Wisconsin 68, Bowling Green 17
Wisconsin Head Coach Gary Andersen ANDERSEN:
Obviously it's great to win. It's always great to win. And proud of
this team. It was some good team effort. We still have a lot we can
work on. But we'll work on those starting tomorrow.
We're going to enjoy this victory right now. And there were some great
individual efforts. Those are great to see, the unselfishness of Melvin
Gordon for the last couple three weeks as we've gone through the first
part of the season has been incredible. I'm so proud of the way that
he's handled it. Today was his day. Great to see him have the success. Derek
Landisch on defense had a fantastic day. And overall we started to do
some things that are really good signs of a good football program. We
face adversity. Get a turnover. Defense holds three and out, we turn
around, go down and score and special teams gets the big return to help
that score. That's team football. That's what you need to
do to have a chance to do special things. So it was great to see that.
I'm excited to break down the plan to win to see exactly how we did.
And I think we did pretty well overall. It was a great
victory. A lot of numbers out there in this football game. And all the
credit goes to those kids. Proud of the way they handled it. The
defense handled the pace very well. We had to disrupt the quarterback's
timing and receiver's timing. Did that for the most part. It's
a team victory. And it's great to see Kenzel Doe, is another, another
kid unselfish. He got a chance today to do special things and he truly
did. I don't know how many games since he's been with us, it's the best
game he's had. So proud of him. He always reminds me of the one (punt return) against Utah State every time he gets a good return. Quick to point that out. QUESTION:
We've seen in the past running backs when they put the ball on the
ground they get benched. Was there ever a thought of making Melvin sit
at all, or is he too good at this point? ANDERSEN:
Absolutely not. Zero thoughts into that. I echoed it very quickly
through the headsets. It came right back into my ear that there was
absolutely zero plan to do anything like that. It was a normal rotation. The
kid did a nice job of stripping the ball. I thought the offensive
coaches handled it very well. Melvin handled it very well. And he was
right back up when his time came. Melvin deserves that.
Nobody's perfect. It's going to happen at certain times. And we reacted
and overcame it very quickly. And he did what he did. QUESTION:
You guys ended up running them into the ground basically. But do you
think Andy (Ludwig)'s play calling early in the game, the diversity he
showed, kind of opened some things up that way? COACH
ANDERSEN: Absolutely. You get the ability to hit the read zone early on
for some big plays. Our zone blocking was very good today with the
offensive line. Those kids had an attitude. And sometimes
they don't get talked about. But I was really proud of the offensive
line, their physicalness, the way they finished. Tight ends got better. I
thought the play calling was diverse. It was broken up very, very well.
The run, pass, the play action, there was a lot of offense to defend
out there. It was great to see. I thought Andy (Ludwig) and his staff
did a tremendous job. QUESTION: After three games, Tanner
appears to have a slow start element to his game. Is it something you
just accept, or at what point, is there something to correct there? Is
there an issue that you see? ANDERSEN: I would say more
than anything, I don't really have that feel. So I don't quite know how
to answer that. I would say he's not perfect on some of the throws
where he's at. He's done some things with his legs early.
So I think overall as an offense we'll look at that. We're not going to
point the fingers at any individual. If we're starting slow in one
section of the game, then we all need to look at each other and say we
need to get better as a unit in that area. QUESTION: You
mentioned Landisch. What specifically jumped out that you saw him
today, whether it was blitzing, tackling? Also it looked like he got
his hands on the pick that (Lubern) Figaro had which kind of turned
things. COACH ANDERSEN: It was pass rushing. One thing
that jumps up at me, his ability to get inside on those guards and the
center a lot of times on the turn protection and get past across and
have a lot of pressure. I know he had one sack but I know he had
numerous pressures. He was highly involved, very
complicated game plan for those inside linebackers. A lot of
misdirections, a lot of blitzes coming from different sides and a lot
of calls that came with those. And then he to command the defense … we
all look over and try to get the call, but you got those freshmen
defensive linemen sitting out there. They know the calls when they're
sitting in the meeting this morning. But when it gets hot out there and
we're rolling, Derek does a nice job commanding the defense and making
sure we're moving ourselves in the right direction. And that was very
obvious today. QUESTION: Gary, you talked about the O‑line being determined. Think Melvin was determined today? ANDERSEN:
Yeah, Melvin ‑‑ and I truly believe this, Melvin's been determined
every game. I've never seen him practice different. You throw in a
practice tape, watch the guy finish, the way he works through pass
protection drills, to stretch, whatever he does, he's done that. I've
not seen anything different from week‑to‑week with him. But
absolutely, was Melvin determined to be a great back and do what he
expects out of himself? I thought he was a great back way before today.
