JessN: Wisconsin preview: Bama goes north and the difficulty level goes up

[JessN]

Wisconsin preview: Bama goes north and the difficulty level goes up
Jess Nicholas, TideFans.com Editor-In-Chief

Projected Alabama Depth Chart vs Wisconsin

One has to wonder what Wisconsin fans were thinking when news broke of Nick Saban's retirement.

It probably sounded something like a Jim Carrey movie line: “So you're telling me there's a chance?”

Through the first two weeks of the season, Alabama has won by gaudy margins, even though the South Florida game was painfully close through three quarters. Wisconsin, a team trying to join the ranks of dynamic offensive programs under head coach Luke Fickell, have two modest victories over Western Michigan and South Dakota, a pair of teams that would probably have a good bit of trouble getting past USF.

Alabama stands to get its starting offensive tackles back this week, and it will be interesting to see if the Crimson Tide opens things up a bit versus the Badgers. The USF gameplan looked a bit vanilla in comparison to what fans were expecting. The question for Wisconsin is whether the Badgers can put more points on the board than they've been able to these first couple of weeks.

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Wisconsin preview: Bama goes north and the difficulty level goes up

One has to wonder what Wisconsin fans were thinking when news broke of Nick Saban’s retirement. It probably sounded something like a Jim Carrey movie line: “So you’re telling me there&#…

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    • 2023: UA 35 @ USF 17
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[ROCKEE]

As usual, a great write up Jesse.

 

[rtr90]

hope your OL prediction hold good .. I have serious doubts

 

[BamaMoon]

I'm confused about the offense possibly being "vanilla" against USF when it appeared we couldn't even do the very basics right. If what we were doing was vanilla, why such a struggle???

From my vantage point, it looked the same as WKU and most games last year.

That should cause all of us to ask, but what is the one common denominator that makes us look this way so often???

 

[bamaga]

Good, on to Whisky, does this mean we have to break out the Brown Liquor Saturday?

 

[Bamabuzzard]

The biggest improvement needs to start with the OL. If we can block we can do damage against (according to Jess' write-up) a Wisconsin that doesn't have a potent offense and whose defense hasn't found itself yet.

 

[colbysullivan]

Never thought I’d see the day where Wisconsin has better receivers than Bama.

 

[colbysullivan]

I'm confused about the offense possibly being "vanilla" against USF when it appeared we couldn't even do the very basics right. If what we were doing was vanilla, why such a struggle???

From my vantage point, it looked the same as WKU and most games last year.

That should cause all of us to ask, but what is the one common denominator that makes us look this way so often???

Our playcalling was very vanilla. We did nothing with any imagination at all.

 

[Bamabuzzard]

Our playcalling was very vanilla. We did nothing with any imagination at all.

I don't see how anyone could tell whether it was vanilla or not due to the big percentage of plays already being blown up at the snap of the ball due to the swinging gates on the LOS.

 

[colbysullivan]

A 31-17 win in that environment would be excellent.

 

[colbysullivan]

I don't see how anyone could tell whether it was vanilla or not due to the big percentage of plays already being blown up at the snap of the ball due to the swinging gates on the LOS.

Well, I guess it depends on your definition of vanilla. If you’re not doing anything to fix obvious issues, I would consider that vanilla. Vanilla just means “bland”. Doing the same thing over and over is very bland.

 

[Bamabuzzard]

Well, I guess it depends on your definition of vanilla. If you’re not doing anything to fix obvious issues, I would consider that vanilla. Vanilla just means “bland”. Doing the same thing over and over is very bland.

We could have ran every trick play in the book and the majority of them for three quarters would have gotten blown up at the LOS. I went back and watched the game again and the play of the OL would have resulted in lost scholarships under some coaches. It was pathetic.

 

[colbysullivan]

We could have ran every trick play in the book and the majority of them for three quarters would have gotten blown up at the LOS. I went back and watched the game again and the play of the OL would have resulted in lost scholarships under some coaches. It was pathetic.

I agree. I’m just saying we could have done something to try to stop it. From that perspective, the staff was very vanilla. I still think the answer was quick slants and screens, but we saw none of that.

 

[BamaMoon]

We could have ran every trick play in the book and the majority of them for three quarters would have gotten blown up at the LOS. I went back and watched the game again and the play of the OL would have resulted in lost scholarships under some coaches. It was pathetic.

Kinda the point. If it was truly vanilla play calling we stunk at executing it.

If we can't run vanilla against USF with some success, how can we move beyond vanilla and get creative against Wisky and Georgia?

IMO, we weren't trying to be vanilla, we were trying to run the offense and, as of now, we don't do a great job of it.

 

[Bamabuzzard]

Kinda the point. If it was truly vanilla play calling we stunk at executing it.

If we can't run vanilla against USF with some success, how can we move beyond vanilla and get creative against Wisky and Georgia?

IMO, we weren't trying to be vanilla, we were trying to run the offense and, as of now, we don't do a great job of it.

Yeah, I don't think the plan was to be vanilla. I think the plan was to run the offense with who we had available for the game. The problem was we had too many swinging gates on the OL and a QB making wrong reads and holding the ball too long. Those aren't the best of combinations when you're trying to run an offense. LOL!

 

[Ledsteplin]

I agree. I’m just saying we could have done something to try to stop it. From that perspective, the staff was very vanilla. I still think the answer was quick slants and screens, but we saw none of that.

I recall at least one screen play.

 

[Slowpoke Catracho]

Great write up. I'm going with 45 - 10 Bama.

 

[Bamabuzzard]

If the OL does their thing
45-17

If the OL doesn't do their thing
20-17

 

[UAH]

I agree. I’m just saying we could have done something to try to stop it. From that perspective, the staff was very vanilla. I still think the answer was quick slants and screens, but we saw none of that.

We all remember Tua hitting those slants. Not sure we have the receivers and certainly we don't have a Tua to throw them. Seriously, I don't believe the quick release, accuracy, timing and touch is there for any type of short passing game.

 

[countrytider]

Never thought I’d see the day where Wisconsin has better receivers than Bama.

They don’t.