2020 Wisconsin football predictions on the HG

May 28

May 28 2020 Wisconsin football predictions on the HG

By Jake Wimberly

What’s to like:

Since 2005, Wisconsin has had 10, double digit winning seasons, and head football coach Paul Chryst has placed double digit wins in four of his first five seasons as the Badgers head man.

Wisconsin annually puts players in the National Football League, by all accounts, has a great football culture and they are now mentioned almost annually as Big 10 contenders for the championship and as a College Football Playoff contender.

The Badgers return Jack Coan at quarterback in 2020 and he will look to improve on his 18-touchdown year in 2019. The Badgers will have to find a replacement for All American running back Jonathan Taylor, but they do return several top pass catchers from a year ago.

Wisconsin returns nine of their top 11 tacklers on defense and will again look to compete for the BIG 10 in 2020.

What’s not to like:

Having to find a replacement for Jonathan Taylor, for one. You just don’t replace a Jonathan Taylor, so the Badgers will have to figure out how to get mass production in that backfield.

Speaking of talent, the Badgers have improved their roster talent slightly over the last three years, but they still lack the overall talent to really get by an Ohio State or make the College Football Playoff.

Scheduling is tricky this year for Wisconsin, as they play a four-game stretch early that includes Appalachian State, at Michigan, Notre Dame and Minnesota. The Badgers also have late season trips to Northwestern and Iowa; making their schedule the 53rd hardest schedule in the country.

That doesn’t sound to terribly tough, but keep in mind, in the early four game stretch they will be the lesser talented team in two match ups and even in another.

What does the Hourglass Say?

2020 Wisconsin pick: Badgers 9-3 overall, 7-2 in the BIG 10, finishing second in the BIG 10 West

2019 HG analytics pick: 10-2; Actual Record 10-2 (100 percent)

2018 Analytics Pick 9-3; Actual Record 8-4 (96 percent accuracy)

2017 Analytics Pick 10-2; Actual Record 12-0 (92 percent accuracy)

Three-year analytic percentage on Wisconsin = 92 percent

2020 Wisconsin Analytics –

Hour Glass National Recruiting Ranking (three-year metric): 31st – Outside our Realistic College Football Playoff Bust Line on our talent index. Wisconsin does not have a roster that can realistically make the Playoff.

National Coaching Rank for Paul Chryst on HG Scale: 7th (Paul Chryst 2020 coaching value set at 19) – Average coaching value for 2020 set at 6.5. – This puts Chryst well above the average coaching category.

Returning Wisconsin quarterback play rated 16th the country in our Power Five quarterback Rankings. Average quarterback metric for 2020 set at 11.66.

Wisconsin quarterback metric value is 16.7 – putting them at the above average quarterback value for 2020.

ODE Analytics – NOTE: ODE is our offensive and defensive scoring efficiency ranking for each team. We use a two-year evaluation of each program.

Wisconsin ranks 14th in the country in our 2020 ODE evaluation. Offensively they have a ranking of 19th in the country and defensively 22nd in the country.

FINAL THOUGHTS:

This should be again another good year for the Badgers. There are some hurdles in the schedule and if they can overcome a few of those, this team could again punch their ticket to the BIG 10 Championship game.

This program is rock solid, and just needs to continue to recruit above their pay grade and they will get to where they need to be. Unfortunately, that will not be this year.

Projected Hour Glass W/L record: Games in red denote games that could be a one possession game or even a different outcome than projection.