I know we all believe that or we should believe that. But this was his
opportunity to break out and he made a lot of people miss today against
a defense that I thought tackled very well throughout their first
games. And it was just, it was fun to watch for a lot of times. Melvin
is determined for his football team. I promise you that's the driving
force between Melvin wanting to have the success. He didn't ask how
many yards he has rushing. He found out that the rushing
totals were a record in total offense's record. Brought a great big
smile to his face to know he was a part of it, not just what he did. QUESTION:
When this game was close early, you have the two turnovers and two big
plays you gave up, but at that time what was more troubling to you,
giving the ball away to them or letting a couple plays get behind you? ANDERSEN:
All of it was. And that's something that we have got ‑‑ we've got
to grow and learn from that. We discussed it at halftime. And in pretty
good detail. And that is not ‑‑ there's fumbles. There's balls
over our heads. It just wasn't clean. Regardless of the
score, that was not a clean first half and it's not the expectations
that we should have. So if we jog out and start the third
quarter and we're feeling real good about ourselves in that scenario,
then I'm completely wrong as a head football coach to let those kids
feel that way. And I don't think they did. But I wanted to
reassure them, make sure they better not, because that is not at the
end of the day acceptable if they want to reach the goals that they've
told me that they want to reach and they all know what those are. QUESTION: See any confusion on defense too at times, first half especially, just knowing where guys needed to be lined up? ANDERSEN:
No, I thought it was really pretty clean for a pace team, I thought it
was good. I believe we took one timeout when we needed it to try to
settle them down. But overall there was … I thought the officials
handled it pretty well. It's never going to be perfect
with a team that plays that fast. It's very difficult. Especially when
you're playing man and then zone. And not to get too
technical with you again, but this (Bowling Green) is a good football
team. They're well coached. You saw the transition go to all of a
sudden the stack routes and different combinations to beat man
coverage. We were trying to get matched up. Got Michael Trotter, they
bring in No. 3 receiver on the inside where they don't put him a lot of
times, and all of a sudden Michael's covered him man to man. Caused
some issues very quickly, because they're good coaches. If
that looked confusing at times, I'm sure ‑‑ we're not sitting here
saying we're perfect by any stretch of the imagination ‑‑ but I
thought they handled the adjustments when the game shifted to man
beater routes pretty well as a defense. That was positive. May not seem
like a big thing to a lot of people that don't get technical about
football, but that's a sign of maturity. QUESTION: You
mentioned the single game record, 644 yards rushing. Is that perhaps
the most impressive rushing performance you've ever been a part of? And
also what about Dare (Ogunbawale)'s performance, knowing he was a
D‑back a couple of weeks ago? ANDERSEN: It was an awesome
performance. I've never been around a rushing total like that, that's
for sure. There's been some great teams that are part of the tradition
here at Wisconsin to be part of something in the record books for those
kids, and for every offensive lineman, everybody that played on
offense, it's something they should remember for the rest of their life. As
far as Dare, again, an unselfish young man that's playing safety,
playing on special teams, involved in some of the nickel packages,
playing some corner, some safety. And all of a sudden we ask him to
move to a running back spot, which is really a place that he's never
played much. He looked at me like I had 12 heads when I mentioned it to
him. But he didn't bat an eye. And it's a great thing,
too. Without rambling to you for too long. We take those times during
camp to evaluate each and every kid in certain positions. And
Dare was ‑‑ basically, the offensive coaches saw him in a drill
during camp that we call speed in space. Where it's used for special
teams drill. It's used to evaluate our talent. And Dare was very hard
to tackle in those situations. And the offensive coaches came to me and
said: What do you think? I was all for it. And the young man was all
for it. And it's fun to see him. How many yards, 90 something? That's
amazing. That's so cool for that kid. Really is. QUESTION:
Can you take us through as much as you can how you started the game and
certain series where you'd have basically a unit and a half defensively
on the sidelines, what you're looking for and how you determine who
goes on, who comes off and how you get lined up? ANDERSEN:
That's how we need to operate when we have those heavy packages against
a pace (offense). You want to get as many kids involved close to the
numbers as you possibly can. It just takes off another 15 yards that
they have to run on and off the field. So much like a huddle of
offense, where they huddle everybody on the sides when they can, we
can't see them when they come on the field. They have 50
kids in the huddle and 11 of them come out of there and we've got to
identify it up top very quickly with numbers. We've got to be able to
understand what personnel it is. There's a quick number thrown out at
us whether it's 10, 12, 22, and not us at the defensive staff, and they
have to quickly get a group of kids out there on the field. And that was good to see. Again, that's maturity in understanding the packages and being in the game for a defensive crew. QUESTION:
Where did Tanner (McEvoy), where has he made his greatest strides from
the opener from last week to this one, and how would you assess his
play? ANDERSEN: I thought Tanner was effective. He'll have
a couple of throws he'd love to be able to get back. Command of the
offense. A lot of checks throughout there in the run game, his ability
to be able to check the run and be consistent with the run, be patient.
