Jim at A Beautiful Day for Football brought up the possibility that ever since Wisconsin's punter flopped to cost the Spartans a victory in the B1G championship game the whole of Wisconsin athletics seems to have been hit by a curse. I think of it more as Karma...but anyhooo, here's something else that fits that theme. It looks like the Badgers' football program is getting hit hard next year. Not only will they be losing several key players (their record setting quarterback, Russell Wilson, and probably their All-American center, Peter Konz -- though it does appear that Montee Ball may come back), they will also be losing 4 assistant coaches. Their offensive coordinator, Paul Chryst, will be Pitt's next head coach and he is taking a couple of assistants with him: o-line coach, Bob Bostad, and linebackers coach, Dave Huxtable. Wide receivers coach DelVaughn Alexander is moving to Arizona State.
What this means is that -- unless they find themselves another Russell Wilson -- there is a high probability that Wisconsin will be considerably weaker next year. If they win 9 games, I'll declare Bielema a genius. What this also means in the long run is that I don't think Wisconsin will ever again have the combination of player and coaching talent that they had this year. Chryst and Bostad's departure will probably hurt Wisconsin's most important area of recruiting: the o-line. And they will probably also take a hit at recruiting linebackers and wide receivers. So the upshot is that Wisconsin should be down next year, and it could actually be a few years before they can seriously compete for the B1G title.
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