I’ll talk about the offensive seniors first. I’ll start out with a player who will not be playing. Like I said above, Peavy is officially no longer a part of the team, but he has been a big part of the program, so I will include him here. In 2015, the then-sophomore became a name in college football due to catching a game-winning touchdown, but having it ruled incomplete for some reason. That “incompletion” cost the Badgers the victory and I think it was the Dan Patrick Show’s Paul Pabst who called it one of the worst calls he had ever seen. But he bounced back in a big way in 2016. Following the graduation of Alex Erickson, Peavy was thrust into a starting spot and he delivered. He was a big time receiver in addition to making plays on the ground. In four of the first six games in 2016, he had at least 65 yards receiving. After having that crushing defeat against Northwestern the previous year, he bounced back in a big way last season against the Windy City Kitties. With Wisconsin leading 3-0 midway through the second quarter, Peavy took a jet sweep 46 yards to the house en route to a Wisconsin 21-7 win. I also loved watching his big jet sweeps against Minnesota and Western Michigan to help the Badgers get big wins. I wished his senior season would have turned out a bit differently, but I hope he gets better.
Now, Fumagalli is one of the best tight ends in college football. His season started out really well, having 13 catches for 197 yards and two touchdowns the first two games. Since, though, he only has one game in which he has more than 40 yards receiving and no touchdowns in conference play. However, he is still the top target for Hornibrook that the defense has to account for. I remember his coming out party against LSU. I was at that game, and was awesome to see him truck some poor Tigers defender. The Badgers needed every bit of his 100 yards against LSU and had a big 20-yard catch to move Wisconsin into LSU territory on the final field goal drive to set the Badgers up to take the lead. Even with that, his best performance was in the Cotton Bowl against Western Michigan. He had six catches against the Broncos and every single one was a monster catch. Five of his six catches went for either a first down or a touchdown and four came on third down. Some of his catches were fantastic, and he sealed the game with a 26-yard catch on third down late in the game. I have faith in Kyle Penniston, but Fumagalli will be tough to replace.Finally, Austin Ramesh has had a really nice year. Every week, it seems like Ramesh blows somebody up on a block. He has done well being the lead blocker for Jonathan Taylor, who has 1,525 yards and 12 touchdowns. Ramesh also is very good at running on short yardage plays. He has two touchdowns this year and five in his career. My favorite score was his touchdown against Ohio State when nobody expected the fullback to get the ball and he plowed his way into the end zone to give Bucky a late lead. Taylor will miss him, and us fans will miss seeing him decleat poor defenders who are in his way.
On defense, there are six seniors starter currently, and I will include Jack Cichy as well. I will start out with three senior defensive ends, Chikwe Obasih, Connor Sheehy and Alec James. First off, it is nice to see Obasih back on the field. He was hurt week one against Utah State and missed the next eight games before making one tackle in the win over Iowa. My favorite Obasih moment was his sack against the Gophers last year. After Wisconsin tied the game at 17, Obasih sacked Mitch Leidner on third down to force a punt in Bucky’s 31-17 victory over Minnesota. Next, Alec James has had a fantastic year. After having a total of 3.5 sacks in his first three years combined, James has exploded for 5.5 this year, which is great for a 3-4 defensive end. He also has had the best sack celebration I have seen in some time. After a sack at Indiana, he licked his fingers and rubbed his stomach. Thanksgiving is not for another few weeks, but this celebration was still great. Finally, Sheehy had a breakout season last year and has carried it over to this year. He has 1.5 sacks this year and has done well defending the run, like always.