There's a couple of those runs, a couple of those times when he's
rolling out of there, you want to tell him to run. And I
think his clock is … three weeks ago would have told him to run. And
he's trying to make some passes in those situations. He made a few of
them. Had a drop on one of them. Had a couple he'd love to be able to
get back. His whole game is continually growing. And I
like the way he carries himself and prepares for the week. I like the
way he carries himself when things don't go so well, and when things go
very well he seems to be maturing in that area and handling things well
to this point. But like everybody, we all got a long ways to go. QUESTION:
You had Rafael (Gaglianone) kick a couple of field goals late, was that
to give him some work for the extra missed point? ANDERSEN:
Like many freshmen, there's nothing like those game reps. And I don't
think we've kicked the ball real cleanly. And we missed an extra point.
And we need to get him in the moment and make sure we're putting him in
the right spots in practice. That's something that I need
to sit back and think about and I'm doing everything I can for Rafael
to put him in the right spots, right situations, and Coach (Jeff) Genyk
and I will continually work on that. But it wasn't as
clean as we would like to have it be. The field goals were good. Missed
extra point, when it appeared it was a good snap, good hold, is not
what we want to have happen. So we're going to continue to aggressively
help him get better. QUESTION: Could you see Dare getting more meaningful carries in the games as he progresses as a running back? ANDERSEN:
We'll see. He's not going to take out Melvin or Corey (Clement) at this
point for sure, but the ability for him to get into a game, have ball
security, handle the offense with a very, very young offensive line in
there and have the production that he had, it cannot go unnoticed. So
I think after one game in this situation you would think he's found a
little bit of a home. He's a sophomore by age. And so we'll see how he
continues to grow. We all know we're down to numbers there. So being
creative with kids is important. QUESTION: Your defense
the last couple of years making a transition installing quicker guys
that can play and move across the field, was today kind of a perfect
example of where having quick guys against a fast offense can pay
dividends? ANDERSEN: Yeah, there was a lot of times when
we had four corners on the field and … Michael Caputo played a lot of
man coverage today. And Michael can really run. The
ability for us to get into those sub packages with the pass rushers,
with the faster linebackers ‑‑ Michael played some linebacker
today. You saw Moose (Leo Musso) and you saw those kids coming off the
edge. P.J. (Peniel Jean) played a lot today. And so we
really wanted to get our speed out there and handle it. But it's going
to ‑‑ the transition is continuing to grow. I was really happy
with the way Dave (Aranda) mixed the calls and we were able to handle
it. And again, when you look at us in our development with
our kids being able to handle large call sheet, which was a fairly
large call sheet today and their ability to be able to communicate is
one thing. But the comfort zone for a coordinator, trust me I've been
there, when you have a call sheet, that call sheet doesn't look so good
because you get confused, you can't get lined up. I think
Dave felt comfortable today. And the belief was there that he could
make a call to those kids and they were going to be able to execute it
like they did in practice. That was good to see. QUESTION:
Not too get too far ahead on Dare. If he does build off this and you're
comfortable with him as a No. 3, does that make your decision easier on
to Taiwan (Deal) to redshirt him because of the injury? ANDERSEN:
Absolutely. No question. Dare has so much game experience whether on
special teams or playing in games that you just cannot put a level of
importance on the ability to be in the moment and be in the Big Ten. You
look at Andrew (Endicott) today, the way he kicked the ball off. He
kicked the ball off a lot. He had one he'd like to get back. But boy he
was very good and very comfortable. And there's a mature that takes
place when you've been in those moments. QUESTION: In the
first half you had some sets where you had Clement and Gordon in at the
same time, is that something you want to utilize more going forward,
and then how do you make sure that that doesn't give too much weight to
the defense that hey we're going to run the ball here? COACH
ANDERSEN: I don't think it will give anything away as far as running
the ball. I think it will put a (defense) on quite a bit of high alert,
as they've got double issues staring them right in the face now. But
we're in a position to be able to throw the ball out of there as we
need to, that will always be part of our package. We will not major in
that package, but it will always be carried.
