Big Ten Football: Conference Award Roundup

Big Ten Defense

So over on defense, this is what we noted in the opening slide.  The Badgers are a team unit and so it’s hard to award individual honors.

For example, Wisconsin DL Alec James earned 2nd Team All Big Ten honors from the coaches and the media.  Meanwhile, Conor Sheehy got 2nd Team honors from the coaches and 3rd Team from the media.

No real arguments here.  James has clearly been the best player on the Wisconsin DL. Sheehy has certainly made significant contributions as well.  But James is the most dangerous down lineman.

At LB, senior TJ Edwards is on both the coaches and media 1st Team.  But Garrett Dooley was 2nd Team from the coaches and 3rd Team from the media.

If you run down the defensive numbers you won’t see any Wisconsin Badger in the top 30 in the Big Ten conference in tackles.  My complaint with the All Big Ten teams is omitting Ryan Connelly.  After all, he is the Badgers’ leading tackler with 71 total stops.

In the secondary, Nick Nelson was a 1st Team  choice for the media and the coaches.  D’Cota Dixon was 3rd Team from the media and 1st Team from the coaches.  Derrick Tindal was a 3rd Team coaches honoree.

I’m a big Nick Nelson believer so he makes sense.  But the split on Dixon and Tindal is interesting.  I think Dixon’s time missed to injury might hurt his cause.  Yet he still has 51 total tackles in 10 games good for third on the Badgers.

Next: The Ohio State Preview for the Big Ten Championship

It’s a testament to how good Wisconsin is on that side of the ball that big play machine Leon Jacobs didn’t make it on any of the top three teams.

But also significant is that the Badger defense plays fewer snaps because it gets off the field on 3rd down.  So as a result, the Badgers won’t amass as many stats.  So its own efficiency hurts its chances at individual accolade which are given based on stats.