x-overs and their unfairness to West Division teams.

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Unknownbadger

Well-Known Member
Does anyone recognize the unfairness to individual Western teams when it comes to scheduling X-over games? Iowa has a similar killer x-over schedule as Wisconsin had last year. For the west, it might always depend on who you play on in those x-over games, when, and where. Wisconsin survived by going 1-2 last year after having to run a gauntlet of back-to-back games. 4 of 6 away and going 4-2 against them. Those 6 teams went 48-29 combined throughout the season. Good luck this year.
 
Geez The...

Badgerfan comes over to cordially start a valid conversation which pertains to our schedule this year. Give him a break.

Badger, i appreciate the observation and point you make. Yes, seems like always an uphill battle for west teams. Actually, i think they hold their own against the east as a whole, record-wise.
 
I think the schedule point is kind of moot. I can make a difference, however it seems like it usually comes down to how the game between Iowa and Wisconsin falls. The winner has been the taken the west the last few years, and will likely -despite Nebraska fan's thoughts- be in the CCG in the foreseeable future.

I'm not sold on Chryst, yet. I'm unsure about BF, but as a homer, I expect him to do quite well.
 
Stick around Badger, good to have some fresh perspectives on the forum.

How do you see Wisconsin shaping up this season?
 
NCHawker said:
Stick around Badger, good to have some fresh perspectives on the forum.

How do you see Wisconsin shaping up this season?
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I'll try to be objective, but it's going to be difficult with the schedule we have.

Offensively our line will be the best we've had in a few years. We've gone from playing promising frosh to playing solid juniors. TE's/HBs will be Wisconsin quality. Not sure we'll have a Gordon or Ball type runner but we may have a couple potential 1000 yard runners (Shaw, James) behind what I suspect will be an outstanding line. Peavy is an exciting WR who came into his own last year but we'll have to wait and see IF we have a couple complimentary WR's to go with them. We think we do with Cephus and Taylor, but finding a partner with our #1 has been a problem. Hornibrook needs to stay healthy at QB or we'll be relying on a couple frosh QBs with no experience. I'm looking for Hornibrook to have a solid if not spectacular season.He hasn't really got the "Oh, Wow!' moments yet for me.

Defensively, our Dline will better than last year and I suspect a little more aggressive both against the run and pass. We return our 2 deep from a very good DL last year. Because we play a 3-4, you have to look at the LB positions as inside and outside. Inside, we may have the best 2 deep in the country returning. Outside, we've got a couple guys who may not (probably aren't) be TJ Watt or vince Biegel but are pretty darn good, Doolry in particular. CB is a bit of a question mark, only in that the Hawaii transfer, Nelson, hasn't yet to play in a Badger uniform. The other, Tindal has been solid. At Safety we have question marks as well in that one has yet to play that position but showed a lot at nickle last year. The other D'Cota-Dixon had a very nice if not outstanding season last year.

Special teams have a lot of good and a lot of question marks. Our kicking game will be solid although Lotti, our punter, wasn't always consistent. The question marks are in the return game where we were in the last 3rd of D1 ball both returning punts and kicks last year.

I don't like making predictions because anything can happen in a game played with a funny shaped ball, but I'd be confident in betting we reach double digit wins this year with the schedule we have.
 
EstronHawkKing said:
We've won the last two in Madison, but I just don't see Iowa winning there this year, However, in hoops we will.
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That would not surprise me at all. Happ's great but we need 4 others who haven't really shown that ability yet to step up and give him some help. We do have a very nice frosh class coming in so there is hope.
 
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Unknownbadger said:
I'll try to be objective, but it's going to be difficult with the schedule we have.

Offensively our line will be the best we've had in a few years. We've gone from playing promising frosh to playing solid juniors. TE's/HBs will be Wisconsin quality. Not sure we'll have a Gordon or Ball type runner but we may have a couple potential 1000 yard runners (Shaw, James) behind what I suspect will be an outstanding line. Peavy is an exciting WR who came into his own last year but we'll have to wait and see IF we have a couple complimentary WR's to go with them. We think we do with Cephus and Taylor, but finding a partner with our #1 has been a problem. Hornibrook needs to stay healthy at QB or we'll be relying on a couple frosh QBs with no experience. I'm looking for Hornibrook to have a solid if not spectacular season.He hasn't really got the "Oh, Wow!' moments yet for me.

Defensively, our Dline will better than last year and I suspect a little more aggressive both against the run and pass. We return our 2 deep from a very good DL last year. Because we play a 3-4, you have to look at the LB positions as inside and outside. Inside, we may have the best 2 deep in the country returning. Outside, we've got a couple guys who may not (probably aren't) be TJ Watt or vince Biegel but are pretty darn good, Doolry in particular. CB is a bit of a question mark, only in that the Hawaii transfer, Nelson, hasn't yet to play in a Badger uniform. The other, Tindal has been solid. At Safety we have question marks as well in that one has yet to play that position but showed a lot at nickle last year. The other D'Cota-Dixon had a very nice if not outstanding season last year.

Special teams have a lot of good and a lot of question marks. Our kicking game will be solid although Lotti, our punter, wasn't always consistent. The question marks are in the return game where we were in the last 3rd of D1 ball both returning punts and kicks last year.

