Four years ago Luke Fickell led No. 8 Cincinnati to Bloomington and left with a 38-24 win that devastated Indiana’s hopes for establishing momentum among the nation’s top programs.
Fickell rode his own momentum from that win to the 2021 College Football Playoff, and ultimately to the head coaching position at Wisconsin.
My how the turntables have turned.
Now in year three at Wisconsin, Fickell might have the hottest seat in college football, while Indiana is 10-0 and appears to be a lock for a second straight CFP. His team is coming off a win over a ranked opponent however. Wisconsin beat Washington 13-10 last weekend.
Fickell, whose daughter Luca plays for the IU volleyball team, brings the Badgers to Bloomington this weekend with a 3-6 record. He was asked a couple questions Monday about facing Indiana.
Does how quickly Indiana has turned things around create hope?
“It does, for everybody, right? I mean, look, I’ve played the AAC for how many years, at the University of Cincinnati, as soon as you know you do something that maybe somebody hasn’t done or wants to do, then you become that, Hey, see, everybody can do it. That’s the beauty of what it is that we do.
Before us at Cincinnati was UCF, and before then, it was us at Cincinnati who made a run and got in the playoffs. And, you know, there’s others, but you know, that’s what Indiana has done the last two years, and there’s a combination of those things. Everybody would like to know what it is. I don’t even know if you asked Coach from within, can pinpoint exactly what it is, but there’s a lot of things that have, you know, obviously, that have gone into it. Great coaching is one of them. Great quarterback play is definitely another. But I think it gives everybody, that’s what I think college football, I’m not sure I want to dive into this part of it, but that’s where, you know, you think about where college football is in four years from now, just schematically, rule wise, worldwise. And then you say, well, maybe it doesn’t need a change, but what can still happen, and so whatever it is, they’ve done a really, really good job, obviously, the last few years.”
On facing Indiana’s offense, the No. 1 scoring offense in the country
“We’ve got to continue to build off of the things that we’ve done. You know, it’s a week in, week out, you know, opportunity for us. And there are some things that, you know, I think we’ve done a really good job of defensively. I think we’ve been more disciplined in what we’ve done.
I think we’ve been sounder in what we’ve done. We’ve done a good job at eliminating the big plays. I think, you know, those kinds of things are going to have to stay intact. We’re gonna have to do a really, really good job of tackling and tackling well in space.
And I think that, obviously, as explosive as they are, I think one of the best things they do is in open space and even in the box, they break tackles and they create larger plays just because of it. You know, so for us defensively, that a lot of those things, the fundamental things, are going to have to apply. But I think one of the big ones is going to be we have to tackle really well.”
Here is Fickell’s full Monday press conference, courtesy of Wisconsin Athletics on YouTube:
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