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Wisconsin football won’t play at Wrigley

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Due to the uncertainty of the coronavirus pandemic, the Wisconsin Badger football team will face the Northwestern Wildcats on November 7 at Ryan Field on the Northwestern campus in Evanston, not the originally scheduled location of Wrigley Field.

Northwestern’s vice president of athletics and recreation, Jim Phillips said, “The uncertainty of football and baseball schedules, and the possibility of limited attendance, made this an easy choice to make for our student athletes and fans.”

Latest Badger COVID Numbers

The University of Wisconsin reported Wednesday that seven athletes have tested positive for COVID-19.

The school originally tested 117 student-athletes with two testing positive.  Roughly a month later, the school conducted 428 tests with seven testing positive.

The University has isolated those who test positive and the athletic department’s infection response team is monitoring their recoveries.

Three Badgers make Big Ten’s All-Decade Team

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Chris Borland (Photo by David Stluka)

The Wisconsin football teams of the last decade won a total of 102 games, second only to Ohio State’s 117 victories.  The Badgers had three players named to the Big Ten All-Decade Team.

The Detroit Free Press surveyed six conference writers from the USA Today Sports Network to select the Big Ten’s All-Decade team.

There were a total of 10 teams represented on the all-decade squad.  Ohio State had the most with six.  Michigan had five, Michigan State had four, Penn State, Wisconsin and Iowa all had three.  Maryland had two and Minnesota, Indiana and Purdue each had one player make the squad.

Leading the way for the Badgers is running back Jonathan Taylor, who played from 2017-19.  Taylor won the Doak Walker Award twice, is a two time All-American, a three-time first-team All-Big Ten selection [Read more…]

Wisconsin secures commitment from Florida DB

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The Wisconsin Badgers landed another commitment for their class of 2021.  Cornerback Ricardo Hallman of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, verbally committed to the program on Monday.

Hallman was ranked a four-star recruit by Rivals.com and a three-star recruit by 247Sports.com.  He has offers from Michigan, Baylor, Miami (Florida) and Mississippi among others.

Hallman becomes the 15th player in the 2021 Wisconsin class to commit and the first cornerback.

Rettke named Big Ten Female Athlete of the Year

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Dana Rettke

For the first time in 20 years, Wisconsin Badgers athlete was named Big Ten athlete of the year when the conference awarded Rettke the female athlete honor on Thursday.  The 6’8 middle blocker is the first UW female athlete to win the award since 1997 and the first UW athlete overall since Ron Dayne was recognized in 2000.

Rettke, who has another year of eligibility left at Wisconsin, led the Badgers to the NCAA championship match and the Big Ten title last fall.

Wisconsin’s last recipient of the Jesse Owens Male Athlete of the Year was Ron Dayne (football) in 2000, while the Badgers’ last female honoree was Kathy Butler (cross country and track and field) in 1997.  In total, Badgers have won the honor seven times overall (once for men, six for women) with five individuals claiming the honor.

Additionally, Rettke is the first Big Ten volleyball student-athlete to win this honor since 2010 and only the fifth all-time.

Rettke competed with the U.S. National Team during the summer of 2019, winning the Volleyball Nations League and qualifying for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.  She was a finalist for both the 2020 AAU James E. Sullivan Award and a 2019 Honda Award.

Ohio State’s Chase  Young was honored as the Big Ten Jesse Owens Male Athlete of the Year.  Young is the fourth Ohio State student in the past six years to capture the honor.

Wisconsin football lands another top defensive recruit

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Paul Chryst

Paul Chryst’s Wisconsin football team has landed another top defensive recruit on Thursday.

T.J. Bollers, a four-star defensive end and the No. 147 overall player in the Class of 2021, committed to the Badgers over Nebraska, Iowa State and Alabama.

Bollers is from Clear Creek Amana High School in Tiffin, Iowa.  He is the eighth-ranked weak-side defensive end in the country and the second-ranked player in the state of Iowa.

Bollers is the 14th commitment and the second-highest ranked player in Wisconsin’s 2021 recruiting class.  The Badgers currently rank 16th nationally and sixth in the Big Ten in 247Sports team recruiting rankings.

Gross joins Wisconsin wrestling staff

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Seth Gross –
Photo by Tom Lynn/Wisconsin Athletic Communications

Wisconsin head wrestling coach Chris Bono announced Thursday that former Badger wrestler and NCAA champion Seth Gross will be joining his coaching staff for the upcoming 2020-21 season.

Gross will begin his coaching career with the Badgers while also training for the 2021 Olympic games.

Gross is very familiar with Bono and associate head coach Jon Reader.  The duo recruited him to South Dakota State as a transfer in 2015.  As a redshirt freshman, Gross went 27-13 and competed at the NCAA championship for the Jackrabbits.  Moving onto his sophomore year, Gross was never ranked below seventh in the country at 133 pounds and earned a second-place finish at the 2017 NCAA Championships.

