The Badgers are going to start the season ranked quite high. They were good last year and lost only a hand full of starters. Of course, they include John Stocco, Joe Thomas and Joe Stellmacher. Regardless, they should have a great team defense and three legitimate running options (don't write off PT for John Clay, above). What people are forgetting, however, is that the Badgers have a pretty consistent record relating to pre-season expectations.
[Editor's note: Corrected, thanks...]
Preseason Ranking -> Final Ranking (AP)
2006: unranked -> 7th.
2005: unranked -> 15th.
2004: 21st -> 17th.
2003: 21st -> unranked
2002: 25th -> unranked
2001: 22nd -> unranked
2000: 4th -> 23rd
1999: 10th -> 4th
1998: 20th -> 6th
1997: 24th -> unranked
1996: unranked -> unranked
1995: 20th -> unranked
1994: 10th -> unranked
1993: unranked -> 6th
Almost every season they begin unranked, they finish above expectations. Almost every season they begin with high expectations, they fail to meet them.
I have been a able to dig up a few early 2007 preseason rankings and they all put the Badgers around 5-15. Historically, that does not bode well for UW.
4 comments:
You need to recheck you stats. I know they finished in the top ten in 1999. Not unranked as you have listed. In 1999 they had the heisman trophy winner and won the Rose Bowl for the 2nd year in a row. We will never know how good they could have been in 2000 as a result of shoe gate destroying the season.
yup, badgers finished 4th in the final poll of the 1999 season.
http://www.uwbadgers.com/sport_news/fb/stat_poll/uw%20in%20the%20polls_3826.pdf
I recognize the underlying point. But, whoever runs this blog should go back and fix the error.
Hey guys, thanks for the heads up. jrj, you found a much better resource than what I was using to compile those numbers and I made an error in copying them over.
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