Wisconsin fans are leery of what Luke Fickell and his coaching staff will bring this next season. The schedule is hard, and they didn't exactly prove any doubters wrong last season. As spring practices are ongoing, some important and even surprising takeaways are unfolding.
1. Jeff Grimes' offense has a higher floor than Longo's
It didn't take an immense amount of football knowledge to see how much the Badgers' offense struggled in 2024. Sure, quarterback injuries and a tough schedule didn't do much to help, but the group went through long stretches of stagnancy far too often. When it was working, Phil Longo's air raid offense was exciting. But when it wasn't, it was ugly.
There's only so much you can take away from spring practices -- most of the action is fundamental drills, one-on-ones, or walkthroughs -- but Jeff Grimes' RVO offense and its different looks should, even at its worst, outperform the bad days of the air raid.
The different motions and pre-snap movements should help Billy Edwards understand what the defense is doing before the play unfolds. In addition, a hefty diet of wide receiver runs, screens and a power run game should give some consistency to the offense, even if things aren't clicking downfield.
Nobody will know what the offense will do once Week 1 rolls around -- and they'll have plenty of work cut out for them given the team's 2025 schedule -- but there should be less volatility and hopefully more production out of the unit under Grimes.
2. There isn't a clear lead RB
Wisconsin carries four scholarship running backs. Of the four, sophomore Darrion Dupree saw the most run in 2024. He closed the season as the Badgers' No. 2 tailback behind Tawee Walker. Cade Yacamelli -- a redshirt junior -- served as a tertiary back. Yet there hasn't been an established pecking order through seven spring practices. Dupree, Yacamelli, and redshirt freshman Dilin Jones have almost evenly split work with the first and second teams -- and none have pulled away based on performance.
Jeff Grimes has had a clear lead back in his lone season at Kansas in Devin Neal, and while he had two running backs exceed 100 carries in all three years at Baylor, Grimes leaned on one tailback in 2020 at BYU. Even if he deploys a one-two punch in 2025 at Wisconsin, it's unclear who will be left out.
Jones and Dupree were each four-star talents coming out of high school, but Yacamelli is viewed as the leader of the group by Luke Fickell and averaged over eight yards per carry on 33 rushes in 2024. There hasn't been any separation between the three backs, and it wouldn't be surprising to see this positional battle trickle into fall camp.
Heck, even redshirt freshman Gideon Ituka has shown flashes on the ground, utilizing his 5-foot-9, 227-pound frame to keep balanced after contact. Ituka hasn't worked with the ones, however.
3. The defensive line should be much improved
The Badgers had just one 300-pound defensive lineman last season. That number skyrocketed to six (seven if you include 299-pound Jay'Viar Suggs) for the 2025 campaign. The size increase should help plug the gaps in the running game, a place where the 2024 roster struggled greatly.
Wisconsin allowed 165.0 rushing yards per game last year -- ranking 91st out of 133 FBS teams -- and averaged the fewest tackles for loss per game (3.5) in the nation. With bigger bodies up front, the Badgers shouldn't get pushed around in the trenches and will likely have more opportunities to make negative plays, even if there hasn't been a massive increase in talent at the position.
It's also difficult to imagine the defensive line would not improve in rushing the passer. Wisconsin had just 17 sacks last season and no player had more than three. Throughout spring camp, edge rushers like Darryl Peterson Corey Walker, Michael Garner and Tyreese Fearbry have been able to get to the quarterback occasionally.
I'm not expecting this unit to suddenly become elite, but it shouldn't be at or near the bottom of the leaderboard in negative plays and run defense.