Let’s play a fun little game. You know, unlike those recent things involving the Packers. I’ll give you five guesses to name who’s most responsible for Wisconsin’s shocker over Ohio State. It can be a person or a group of people. We’ll call he, she or them Entity X. Five guesses, and you’ll be wrong every single time.
What’s that? It’s no fun being wrong? Well, maybe, but it’s still more fun than watching the Packers these days. Just not more fun than sports writer Jeff Pearlman is willing to have at the expense of his own, um… naïveté… all for the good of a friend. (Well done, Jeff.)
So back to the game. I ask you for guess No. 1, and you tell me John Clay and James White. Because Wisconsin’s tailback twosome combined for 179 yards and three touchdowns. And it’s a darn good first answer but also pretty darn wrong. Because without the efforts of Entity X, who knows what Clay and White may have done.
Ah, you figure I’ve given too much away with that last sentence. So with your next guess, you say Entity X must be the Wisconsin offensive line. Because without all that Badger beef opening up holes the size of Brent Musburger’s mouth, Clay and White never get their yardage. Moreover, the line didn’t allow a single sack. Salient points, indeed. But equally wrong. And personally, I’d have gone with Joe Morgan’s mouth because ESPN may be shutting it very soon.
Two up, two down, so you try to change tactics. Let’s plumb the emotional depths because no way the Badgers win without an extraordinary adrenaline boost. So it must be David Gilreath, whose game-opening kickoff return for a TD produced enough adrenaline to send elephants over Everest. True, but opening kickoffs don’t win football games. Just ask Ohio State and Ted Ginn.
Well, then let’s get back to basics. The Buckeyes trailed 21-0, had three points at halftime and finished with a season-low of 18 points. Defense wins championships, right? And the most impressive part of Wisconsin’s defense was the play of its line. Specifically J.J. Watt, the aptly named defensive end who lit up any Buckeye unfortunate enough to fall into his path. So there’s your Entity X. And while I can’t argue with the defense’s effort, I still say you’re wrong because you’re not thinking of the big picture.
Ohhh…. now you’ve got me. Now you see where I’m going. Now you’ll say it’s head coach Bret Bielema. He’s the architect. He’s the guy who put this whole team together, who recruited guys like Clay and White and Gilreath and Watt. He’s the man who came up with the game plan and kept his team together and convinced them they could make history. And you know what? You’re right on every point. And you’re still wrong. Because the man most responsible for Wisconsin’s win never even suited up for Wisconsin. And now you’re out of guesses.
Wait! You’ve got it now. That was the final clue. You want one more guess. Fine, I’m a generous guy, so I’ll listen while you say that Entity X is Terrelle Pryor. He’s the Heisman Trophy candidate who wasn’t up to snuff, the Buckeyes QB who managed just 156 yards passing and 56 yards rushing and threw an interception. His underwhelming performance is the reason Wisconsin won. But no, he’s not the answer, and I’m sorry, because our time is up, and you still haven’t come up with the name.
Because you don’t remember Andrew Gardner.
Hard to blame you. Kickers from Football Championship Subdivision schools in the Great West Conference aren’t exactly household names. Not even in Great West Conference households. But this particular kicker holds a special place in Badgers lore.
Because Gardner was the Cal Poly player who missed three extra points against Wisconsin in 2008. And that let the Badgers escape with a 36-35 win. And that may very well have saved Bielema’s job.
If Wisconsin doesn’t win that game, the team finishes that season with a record of 6-6. The Badgers don’t go to a bowl game because they lost to a Cal Poly team that spent the next week losing to Weber State. It would’ve been the final blow in an eminently disappointing season for what looked very much like a failed coaching regime. And how in the world does Bielema survive that?
The answer is, he probably doesn’t. So he never gets the chance to recruit White or develop Clay, Gilreath and Watt. He’s gone in favor of some new coach, who spends 2009 and 2010 rebuilding the Badgers, implementing his own system, bringing in his own players and asking fans to be patient while it all comes together. And that is most definitely not a recipe for beating Ohio State.
So that glorious sea of red-clad rowdies never rushes the field at Camp Randall. The 2010 season never gets a chance to become a special one, and there’s nothing to distract the state from all of those Packers problems up in Green Bay.
But on a November day in 2008, a little-known and long-forgotten kicker named Gardner missed three extra points. And Wisconsin won by one point in overtime, and Bielema kept his job, and the Badgers beat a No. 1 team for the first time since 1981.
Sometimes, you just never know where X will mark the spot.
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(Photo by Jeff Miller/University of Wisconsin-Madison.)
