Badgers lose their QB in a loss to Michigan 38-17
Wisconsin- In a loss to Michigan, Graham Mertz left the stadium with a rib injury.
After being dismantled by the Irish last week, the Badgers wanted to come out against Michigan and stop their undefeated streak. Going into a huge Big 10 match-up against another ranked opponent in back to back weeks, Wisconsin wanted to be close to perfect and not give the Wolverines a short field.
Wisconsin had some great defensive stops early in the game, but how long was that going to last with the Badgers' offense not converting on third downs. Wisconsin got caught with their hands' in the cookie jar and Michigan made them pay. Cade McNamara and crew decided to mix it up a bit in the redzone and threw a Flea Flicker, which resulted in a touchdown to put the first points on the scoreboard.
The Badgers made one huge mistake at the start of the second. On a punt return, after letting the ball drop to the ground; one of the Badgers' players touched the ball and Michigan jumped all over it. Four plays later, Michigan kicked a field goal to extend their lead 10-0. Despite not really getting anything going offensively, the Badgers were hanging in there. Wisconsin got a much needed touchdown at the end of the half to go into the locker room down 13-10.
The Badgers started the second half with some potential bad news. Their starting QB was lit up on a third down play and it looked like he suffered an injury to his ribs. Chase Wolf replaced him and the offense was very obvious after Merz left the game. The coaching strategy was to just run the ball to take the pressure off of Wolf and see if they could get a big play going.
Things went downhill in the fourth quarter for the Badgers. Wolf was picked off twice in the first three minutes of the fourth, which set up Michigan for two scores to put the game out of reach.