| It's tough to say how Wisconsin comes out. It's clear the locker room was not united behind the decision to fire their coach. But this may have been the right time to do it, if that was going to happen anyway. From a schematic point, doing it going into a bye week is probably ideal. But from a roster management point, going two weeks without a game is likely not ideal. Going on the road, spending the night together in a hotel, but going into a non hostile environment, may help them move beyond. For this struggling defense, the Northwestern offense is exactly what they need. The Badgers are dead last in ppg in conference games, and #13 in run defense and pass efficiency defense. But Northwestern's offense is absolutely dreadful. They essentially had a good quarter against a horrible Nebraska defense, and that's it. But how has Northwestern won 4 of the last 8 against an always better Wisconsin team? The Wildcats are +13 in turnover margin in those 8 games. And ball security is not exactly the strength of this version of Bucky, with 3 turnovers each in their losses to Washington State and Illinois. To make it 5 of 9, those patterns are going to have to repeat. This Wildcat offense is so aggressively bad that it I'm not even sure that's enough. Penn State turned the ball over 5 times last week, and Northwestern turned those 5 turnovers into exactly zero points. Wisconsin is going to need to get some run game going to alleviate some of the pressure on Graham Mertz, who just is who he is at this point. Penn State's improved run game last week forced it, running the ball 58 times, but for just 3.8 ypc, and just one run longer than ten yards (19). This won't be fun to watch, but even against a struggling Wisconsin defense, I just don't see how Northwestern generates anything offensively. |