Now, to the linebackers. Like last year, both starting outside linebackers will be gone the following year. People figured Leon Jacobs and Garret Dooley would be the starters, but no one knew how effective they would be. Gone were NFL Draft picks Vince Biegel and T.J. Watt, who combined for 15.5 sacks and 21.5 tackles for loss last season, so Jacobs and Dooley had big shoes to fill. First off, Jacobs played his 55th career game last Saturday, which put him at the top of the all-time games played list for the Badgers. It was always easy to see Jacobs' talent for Wisconsin, but he always had to sit behind great linebackers like Watt, Biegel and Joe Schobert. He even transitioned to fullback in 2016. As a senior, he was moved back to linebacker and has made the most of his opportunity. In 10 games, he has 3.5 sacks and nine tackles for loss. He also made one of the bigger plays of the season in an October matchup with Purdue. With the Boilermakers driving and facing 2nd-and-Goal from the Badgers 8 with a little more than eight minutes remaining, Jacobs picked off Elijah Sindelar and sealed the win for Bucky. His only other pick in college was rather big as well. His interception and return of a Mitch Leidner pass last year against Minnesota helped Wisconsin put the game away late. I think he could have a chance at a long career in the NFL. His size, strength and speed are huge assets that teams look for in a linebacker. After registering 3.5 sacks last year as a reserve, Dooley has sacked opposing quarterbacks five times so far in 2017, including three in a win over Northwestern in late September. Dooley and Jacobs have teamed up for a combined 8.5 sacks and 17 tackles for loss, which helped make up for the losses of Watt and Biegel. They still have four games left to pad their stats and help the Badgers potentially make the College Football Playoff.Even though he is out for the year, I have to mention a big member of this defense, Jack Cichy. It is too bad he tore his ACL prior to the season because he would have made an already great defense that much better. Cichy has had a fantastic career with the Badgers, but only one moment sticks out for me. It is where he earned the moniker ‘Three Sack Jack.’ Even though he had a solid sophomore season, the Holiday Bowl would be his coming out party. Cichy would have to sit out the first half of the bowl game against Southern California due to a targeting penalty he had against Minnesota in the regular season finale. That did not bother the former walk-on, as he went on to earn Holiday Bowl Defensive MVP. With Wisconsin clinging to a 20-14 lead and USC starting with great field position at midfield, Cichy took over the series. Trojans quarterback Cody Kessler dropped back to pass all three plays......and he would be sacked by Cichy on all three. Cichy single-handedly moved Southern Cal all the way back near its own 20. That would not be all for him on the night, either. With the Badgers leading 23-21 and Kessler trying to move USC down the field for a winning field goal, Cichy pressured the Trojans quarterback, forcing him to throw a poor pass that was intercepted by Sojourn Shelton. The play helped seal Wisconsin’s two-point win in the Holiday Bowl. He carried that into his junior season with that Badgers, where he was perhaps the best player on the defense the first seven weeks. Yes, even better than Watt. In his seven games, he led the team in tackles. Against Ohio State, he was the best player on the field. Cichy registered career-highs with 15 tackles and 3.5 tackles for less to go along with a sack and a forced fumble. Unfortunately, he would suffer a torn pectoral muscle the following week in Iowa City that would force him to miss the final seven games of the season. He has had a string of bad luck with injuries, but he’s a fighter and I have confidence he’ll help an NFL team in the near future.
Finally, I will mention the two senior starting defensive backs. There is a possibility Nick Nelson leaves for the NFL, but I will only talk about the seniors for this, cornerback Derrick Tindal and safety Natrell Jamerson. Tindal has been a part of two of the best cornerback duos in program history the past few years with Shelton last season and Nelson this year. He has four career interceptions, and I was fortunate to see one in person, as he picked off a Brandon Harris pass right before halftime to preserve a 6-0 lead over LSU at the break. He also had a long return off an interception in last year’s meeting with Michigan, which set up a touchdown reception by Dare Ogunbowale. Tindal had 10 passes defensed last year and has six more this year, helping the Badgers to be one of the best pass defenses in the county. Also helping that category is Jamerson, a former cornerback who replaced Leo Musso upon his graduation. He has taken that job and ran with it. Jamerson has been a sure tackler in the back end of the defense and has even added a pair of interceptions, including a pick six against Northwestern. Along with D’Cota Dixon, he has formed a terrific safety duo and these four are responsible (along with the pass rush) for making it a nightmare for opposing quarterbacks to throw the ball, ranking No. 1 in the country in passing efficiency.I will miss this group of seniors. They have done quite a bit to keep the train rolling from Gary Andersen to Paul Chryst and in the case of the defenders, they have had three defensive coordinators in three years. No matter who the coaches have been, this program has kept on winning. Since 2014, this year’s class (yes, I know some have been here five years) has gone 42-9 and has made the Big Ten Championship game twice and won all three bowl games it has appeared in. It was fun to watch this group grow right before our eyes and it will be exciting to watch some of them play in the NFL. As I end this post, I will leave you with two words: Beat Michigan!
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