Badgers are Champs, after all

So the bowl destination is ... Florida. Again. It beats Christmas in Madison, but I was sort of hoping for Pasadena or New Orleans or Phoenix or Miami. Oh well.

The Champs Sports Bowl it is, set for December 27 against Florida State. My thoughts:

-Love the opponent. Florida State is a brand name in college football, and was arguably the top program of the 1990s. As a kid I was enamored with their uniforms, the mascot, the Tomahawk Chop that Braves fans stole from FSU fans.

What I also love is that they are eminently beatable nowadays. The Seminoles lately have been a shadow of what they were in the '90s, for a variety of reasons. A decline in offensive coaching. The resurgence of in-state rivals Florida and Miami. Off-the-field problems.

Can't say I paid close attention to this year's team, but looking at their results their four losses are respectable: Wake Forest, Georgia Tech, Boston College, and Florida.

Their quarterback, Christian Ponder, has thrown more interceptions than touchdowns and has been sacked 17 times, but has run for more than 400 yards. Antone Smith, their leading rusher, is a well-regarded running back. Wide receivers Greg Carr and Preston Parker are also highly thought of, even if neither has more than 40 catches or 500 yards receiving.

-I want to learn more about this Myron Rolle kid. If you've been paying attention, he's the guy who recently was named a Rhodes Scholar, interviewing for it on the day of a game, then flying in to join the team while the game was underway. Great story.

When my brother, dad, and I were hearing about this a couple weeks ago, our shared reaction was "He was a potential Rhodes Scholar and he went to ... Florida State?" Surely Stanford, Northwestern, Vanderbilt could have challenged him more academically. Whatever, good for FSU and good for Rolle.

-Rolle and his teammates had the 13th-best defense in the country this year, yardage-wise. That D is going to be a tough test for the Badger offense, lot of athletes and well-coached.

-As much as Orlando is starting to seem repetitive, and the trip might be a tough sell to Badger fans, going to Florida for the fifth straight year is a good thing. It's a state that Bret Bielema has made a recruiting priority, and we're doing pretty well there lately. Zach Brown. Aaron Henry. Jae McFadden. Elijah Hodge. Eriks Briedis. Anthony Mains. Kevin Claxton. Antonio Fenelus. Xavier Harris. Josh Nettles. Recruits David Gilbert and Conor O'Neill. (Florida State was also reportedly in the mix for O'Neill.)

Florida is an important state for us, and the more we're there, the better. Even if our fans aren't showing up in the usual numbers, you can bet that the family and friends of all those guys above will be in Orlando, and might even bring along some other promising young athletes.

-Even though this trip will be a tough sell, I'm hoping the opponent will be attractive enough to entice Badger fans to make the trip. (Disclosure: I won't be going.)

-This is our seventh straight bowl appearance, the second-longest in the Big Ten behind Ohio State. That's nice.

-Finally, this will be a battle of maligned coaches with the the initials B.B. If we think what Bielema has been going through this year is tough, imagine what it's been like for Bobby Bowden. He's presided over the slow decline of his program while enduring constant talk that he's too old, the game has passed him by. Sort of like Joe Paterno up in our conference.

My take on it is that Bowden really isn't that far off from having his program great again. He still hasn't recovered from Mark Richt leaving for Georgia (or too an extent from Chuck D'Amato leaving for North Carolina State), and putting his boy in charge of the offense didn't go that well. The other part of the downfall, off-field troubles, probably come from taking chances on kids of questionable character in an attempt to keep up with Florida and Miami. Or a run of bad luck. Iron those two things out and Florida State is not far from being golden again.

Hopefully it doesn't start with a win over Wisconsin.

Wisconsin-Tennessee halftime thoughts

All in all, pretty happy to be down only seven at halftime. We really haven't done anything to slow down their offense, and we've been inconsistent with the ball. If Donovan can survive one more half we have a shot at this thing.

-Really going to miss Mehlhaff's kickoffs, that's been a real positive for this team for four years.

-Could you get a worse person to announce your starting lineup than Heath Shuler? Yes - Matt Kenseth. Would have been nice if someone had gone over Ike's name with him beforehand.

-O'Brien Schofield did in fact start at defensive end, but hasn't done much. Will be interesting to see if he or Kirk DeCremer starts there next year.

-In the second half, watch how far Erik Ainge sets up in the shotgun, might be a reason he doesn't get sacked often.

-On that note: we're not getting any pressure on Ainge, so why not drop eight guys and make them beat you six yards passing at a time?

-Jae McFadden and Josh Nettles both should have had picks very early; had they, it would have dramatically changed the complexion of the game.

-Interesting end-around call to Lance Smith, that usually goes to a receiver. Reminded me of watching Dan Pallante's Wing-T at Fremont Ross.

-Did you see the two men in motion penalty that wiped out Brown's touchdown run? I didn't.

-Nice first half for Garrett Graham - four catches, 37 yards, and a nice box-out block on Donovan's touchdown run.

-What a stupid call by the Vols to run that trick play. They were moving the ball at will without trickery. Interesting concept for a trick play, though.

-Donovan has to go down as one of the toughest players in Badgers history, we'll miss that. He's taken a lot of vicious hits; not sure if they're dirty or not - they seem so at first, but replays make them just look like hard hits - but Bielema's lobbying that they were resulted in a nice 15-yard penalty in our favor on the last touchdown drive. Really don't want to see Evridge taking snaps until the spring game.

-P.J. Hill is clearly our best running back today. He's running quicker and getting a better lean than Zach Brown.

-Great drive to end the first half, really needed that to have a chance. Beautiful play call by Chryst on Crooks' first catch of the year.

-During a commercial I flipped on the Cotton Bowl and heard an overmatched announcer wading through the Arkansas starting defense. Pat Summerall is back! Why?!

Should be a good second half between two evenly matched teams. It's going to come down to halftime adjustments, specifically Can we stop their passing game?

Outback Bowl one-minute preview

Every year I'm struck by how the Badgers' bowl game just kind of sneaks up on us. We usually learn the destination and opponent a month before it happens, then news and previews leak out, then Christmas, then boom! - game's here and it feels like I haven't given it much thought.

So the big game against Tennessee comes at 10 a.m. CST Tuesday, and here's my one-minute Outback Bowl preview.

-Tennessee is missing six players because of academics, including their leading receiver and starting defensive tackle and linebacker.
-Quarterback Erik Ainge, who was sacked only three times this year, is very good. He played most of the year with a shoulder injury.
-Running back Arian Foster had a big fumble in last year's Outback Bowl against Penn State, but he's used it to motivate him.
-The only new Badger injury since the Minnesota game is to cornerback Aaron Henry. Ben Strickland and Josh Nettles will replace him. This could be a big problem against a good passing team.
-Elijah Hodge is as healthy as he's been all season.
-P.J. Hill is expected to play, and so is Lance Smith, but Zach Brown will start at running back.
-Travis Beckum has decided to bypass the NFL draft and return for his senior season, but Jack Ikegwuonu is undecided and needs to decide in the next two weeks.

That's it, check back for my thoughts during and after the game. Go Badgers!

Oh, and this: Wisconsin 33, Tennessee 27