The Badgers are coming off an exemplary season in which they barely missed a Rose Bowl title. They’re set to lose a number of players, but none greater than Jonathan Taylor, who is Wisconsin’s first two-time Doak Walker Award winner. He racked up over 2,000 yards in 2019, his second 2,000-yard season. He also greatly improved his receiving game this past season, catching 26 passes for 252 yards and five touchdowns.
Losing that kind of production means the next great Wisconsin running back will have to step up in a major way. The odd part of Paul Chryst’s system is that the next highest total from a running back in terms of rushing yards is Nakia Watson with 331 yards. That represents 10 percent of Wisconsin’s total rushing offense. Meanwhile, on the other side of that coin, Jonathan Taylor’s 2,003 yards represent 62 percent of Wisconsin’s total rushing offense. There’s a huge disparity between the two. That means Nakia Watson will be expected to make a significant jump in his output.
What this likely means as well: Chryst will probably funnel the offense through Jack Coan a little more as Watson settles into being the No. 1 guy, just a few years removed from being the Badgers’ highest-rated running back recruit in the 2018 recruiting class. Coan will have the benefit of a veteran offensive line that will nevertheless have to deal with the departure of Tyler Biadasz. Even without Biadasz, Wisconsin will have an offensive line with enough experience to open a running lane wide enough for my grandmother to run through.
This makes Coan the player most likely to benefit from Wisconsin’s adjusted playcalling. The offensive line is also going to be bolstered by the recruitment of five-star offensive tackle Logan Brown and four-star tackle Joe Tippmann. A big question is if Graham Mertz will get more playing time as Coan’s backup in blowout games or other special situations. Coan should get enough protection from his offensive line to improve upon his 2019 season, which he ended as the 52nd-ranked passer in terms of total passing yards.