Why stock is being bought at Wisconsin under Luke Fickell

It’s time to get on the Wisconsin Badgers bus before Luke Fickell drives the bandwagon too far away.

On3’s JD PicKell is certainly one of those leading the charge. He’s a gigantic believer in Fickell’s mettle, and believes he’ll work wonders for the Badgers in 2023 and beyond.

In the latest episode of The Hard Count, PicKell explained as much, stating that he’s buying immense stock in Wisconsin’s future.

“Let’s talk about the Big Ten. Who are we buying stock in, in the Big Ten over the next five years?” prefaced PicKell. “Again, it’d be easy to say Ohio State, because they’ve won a lot. It’d be easy to say Michigan. Yeah, great job. They’ve won the last two Big Ten titles. Yeah, Penn State. You can see that too. We’re actually going to try to get a better bargain here than we did in the SEC. I’m going to go ahead and invest in Wisconsin.

“When I say I’m investing in Wisconsin, I’m investing in Luke Fickell, man. I would follow Luke Fickell into a dark alley without any hesitation.”

Continuing, PicKell elaborated on why Fickell and his coaching staff breathing new life into the Badgers will go a long way towards their success.

“He has won everywhere he’s been. He is pumping new life into that operation from a recruiting perspective. And they’re going to have a new age offense with Phil Longo,” added PicKell. “I say new age, new age relative to what Wisconsin has been. Because you think Wisconsin, you think of probably heavy squat numbers. You think of an offensive line that just pummels the opposition. You think of cold weather games where Wisconsin just dominates on the ground. And they’re going to still have that old school identity and mentality I believe, but now you’re bringing in Phil Longo’s offense, and Phil Longo was previously overseeing Drake Maye at North Carolina and that worked out just fine.

“They’re going to be a little bit more wide open. They’re going to spread it out. Like, they’re going to throw the football now. They’re going to throw the football now at Wisconsin. So new age offense plus old school mentality. I think it breeds balance.”

Evidently, a balanced offensive attack for the Badgers has PicKell excited, as he theorized that it’ll make Wisconsin borderline impossible to game-plan for.

“Here’s the thing about balance. Balance is just hard to game-plan for,” PicKell explained. “Like to be real, if I don’t know if you’re going to run the football at me with Braelon Allen, or whoever the next great Wisconsin running back is, because we all know they’re probably going to still recruit great at that running back position moving forward at Wisconsin. Or if you’re going to try and go vertical against me, like as a defensive coordinator, that’s just a difficult position to put me in when I’m game-planning the week.

“So being able to keep teams off balance, by having balance offensively for Wisconsin, I’m buying into that. So keep an eye on them, especially as the College Football Playoff expands.”

Alas, JD PicKell makes some salient points regarding Luke Fickell and the Badgers. Wisconsin will be a team to keep an eye on moving forward under his watch.