In his junior season at South Dakota State, Gross was the top-ranked wrestler in his weight class for the entire season.  He took his 29-1 record to the NCAA championship and claimed the 133-pound title over [Read more…]

Rettke, Taylor named Wisconsin’s Athletes of the Year

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Dana Rettke

Junior middle blocker Dana Rettke of the volleyball team and junior running back Jonathan Taylor of the football team were both named University of Wisconsin Athletes of the Year.

The pair also serve as Wisconsin’s nominees for the Big Ten Conference Athlete of the Year honors, which will be awarded on Thursday.

The Big Ten has recognized a Jesse Owens Male Athlete of the Year since 1982 and first honored a Female Athlete of the Year in 1983.  The Big Ten Athletes of the Year are selected by a panel of conference media members, with one male and one female student-athlete nominated from each Big Ten institution to be considered for the honor.

One of the country’s best middle blockers, Rettke helped lead the Badgers to the 2019 NCAA National Championship match and earned her third-consecutive selection as a first-team All-American (2017, 2018, 2019).  The 2019 Big Ten Player of the Year, Rettke was also selected to both the 2019 NCAA Championship All-Tournament team and 2019 NCAA Regional All-Tournament team.

Jonathan Taylor

Rettke competed with the U.S. National Team during the summer of 2019, winning the Volleyball Nations League and qualifying for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.  She was a finalist for both the 2020 AAU James E. Sullivan Award and a 2019 Honda Award.

Taylor cemented his place as one of the great running backs in college football history during the 2019 season.

He finished his career with 6,174 yards, finishing number-six all-time in rushing among FBS players and is the only player to ever eclipse the 6,000-yard mark in just three seasons.  His career total ranks No. 2 all-time among Big Ten players, trailing only Badgers great Ron Dayne (7,125).

Taylor repeated as winner of the Doak Walker Award as the nation’s premier running back in 2019, while also earning unanimous first-team All-America honors for the second straight season.

Taylor was picked in the second round of the 2020 NFL Draft by the Indianapolis Colts.

 

Wisconsin’s Roque named Women’s Player of the Year

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Abby Roque

Wisconsin women’s hockey senior Abby Roque joined hockey royalty on Wednesday afternoon as the forward became the fifth Badger to be named the Bob Allen Women’s Player of the Year, given to the top American-born women’s player by USA Hockey.

Roque joins fellow Badgers Brianna Decker (2015 & 2017), Hilary Knight (2014), Meghan Duggan (2011) and Jessie Vetter (2009) as past winners of the award.  The Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, native is the second collegian in the past three years to receive the award, joining UMD’s Maddie Rooney, who received the award in 2018.

The 2020 WCHA Player of the Year, Roque scored a career-high 26 goals to go along with a career-best 58 points.  Her 32 assists this year tied her season-best mark set last year and her goal, assist and point totals all ranked in the top 10 in the country and in the top five in the WCHA.

The senior center led Wisconsin to its eighth WCHA regular-season title and to the No. 2 seed in the [Read more…]

Badgers secure commitment from standout pass rusher

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The Wisconsin Badger football team locked up one of their top defensive targets in their 2021 recruiting class, receiving a verbal commitment from Akron outside linebacker/defensive end Darryl Peterson.

This is a big get for Badgers coach Paul Chryst.  Peterson chose Wisconsin over Alabama, Michigan, Penn State and Minnesota among others.

Peterson recorded a school-record 21 sacks as a high school junior.  He gives the Badgers 12 known commitments for the 2021 class.

Shelton released by Cardinals

Former Badger defensive back Sojourn Shelton was waived by the Arizona Cardinals on Monday.

The 25-year-old Shelton originally signed with the Cardinals as an undrafted free agent out of Wisconsin in 2017.  He also spent time with the Bengals and Eagles before returning to Arizona.

During his college career at UW, Shelton recorded 129 tackles, nine interceptions, tow forced fumbles and a fumble recovery in 53 games.

 

Former Badger hockey star, Rob Andringa passes away

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Rob Andringa – Photo UW Sports

Madison native and former Wisconsin Badger hockey standout Rob Andringa passed away on Friday after a long battle with stage 4 colon cancer.  He was 51.

Andringa played in a program-record 179 games from 1987-’91.  He finished seventh on the all-time list for assists by a Badger defenseman with 88.  Andringa was 10th  all-time in points for a UW defenseman with 103.

Andringa helped UW win the 1990 NCAA title under Jeff Sauer and later served as an analyst on both radio and television broadcasts for Wisconsin men’s hockey.  He partnered with Brian Posick on WIBA Radio in Madison to call the three overtime win (1-0) over Cornell in the 2006 NCAA Regional in Green [Read more…]