I don't like making predictions because anything can happen in a game played with a funny shaped ball, but I'd be confident in betting we reach double digit wins this year with the schedule we have.
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But I know my team. I'd like to hear you all analyze Iowa's in 2017. I used to hear a lot from my co-workers and neighbors but don't have that opportunity any more since I moved back to Wisconsin.
 
Unknownbadger said:
But I know my team. I'd like to hear you all analyze Iowa's in 2017. I used to hear a lot from my co-workers and neighbors but don't have that opportunity any more since I moved back to Wisconsin.
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Kind of hard to say about Iowa this year since we will have a new starting QB, and we don't even know who that is just yet. Plus, we have a new offensive coordinator (Ferentz's son Brian takes over) so we are kind of wondering how that will turn out. The thing that really hurt Iowa last year was our horrible receivers, our best one broke his leg during practice after the ISU game, and he still is nursing it. Ferentz fired the receivers coach, so we have a new coach at that position as well. I went to the spring practice and the receivers still looked very weak. Our defense should be solid, Jewell is back at LB.
 
Its called parity scheduling. Since the BigTen went to a 9 game schedule, The following teams play every year

Neb - OSU
Wisc - Mich
IOWA - PSU
NW - MSU
MINN - MD
ILL - Rut
PUR - Indy

So Iowa plays PSU every year and 2 random teams that Iowa plays 2 times every 6 years. So if was set up equally every year, Iowa should play 1 of these 3 power teams every year

OSU, Mich, MSU

And 1 bottom feeder each year

INDY, Rut, MD

But it did not get set up that way. Instead Iowa got OSU and MSU in the same year. But the good news is that MSU will probably be down this year, so it actually worked out that this years schedule is not so bad. In fact it is not much different compared to last year when Iowa played PSU, Mich and Rut.
 
Unknownbadger said:
Does anyone recognize the unfairness to individual Western teams when it comes to scheduling X-over games? Iowa has a similar killer x-over schedule as Wisconsin had last year. For the west, it might always depend on who you play on in those x-over games, when, and where. Wisconsin survived by going 1-2 last year after having to run a gauntlet of back-to-back games. 4 of 6 away and going 4-2 against them. Those 6 teams went 48-29 combined throughout the season. Good luck this year.
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Why wouldn't we want a tough schedule?
 
Unknownbadger said:
Does anyone recognize the unfairness to individual Western teams when it comes to scheduling X-over games? Iowa has a similar killer x-over schedule as Wisconsin had last year. For the west, it might always depend on who you play on in those x-over games, when, and where. Wisconsin survived by going 1-2 last year after having to run a gauntlet of back-to-back games. 4 of 6 away and going 4-2 against them. Those 6 teams went 48-29 combined throughout the season. Good luck this year.
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It seems you'd have to be blind in one eye and can't see out of the other not to notice that there is an imbalance of power between the East and the West.

If the West was a bit stronger the "unfairness" that you proclaim wouldn't stink as much.

On a side note, I'm not much of a fan of "luck" but if you want to call preparedness meeting opportunity as "luck" then have at it.
 
HawkU said:
It seems you'd have to be blind in one eye and can't see out of the other not to notice that there is an imbalance of power between the East and the West.

If the West was a bit stronger the "unfairness" that you proclaim wouldn't stink as much.

On a side note, I'm not much of a fan of "luck" but if you want to call preparedness meeting opportunity as "luck" then have at it.
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HawkU said:
It seems you'd have to be blind in one eye and can't see out of the other not to notice that there is an imbalance of power between the East and the West.

If the West was a bit stronger the "unfairness" that you proclaim wouldn't stink as much.

On a side note, I'm not much of a fan of "luck" but if you want to call preparedness meeting opportunity as "luck" then have at it.
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if the east is so much stronger then how come the cross-division records the first 3 years of the east-west setup is virtually an even .500 each year. The only argument the east has that they are stronger is that they have won the CCG all 3 years so far. Other than that its virtually even. Even a blind person can look it up.
 
guffus said:
if the east is so much stronger then how come the cross-division records the first 3 years of the east-west setup is virtually an even .500 each year. The only argument the east has that they are stronger is that they have won the CCG all 3 years so far. Other than that its virtually even. Even a blind person can look it up.
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Probably because those teams from the West that got to play Rutgers, and Maryland almost always won. Its not the overall strength of the divisions as it is the strength of the upper half of the divisions. I wonder how Tosu, PSU, MSU, and UM did against the West (even with PSU, MSU and UM being down at times)?
 
HawkU said:
It seems you'd have to be blind in one eye and can't see out of the other not to notice that there is an imbalance of power between the East and the West.

If the West was a bit stronger the "unfairness" that you proclaim wouldn't stink as much.

On a side note, I'm not much of a fan of "luck" but if you want to call preparedness meeting opportunity as "luck" then have at it.
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That was exactly my point. There is an imbalance and those teams from the West regardless how good they are who have to x-over and play the cream of East are going to be at a disadvantage. Stink as it may.

Since you take some exception to "Good luck", how's "wishing you a good season"?
 
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