I’m not sure what everyone was expecting this season from a W/L standpoint.
We’ve lost most of the games we were supposed to lose—3 of the losses were to ranked opponents. 2 of those games came down to the final possession, including one on the road to what will likely be a Top 10 team by next week. Illinois was trash, and we were favored big, but we were also picked to lose to Penn State and won that one.
What I saw today is more of what I saw in every game outside of Illinois—stronger line play and young talent. Martinez played well today. We had a couple of goofball plays, but we lost to a good team, on the road, on the last possession.
The main difference I see is that our talent matches Northwestern and Iowa up front. We aren’t better yet, but we match up. I felt like our past two Iowa battles were WAY flukier than this one. We should’ve been blown out in both. This was different. We’re just about as good as Iowa and NW. We played NW a lot tougher than Wiscy did.
Frost is definitely not a polished product as a head coach, but he’s showing me he can recruit, and that’s really really important. It takes time (5 years to fill it out across a program) to get a pipeline going up front in a conference this big and physical. Just ask Indiana.
Under Allen:
5-7
5-7
8-5 (if we win out this season—and I think we will—our record might’ve been quite similar to this with a full season)
4-1 and top 15.
I’m not a Frost apologist, but I saw a pretty well coached team today with a lot of guys stepping up to make plays. Martinez was pretty darned good against a top 10 defense, and our defense was tough.
When you lose games you’re not supposed to lose, the pitchforks should come out, but when you’re in year 2.5 of a dumpster fire reclamation project, it’s pretty hard for me to be upset about taking two ranked opponents, on the road, down to the last possession.
Finally, the system Frost is attempting to run on offense is ballsy for the B1G. I’m sure we could ho hum our way to Iowa status running power and chewing clock and be decent a lot quicker, but there’s most definitely a ceiling to that system. Frost’s system is a gamble because it requires elite talent. But if he gets it here—if he continues to win recruiting battles, a whole lot of people are going to be eating crow. Two freshmen and a sophomore on the Oline and a fairly dominant freshman on the DLine is giving me enough patience to enjoy some of what I’m watching.
I still think Frost gets it done here.
We’ve lost most of the games we were supposed to lose—3 of the losses were to ranked opponents. 2 of those games came down to the final possession, including one on the road to what will likely be a Top 10 team by next week. Illinois was trash, and we were favored big, but we were also picked to lose to Penn State and won that one.
What I saw today is more of what I saw in every game outside of Illinois—stronger line play and young talent. Martinez played well today. We had a couple of goofball plays, but we lost to a good team, on the road, on the last possession.
The main difference I see is that our talent matches Northwestern and Iowa up front. We aren’t better yet, but we match up. I felt like our past two Iowa battles were WAY flukier than this one. We should’ve been blown out in both. This was different. We’re just about as good as Iowa and NW. We played NW a lot tougher than Wiscy did.
Frost is definitely not a polished product as a head coach, but he’s showing me he can recruit, and that’s really really important. It takes time (5 years to fill it out across a program) to get a pipeline going up front in a conference this big and physical. Just ask Indiana.
Under Allen:
5-7
5-7
8-5 (if we win out this season—and I think we will—our record might’ve been quite similar to this with a full season)
4-1 and top 15.
I’m not a Frost apologist, but I saw a pretty well coached team today with a lot of guys stepping up to make plays. Martinez was pretty darned good against a top 10 defense, and our defense was tough.
When you lose games you’re not supposed to lose, the pitchforks should come out, but when you’re in year 2.5 of a dumpster fire reclamation project, it’s pretty hard for me to be upset about taking two ranked opponents, on the road, down to the last possession.
Finally, the system Frost is attempting to run on offense is ballsy for the B1G. I’m sure we could ho hum our way to Iowa status running power and chewing clock and be decent a lot quicker, but there’s most definitely a ceiling to that system. Frost’s system is a gamble because it requires elite talent. But if he gets it here—if he continues to win recruiting battles, a whole lot of people are going to be eating crow. Two freshmen and a sophomore on the Oline and a fairly dominant freshman on the DLine is giving me enough patience to enjoy some of what I’m watching.
I still think Frost gets it done here.
