Wisconsin football is in the midst of an offseason that came around all too quickly, as the program missed its first bowl game since 2001. With early national signing day in the books and the transfer portal having just opened on Monday, one of the busiest portions of the college football calendar is in full swing.

With the Badgers' season over prematurely, BadgerBlitz.com will give a breakdown and review of each position on the team in the coming weeks. Before diving into each unit individually, let's hand out grades position-by-position.

This unit's only saving grace was the emergence of Elijah Hills, who was the team's best defensive lineman and one of the best transfer portal pickups from this past offseason. Otherwise, this unit was a complete disaster.

First-year position coach EJ Whitlow's unit got pushed around in his debut season. They couldn't generate penetration, pressure, or any havoc with any sort of consistency. This unit disappeared all too often, and while the Badgers had a solid run defense, the defensive line's lack of an ability to control the line of scrimmage hurt this team time and time again.

The outside linebackers were one of the biggest letdowns of the 2024 season. After newcomers John Pius and Leon Lowery made a big splash in spring camp, neither managed to bring any sort of juice to the Badgers' lifeless pass-rush. The incumbents, Darryl Peterson and Aaron Witt, offered little as well.

Too often, the edge wasn't set. Too often, offensive tackles locked down the Badger outside backer lined up across from them. Too often, Wisconsin couldn't get pressure with just four.

This is a group that needs a personnel makeover. Two exciting fresh faces from the 2024 cycle (Anelu Lafaele and Thomas Heiberger) should be chomping at the bit for snaps next fall.

Going into the season, Wisconsin's inside linebacker room was thought to be the deepest, most talent-rich position on the defense and perhaps the entire team. It didn't quite play out like that.

For one, starters Jake Chaney and Jaheim Thomas simply didn't play to expectations. Neither particularly flew to the football and neither made game-wrecking plays with any sort of regularity. A combined 6.0 TFLs from your starting inside linebacker duo for most of the year isn't much to write home about.

Christian Alliegro asserted himself as the best inside linebacker on the roster, and played starter-level snaps in the final third of the season. He remains one of the key cogs on this defense and is a candidate to pile up 120-plus tackles next fall as the centerpiece of the defense. His continued emergence was encouraging, but otherwise, just about everyone in this room fell shot of expectations.

Cornerbacks were quite possibly the best position group on the team in 2024. You know it's a rock solid unit when your true freshman backup (Xavier Lucas) is likely better than both starters (Ricardo Hallman and Nyzier Fourqurean), but all three deserve to play. That was the case for position coach Paul Haynes' room in 2024.

After his NCAA-leading seven-interception season in 2023, teams shied away from throwing at Hallman. Instead, they targeted Fourqurean, who had an excellent season save for a rough performance in the Axe Game. Otherwise, though, these corners went toe-to-toe with just about every receiver they matched up with. The Alabama game was the only team-wide exception where the corners simply got shredded from top to bottom.

Lucas announced his presence early by picking off a pass in his first career game. He's the future at the position, and the sky is the limit for him. As for the older players in the room, it remains to be seen who will still be on the roster come 2025. But in a secondary that made of up one of the nation's better passing defenses, the corners had a largely outstanding year.

Wisconsin's safeties were solid, but they failed to make that big of an impact in terms of splash plays. They were good tacklers for the most part and were often in the right place at the right time, but it was the same old story as the rest of the defense: they didn't create enough havoc.

The Badgers played plenty of safeties, as Austin Brown got involved in the slot quite frequently. Hunter Wohler led the team in tackles but didn't log an interception or a sack, and he only managed 1.0 TFLs. Preston Zachman had a very solid season, but he got bested in some crucial one-on-one situations, like in the Minnesota game. So did Wohler — several plays in the USC game where he either got beat in coverage for the TD or missed a tackle that led to a touchdown come to mind.

The safety room is expected to lose Wohler and Zachman this offseason, leaving Brown as the next man up. With Braedyn Moore's departure from the program via the transfer portal, there's no clear next up behind Brown, putting lots of onus on the young players in the program and potentially the staff's ability to find a plug-and-play starter in the portal.

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