TEAM NOTES Wisconsin’s
captains today were senior Michael Trotter and juniors Sam Arneson,
Michael Caputo and Alex Erickson. They were joined by honorary captain
Cecil Martin. Wisconsin’s 68 points is the sixth-highest mark in
school history, the most since scoring 70 against Nebraska in the 2012
Big Ten Championship game. Today was the ninth time in school history UW has scored at least 60 points in a game and the sixth time in the last five years. Wisconsin
ran for a school record 644 yards, breaking the old school mark of 564
set at Indiana on Nov. 10, 2012. That is the most rushing yards in
modern-era Big Ten history, breaking the mark of 573 (Michigan State at
Purdue on Oct. 30, 1971 and Michigan vs. Northwestern on Oct. 18,
1975). Today was the sixth time in school history Wisconsin has rushed
for at least 500 yards. UW also set a school record for total
offense, gaining 756 yards. The old mark was 705 yards vs. Indiana on
Oct. 16, 1999. UW’s 756 yards is the second-highest total in Big Ten
modern-era history, trailing only the 763 yards gained by Purdue
against Indiana on Nov. 20, 2004. The Badgers had three 100-yard rushers for the sixth time in school history and the fifth time in the last 18 games. Wisconsin tied the school record by running for eight touchdowns today (Dec. 1, 2012 vs. Nebraska). UW has forced five turnovers on the season and scored four touchdowns off of those turnovers. UW’s 41 points in the first half were the most in a half since scoring 49 vs. Northwestern on Nov. 27, 2010. Wisconsin has worn red helmets five times over the past two seasons. UW has won all five games by a combined score of 227-62. The
Badgers extended their home winning streak against non-conference
opponents to 31 games, the second-longest streak in the nation. The
Badgers’ 26 rushing first downs is the second-most in school history,
as UW had 32 first downs on the ground against Northwestern on Nov. 16,
1974. Wisconsin’s defense forced Bowling Green into a three-and-out
series on nine of 17 possessions. The Falcons only had a total of five
three-and-outs in their previous three games this season combined. INDIVIDUAL NOTES Junior
RB Melvin Gordon tied the school record and became the sixth Badger to
score five touchdowns in a game, joining Billy Marek, Anthony Davis,
Lee Evans, Brian Calhoun (did it twice) and P.J. Hill. The last player
to score five TDs in a game was Hill, who did so on Sept. 15, 2007 in a
45-31 win over The Citadel. Gordon’s previous personal best was three
TDs twice last season (Sept. 21, 2013 vs. Purdue and Oct. 19, 2013 at
Illinois). Gordon went over the 100-yard rushing mark
with 11:18 left in the second quarter and had 179 rushing
yards at halftime. He finished with 13 carries for a career-high 253
yards. His average of 19.5 yards per carry smashed the UW record for
average per carry in a game with at least 10 attempts (14.9 by Ken
Starch on Sept. 28, 1974 vs Colorado). Gordon’s 253 rushing yards
today are the most by a running back vs. an FBS team this season
(Duke’s Shawn Wilson had 245 yards vs. Kansas on Sept. 13). Gordon
is now tied for the NCAA career lead in yards per carry, averaging 8.26
yards per carry. That ties Army’s Glenn Davis, who averaged 8.26 yards
per carry from 1943-46. It was Gordon’s second career 200-yard
rushing game, the 11th time in his career that he has rushed for at
least 140 yards and his 12th 100-yard rushing game. Gordon had a
40-yard run late in the first quarter, a 50-yard TD run in the second
quarter and a 69-yard touchdown run in the third quarter. He now has 14
rushes of 40 or more yards in his career. Junior QB Tanner McEvoy
rushed for a career-high 158 yards, the most by a quarterback in school
history, eclipsing the mark of 134 yards set by Shawn Wilson vs. Cal in
1989. The last Badgers’ QB to run for at least 100 yards was Brooks
Bollinger on Nov. 23, 2002 against Minnesota (112 yards). Sophomore RB Corey Clement rushed for 111 yards on 16 carries, his fourth career 100-yard rushing performance. Sophomore
RB/CB Dare Ogunbowale rushed for 94 yards on 13 carries in his running
back debut for Wisconsin. Ogunbowale has played in 10 games prior to
today, all at cornerback. Senior WR Kenzel Doe’s 38- and 40-yard
punt returns were the Badgers’ longest punt returns since Doe’s 82-yard
return for a touchdown vs. Utah State Sept. 15, 2012. Both punt returns
set up UW touchdowns. Doe finished with 165 return yards (punt and
kickoff). Senior TE Sam Arneson caught a 34-yard touchdown pass
early in the second quarter, his first TD grab of the season and fifth
of his career. Freshman S Lubern Figaro recorded his first career
interception, thwarting a second quarter Bowling Green scoring drive
with a pick in the end zone that he returned 43 yards. Sophomore LB
Vince Biegel forced his first career fumble, stripping Bowling Green QB
James Knapke in the second quarter. Freshman DE Alec James recorded his
first career fumble recovery on the play. Senior LB Josh Harrison recorded his first career sack in the fourth quarter. Senior LB Derek Landisch enjoyed a career high two sacks and 3.5 tackles for loss.
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