Wisconsin's 2018 football season is right around the corner, with fall camp expected to start at the end of the month. With that in mind, BadgerBlitz.com will be running through the burning questions the Badgers are facing at each position group as they look to build on last year's 13-1 season.
Position Primer
If you think back to this time last year, you will recall that the Badgers were preparing to work some fresh blood in to their wide receiver corps to supplement seniors Jazz Peavy and George Rushing. But Rushing missed the season due to an injury and Peavy played in just five games, forcing Wisconsin's younger players to grow up quickly.
Luckily for the Badgers, their younger players rose to the occasion several times during the season. Quintez Cephus built on a strong spring camp to emerge as a true No. 1 wide receiver for the offense, and led the team with six receiving touchdowns before suffering a season-ending leg injury in Week 9 against Indiana. That would have been a tough blow for any team to take, but A.J. Taylor, Kendric Pryor, and true freshman Danny Davis all elevated their games to keep Wisconsin's passing game moving the chains as the Badgers competed for a spot in the College Football Playoff.
The good news for the Badgers is that all four of those players should be healthy and ready to contribute in 2018. And with other talented young players like Aron Cruickshank already looking like they can contribute, Wisconsin has more depth at wide receiver than they have had in a very long time.
One Burning Question: How will the team divvy up reps between the big four?
Make no mistake: having four Big Ten-caliber wide receivers is a good thing for the Badgers. But in their classic run-first scheme there are only going to be so many targets to go around as long as running back Jonathan Taylor is the focal point of the offense.
Plus, Wisconsin's offense usually heavily features a receiving tight end over the middle of the field. Troy Fumagalli might be off to the NFL, but someone will take his place. That means that divvying up the targets between Cephus, Taylor, Davis and Pryor might get a little complicated.
Last season Cephus averaged 4.22 targets per game when he was on the field, with Davis averaging 3.33 and Taylor averaging 3.28. Pryor's average of just 2.6 is a little skewed on the low side because his target share rose after Cephus' injury. If you add all that up and account for a tight end getting somewhere between 3 and 4 targets per game, that does fit in with the number of times Alex Hornibrook attempted a pass last year. But you still have to account for throw aways and working the fullbacks and running backs in to the passing game a little as well - so unless you think that Hornibrook is going to attempt more than 23 passes in a game on average, the target distribution is going to be tight in 2018 - and that could mean there's not much left over for younger players like Aron Cruickshank.
But competition is a good thing - Wisconsin's wide receivers are going to have to earn what they get this fall when they get on the field. And there are other ways of getting the ball in their hands, too, such as giving Kendric Pryor a few carries on a jet sweep play. So while figuring out how to use everyone's talents might be a bit of a headache for UW, it's a problem they're probably going to be happy to try and solve.
Micro-Blitz
In preparing for our fall camp series, Jon McNamara and John Veldhuis sat down to break down what they are expecting to see out of Wisconsin's position groups during the pre-season. Their conversation is included below.
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John Veldhuis covers Wisconsin football, basketball and recruiting for BadgerBlitz.com on the Rivals.com network. Follow him on Twitter at @JohnVeldhuis.
