Luke Fickell shares his message to players after ReliaQuest Bowl loss

Luke Fickell didn’t blow smoke after Wisconsin’s 35-31 loss to LSU in the ReliaQuest Bowl. However, he certainly spoke with fire. During the postgame press conference, Fickell evaluated his team’s game and season, as a whole.

“It doesn’t just happen because you say it’s going to happen,” Fickell said after the game. “‘We’re going to tackle better, we’re going to do this, we’re going to do that.’ In reality, it’s a lot of hot air. It’s why I don’t like to make statements up here. I don’t like to say things that we’re going to do moving forward because ultimately you are what you put on film, whether it’s your culture, whether it’s the things that you want to do.

“We know darn well last year we didn’t finish well. This year, we didn’t finish well. We didn’t start well. There’s a lot of things. It gives us a hell of a lot of things that we’ve got to start work on here Jan. 14 when our guys get back.”

Like most teams across the country this season, Wisconsin struggled to stop LSU’s offense. The Tigers tallied 492 total yards of offense while only committing one turnover. To make matters worse, LSU was carried by backup quarterback Garrett Nussmeier, who started in place of 2023 Heisman Trophy winner Jayden Daniels.

Wisconsin isn’t used to being on the painful end of an offensive barrage. The Badgers only allowed 344 yards per game game this season, ranking No. 38 in the country. Despite the team’s sputters against LSU, Fickell believes the his program’s future is bright.

Luke Fickell has hope for the future

“There’s a lot of encouraging things,” Fickell said. “We know darned well that we’ve got the guys that we need. We’ve just got to get everybody on the same path. We’ve got to get everybody going the same direction, and that’s on the coach. That starts with me.

“I thought we did a much better job of that in our preparation, in particular offensively just getting ourself in the right path and going about things the right way,” Fickell said. “I think it showed. But you’re still finding ways to overcome what it is that we need to be able to overcome, and finding ways ultimately of winning ballgames and finishing.”

In his first season at the helm in Wisconsin, Fickell boosted the Badgers to a 7-6 record. Wisconsin has not boasted a 10-win campaign or better since 2019.