Are The Badgers Ready For Indiana? » Brats & Beer

September 28, 2006
posted under: Badgers football

Okay Wisconsin, time to pick yourselves up, dust yourselves off, and get back at it. The loss to Michigan was disappointing, yes, but there is still a lot of season to be played. Indiana is next up on the Big 10 schedule and UW needs a road win to get back to .500 in conference play.

The Hoosiers are 2-2 in non-conference play, having beaten Western Michigan and Ball State before falling to the Southern Illinois Salukis and UConn. In the conference rankings, the Hoosiers are right ahead of the Badgers in offensive scoring and rank fourth in the Big 10 with 908 passing yards. On defense, though, Indiana has allowed 23 points per game (8th) and 322.3 yards per game (8th).

Clearly Indiana isn’t much of a threat to run the ball: Their top rusher is quarterback Kellen Lewis, with 34 yards per game. Running back Demetrius McCray has averaged 25 yards a game with 21 carries so far this year. Lewis and Blake Powers have been sharing duties under center, and there hasn’t been a decision yet which player will get the starting job.

Yesterday’s Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel was bemoaning the fact that the Wisconsin defense has been carrying most of the load so far this season, but I think that’ll change this weekend. Indiana has given up 153 yards a game rushing, so PJ Hill should be able to get some good yardage and pick up some first downs for the Badgers. This should be a pretty lopsided game in favor of UW.