The Wisconsin football team is back in action at camp after their scheduled rest day, and plenty has changed for the team in just a day.
The exciting and open quarterback battle quickly clamped down to two quarterbacks early on, and now has appeared to close. Quarterback Tyler Van Dyke stepped up during practice and displayed his arm strength with multiple 50-plus yard bombs down the field. While the quarterback shined, his receivers had a bit tougher of a day trying to hold onto the ball.
Wisconsin Football Begins Second Week of Camp With Padded Live Action
The Wisconsin football staff has continued to turn up the heat at practice as they attempt to bring a more well-rounded team to the field this season. The Badgers have a few practices left before their time in Platteville is done and the team returns to Madison to finish off their preparations. The early looks from the team have been positive so far, in particular the pace and tenacity they have played with during the padded live practices.
Quarterback Tyler Van Dyke Emerges as Winner of Position Battle
After a week of close battling and rep sharing between the two quarterbacks, Miami Hurricanes transfer Tyler Van Dyke appears to be the starter moving forward. Van Dyke looked far more impressive than his competitor and fellow teammate Braedyn Locke during the past practice and earned himself the bulk of first team reps. While the competition is not officially over, it is going to be hard for Locke moving forward given the success of Van Dyke recently.
During this past practice, Van Dyke launched multiple beautiful passes down the field and dropped them directly on target. Van Dyke had previously shown solid accuracy across the route tree, but finally had a chance to really air the ball out during live play. The quarterback did not disappoint, and his accuracy throwing the deep ball appeared more impressive than his arm strength.
Van Dyke previously had not been a quarterback who was able to really air the ball out given his offensive line and coordinator as well. The Wisconsin quarterbacks suffered a similar issue last year and did not air the ball out deep as much as the staff would have liked.
The Wisconsin football staff has not yet named Van Dyke as the starter, and likely will not until after their time in Platteville is done to be fully sure of their decision.
Wisconsin Badgers Football Wide Receivers Struggle With Drops Once Again
While the quarterbacks, in particular Van Dyke, had a great day, the receivers on the other hand struggled at times with key drops. Van Dyke delivered an amazing pass downfield at one point during the live drills that was dropped by the receiver. It would have been an impressive catch by the receiver given the defender in the area, but regardless it was delivered where it needed to be and dropped.
The Wisconsin football team struggled with drops from their receivers last season, and the staff has worked diligently to try and reduce that issue moving forward. Wisconsin saw their receivers drop the ball 30 times last season, with star receiver Will Pauling leading the team with seven drops. Drops truly hurt Wisconsin and contributed to some of the losing results the Badgers had last season.
How the Wisconsin football staff handles receivers dropping passes will be interesting moving forward given the fact that it was an issue the staff stressed needed to be fixed.
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