any conference member (6), and a program which has gone seven years without winning the league.

Wisconsin inhabits a weird and complicated reality heading into this latest Big Ten title tilt with Ohio State: The Badgers have been undeniably and consistently successful. Their program is in a very good place. They just punched Minnesota in the teeth to win a division title and knock the Gophers out of the Rose Bowl. How sweet is THAT? They are making their third trip to Indianapolis in the past four seasons, their fourth in the last six. Yet, they haven’t been able to win in Indianapolis since 2012 against Bo Pelini.

They didn’t beat Penn State in 2016, in a game which got away from them. They didn’t beat J.T. Barrett and a vulnerable Ohio State team in 2017. The 2014 game against Ohio State? Let’s not talk about that one. You know what happened then. Wisconsin is still searching for an elusive conference title. Ohio State fans will quickly point out that if the 2012 Buckeyes had been eligible for postseason play, they would have replaced Wisconsin as Nebraska’s opponent in Lucas Oil Stadium.

This is a seven-year itch for Wisconsin. Can the Badgers scratch it tonight? It would mean the world — and then some — if they can. It would also mean a ticket to Pasadena on January 1. It’s go time for UW.

It is that time of year when a lot of people complain about the conference championship games not being College Football Playoff quarterfinals. I agree that if two teams (think Utah and Oklahoma) can settle a playoff debate on the field, they should play each other on this Conference Championship Saturday, instead of playing someone from their own conference. However, I firmly disagree with people who say that conference championships don’t mean much.

As the Wisconsin Badgers prepare to face the Ohio State Buckeyes in the Big Ten Championship Game, it is worth noting that the pride created by beating a Midwestern powerhouse and neighbor would be extremely satisfying for Wisconsin. The larger reality of sharing the same part of the United States with 13 other teams — and then being able to say you are the champion in that conference of 14 schools — seems like a big deal to me. The fact that the Big Ten asks its champion to play 10 games (nine in the 12-game set schedule, then No. 10 in Indianapolis if able to qualify for the Big Ten Championship Game) makes a conference championship very substantial. Playing 10 out of 13 games in a season, and being the best team in those 10 games, is a huge accomplishment.

In a league of Ohio State, and Michigan, and Penn State, and Minnesota, and Iowa, a Big Ten championship stands out as a huge feat of athletic prowess and coaching acumen. If Wisconsin can win this title — and go to the Rose Bowl as a result — it would be an enormous achievement for Paul Chryst, his staff, his players, and the whole program.

Look at the Oregon program which beat Utah to win the Pac-12 title and go to the Rose Bowl, possibly as Wisconsin’s opponent. The Ducks fell on hard times as soon as Marcus Mariota left for the NFL. Yeah, Oregon is not in the playoff, but returning to the Rose Bowl is a big freakin’ deal for the Ducks. It was very similar for Washington to make the Rose Bowl last season. The Huskies hadn’t been to Pasadena since the 2000 season. They waited 18 years to return! A conference championship made that possible.

Let’s defend the honor of conference championships… and hope that Wisconsin can win one against Ohio State in the Big Ten Championship Game tonight.

Phil Harrison is the editor of our sister site, Buckeyes Wire. Follow Phil and the rest of his terrific team at Buckeyes Wire for sports coverage through an OSU lens. Get an Ohio State-centric understanding of the Big Ten Championship Game at Buckeyes Wire.

Phil answered four questions I posed to him about Saturday night’s big game in Indianapolis:

1 – How is the rematch most likely to be different from the first game in Columbus?

The checklist of “to-do items” for Wisconsin Badgers quarterback Jack Coan has not changed. Coan’s priorities against the Ohio State Buckeyes this Saturday night in the Big Ten Championship Game are not different from Oct. 26, the date of the first meeting between these two teams in Columbus. In this Indianapolis reunion, Coan doesn’t have a different battle plan. The key is to simply actualize it. He didn’t in the Horseshoe several weeks ago.

We know that a Wisconsin victory becomes a lot more possible if Coan can move the sticks on third and five. It was true in late October. It will be true on the first Saturday of December. We don’t need to explain the importance of that statement a second time. We don’t have to revisit that discussion point in great detail. It is self-evident that Wisconsin must keep Justin Fields on the sideline as much as humanly possible.

There are two primary angles connected to Coan’s rematch against Ohio State. In this first piece (part two will soon follow), I will stress the point that Coan has very clearly evolved and is in a position to build on that evolution on Saturday night.

Jack Coan’s evolution in 2019 is most profoundly seen in the two bad-weather games he has played. The first was the Ohio State game in Columbus. The second one was this past weekend against Minnesota, also a road game. Yes, it is true that Ohio State has Chase Young and Minnesota does not. Yes, the Buckeyes have athletes — and depth — on a scale the Gophers lack. No one needs to be reminded of these obvious truths.

Nevertheless, Coan handled bad weather and big-game pressure with so much more steadiness and command in Minneapolis. Instructively, it’s not as though Wisconsin’s ground game flourished against Minnesota. Coan did not throw for 280 yards and a number of big plays because the Badgers established their ground game. Jonathan Taylor was held in check. P.J. Fleck would have liked his chances of winning if told that Taylor would be held to 76 rushing yards. Coan was asked to do more… and he did more.

Coan didn’t have to be the hero against Iowa, Nebraska or Purdue, not with the offensive line blasting open big holes for Taylor and the ground game. Those games required competent, game-manager-level performances from Coan, which he delivered. The Minnesota game was likely to require something extra from Coan. In bad weather, the quarterback gave Paul Chryst and his defense exactly that. This is the evolution of Coan, whose confidence ought to be sky-high heading into Indianapolis.

Now, as Coan’s reward for evolving in bad-weather conditions against quality opposition, he gets to throw in a climate-controlled environment. His feel for a wet ball wasn’t great in Columbus, but it dramatically improved in Minneapolis. Now, Coan can throw without worrying about the ball sliding, or the wind changing the flight path, or his receivers possibly slipping. An evolving quarterback gets to play in ideal conditions for a passing game and an offense. Everything Coan and Wisconsin lacked on Oct. 26 in the Shoe can rise to the forefront on Dec. 7 in Lucas Oil Stadium.

This is one clear reason Wisconsin has a legitimate hope of pulling off a significant upset… and winning its first Big Ten title in seven years.