Building A Rivalry: Wisconsin Football vs. Nebraska

“They better get season tickets right now because, before long, they probably won’t be able to.”

Barry Alvarez’s statement during his introductory 1990 press conference announcing him as the head football coach of the University of Wisconsin was viewed as either bold visionary or complete buffoonery. After all, UW was coming off five consecutive losing seasons, was a combined 6-27 in the three seasons under previous head coach Don Morton and was a program that had its fans giving away tickets to the 1989 season opener against No.3 Miami (spoiler, UW lost 51-3).

Many fans likely thought Alvarez was in over his head when the Badgers went 1-10 his first season, but the groundwork was being laid that season for what has been – for the most part – 30 years of success.

Starting with Alvarez’s 16 seasons (1990-2005) and extending to Bret Bielema’s seven years (‘06-‘12), Gary Andersen’s brief tenure (‘13-‘14) and, now, Paul Chryst (‘15-present), Wisconsin has been one of the more successful programs in the Big Ten. The program has won six conference championships, been to seven Rose Bowls and won 15 bowl games. Most importantly, the Badgers have either swung momentum in Big Ten series, completely dominating conference teams or closed the gap against some of the league’s heavyweights.

To understand how impressive Wisconsin’s run of success has been in the Big Ten, BadgerBlitz will examine UW’s series against 11 Big Ten opponents, looking at where it was and how it has evolved over four different Badgers coaches (Note: for this exercise, we are not including UW’s conference games against Maryland and Rutgers. The Badgers are 3-0 against each school and have outscored them a combined 137-71 in those six games).

Today, we examine UW’s series against the Nebraska Cornhuskers.

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Although the Huskers are one of only three current Big Ten teams he never coached against at Wisconsin, Alvarez played a part in this rivalry. A linebacker for the Huskers from ‘66-’68, Alvarez registered an interception in the No.2 Huskers’ 31-3 win at Camp Randall Stadium in '66. That victory followed a 37-0 drubbing in Lincoln the year before.

The two schools played a home-and-home series in ’73-’74, with the Badgers falling, 20-16, at No.2 Nebraska first before registering a 21-10 home victory over the fourth-ranked Huskers the following year.

By that time, Alvarez was coaching high school football in Nebraska and started modeling his style after one of his mentors, Nebraska head coach Bob Devaney.

Hosting Nebraska for its first Big Ten conference game in 2011, both schools were 4-0, ranked in the top eight of the major polls and were being featured in front of a national audience.

"I think everybody in our athletic department is anxious to see how we measure up in the Big Ten," Nebraska athletic director Tom Osborne told ESPN at the time.

The answer has been the theme of the series. UW delivered a 48-17 pasting of the Huskers, scoring 20 points in the second quarter alone and not allowing a touchdown in the second half. Montee Ball dazzled with 151 yards and four total TDs while Russell Wilson threw for 255 yards and a pair of scores.

“We didn't make plays," Nebraska coach Bo Pelini said. “I'm embarrassed. I apologize to the fans of Nebraska.”

It wouldn’t be the last time he had to make that statement. A year later, after the Huskers claimed a 30-27 victory in Lincoln, Wisconsin hung 70 points on 12th-ranked Nebraska in the 2012 Big Ten title game. Two years later, Melvin Gordon set an FBS single-game record by rushing for 408 yards (doing it on just 25 carries in only three quarters) in a 59-24 beatdown.

Running wild has been a common theme for the Badgers against the Huskers on its current seven-game win streak in the series. In five of the wins, UW has rushed for over 350 yards as a team. The two exceptions were the come-from-behind 23-21 win in 2015 (Rafael Gaglianone kicked the game-winning 46-yard field goal with four seconds left, thanks in large part to quarterback Joel Stave’s 322 passing yards) and the 23-17 home overtime win in 2016 that gave seventh-ranked Nebraska its first loss of the season.

Wisconsin’s 2012 season was a nightmare for Bielema’s Badgers. Off-the-field issues, coaching changes in the non-conference season and a rotating door at quarterback contributed to five one-possession losses, including four by three points and three in overtime. One of those was a 30-27 loss at Nebraska and the Huskers (10-2) were installed as 12-point favorites over a 7-5 Wisconsin team that was only playing in the title game because Ohio State and Penn State were ineligible.

Wisconsin didn’t let its opportunity slip by. Scoring seven touchdowns on their first nine possessions, UW blew out Nebraska, 70-31, to win their third straight, and most improbable, Big Ten title in Indianapolis.

For the first time in school history, the Badgers had two 200-yard rushers. Gordon (216) and Ball (202) helped the school rush for 539 yards.

UW was so dominant on the ground that it only needed to throw 10 passes, but three different Badgers threw them, including running back James White. White was responsible for five touchdowns, including a short pass to tight end Sam Arneson at the end of the first half to make it 42-10.

The defense was also dominant. In the first half alone, Nebraska quarterback Taylor Martinez was sacked three times, fumbled twice and having cornerback Marcus Cromartie register a pick-six in the opening quarter.

Nebraska has not beaten Wisconsin in eight years and the domination as of late is impressive. Since blowing a lead late in its 2015 loss, Nebraska has led Wisconsin for a grand total of 3 minutes, 4 seconds in the last four meetings in the series. The Huskers haven't won a conference title or gone to a BCS bowl game since the 2001 season, while Wisconsin has won three Big Ten titles, played in four Rose Bowls, a Cotton Bowl and an Orange Bowl.

Since the addition of the Freedom Trophy, UW is 6-0 with an average margin of victory of 16.2 points per game.

Wisconsin’s overall record vs Nebraska pre-Alvarez: 2-3

Wisconsin’s record vs. the Huskers since 1990: 8-1

The Alvarez Years: 0-0

The Bielema Years: 2-1

The Andersen Years: 1-0

The Chryst Years: 5-0