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Podcast: Big Bets On Campus Episode: College Football Offseason Update | Part 2 Segment: Wisconsin podcast segment **Team-Specific Podcast Notes** - **Wisconsin +20.5 vs Notre Dame at Lambeau** — Calabrese has a **play in pocket** on Wisconsin; likes it at **20.5** and said he’d still play it at **21.5**, with a fair number around **16.5-17**. - **Wisconsin vs Notre Dame at Lambeau:** Calabrese likes Wisconsin catching a big number because the Badgers’ offense should be improved with **Colton Joseph** at QB, and Lambeau creates a special neutral-site environment that can help Wisconsin play above its baseline. Transcript excerpt: You back him time and time again. Dating back to his time at Purdue, he's gone 26, 15 and one against the spread as a dog over 63%, making him one of the most profitable power four coaches in the past nine years. One number that I still think is good, though, I'm going to bring it to the table here. I know you've basically tiptoed a little bit around your love affair with this Wisconsin team kind of, you know, having a rebound, having an injection of optimism when it comes to what they did in the portal, particularly a quarterback. They're catching 20 and a half. Against this same Notre Dame team that you just mentioned, they're playing at Lambeau. I remember their last game at Lambeau 10 years ago when they had a matchup against LSU. They roll in to the Packers Stadium, number five in the entire country, and Wisconsin laid a tiger trap for them, gives Brandon Harris through two picks. They won 16 to 14 in front of 77,000 hammered Wisconsinites. And when LSU and Wisconsin get together, that's a drinking national championship. That's a conversation for another time. I don't think there's two better drinking fan bases from a non-con perspective that could get together. Speaking of big kickoff games in NFL stadiums, though, this is something Notre Dame's done many times over. In 94, in nearly identical scenario, the Irish opened number two in the AP poll. They go ahead and they play Northwestern at Soldier Field. The Irish had Heisman hopeful quarterback in Ron Paulus. The point spread reflected that. They were 24 and a half point favorites. They cover, although there was a situation later, I believe it was two or three years, that Northwestern's basketball and football team was hit with some points shaving scandal. So was Northwestern laying down that situation? I think it was just, you know, they were totally outclassed in every way. But I bring this up because Wisconsin is no doormat. Not with this roster, not with this coaching staff. Despite a 4-8 mark in 2025, I think this is absolutely the spot to buy them low. And if it creeps over to 21, that's going to be one of my favorite plays from the early portion of this season. Because the Badgers have a chance to flip the script in a major way because of that quarterback upgrade. Colton Joseph arriving from Old Dominion. He's the perfect dual threat weapon to really inject life into this offense. He was one of two Power 4 quarterbacks. You know, now he's on a Power 4 roster who accounted for more than 2,600 passing yards and 1,000 rushing yards last fall. The Badgers covered in four of their last five games, by the way, in 2025. They also upset nationally ranked Washington and Illinois. So I'm going to back Joseph here and take the points. I think this is mispriced by, I would put it, if I was hanging numbers, 17. I think this is a spot where Wisconsin is going to play with enthusiasm. They're going to run through the tape. They're going to give them 60 minutes and a tough game. And as I brought up in our first episode, the C.J. Carr, you know, I don't even quite understand. I think it's time for me to plant my flag here when it comes to C.J. I think he's a good quarterback. I haven't seen him play without Love. I haven't seen him have to carry this offense against really good teams. And they played a bunch of tin cans that they were never going to lose to in the last five weeks of the season. The quarterbacks that they played, the C.J. Carr love affair, the coronation that's happening right now. I think it's just tied to the jerseys, tied to the laundry. This kind of feels the way that players get mispriced in Ohio State and Alabama, a Texas, a USC. Notre Dame hasn't had a quarterback with this kind of buzz in quite a while. And I think for that reason, there's just this mispricing in the market. So, like I said, as soon as it gets to 21, I'm hammering it. But 20 and a half, I think, is a good number too. What are your thoughts between the Badgers and the Fighting Irish at Lambeau? I've got quite a few thoughts. I already have a play in pocket on Wisconsin. I can see where this number is coming from. I thought fair market value would have been 16 and a half, 17 or somewhere around there. But the number is being priced in accordance with how it looked for Wisconsin last season. Far and away, the least, most, least explosive offense in FBS last season. They had 23 plays all season in excess of 20 yards. Worse than North Carolina. Worse than all of these other terrible, inexplosive offenses. And if you don't think Colton Joseph can do it against the best of the best, put the film on from last year, week one, Old Dominion. He tore Indiana up in the first half. This guy, the skill set that he brings will elevate the performance of everybody else in the room. I'm not trying to make the case that Wisconsin's going to win or that they're going to win the Big Ten or that they're going to win 10 games. But Wisconsin's offense is going to be much stronger than it was last season. And we saw their defense play up against the elite competition in the Big Ten. And their defense kept them in games week after week after week. So I do think that it's going to be much more competitive than a three-touchdown spread. There was a situation in 2024 where we had a matchup. It just happened to be involving Notre Dame as well. But I think it applies here. Northern Illinois went to the cathedral and played Notre Dame. They were catching open 33. I think it got bet down. Northern Illinois's roster was really composed primarily of tough, hard-nosed, south side of Chicago kids. Under-recruited, undervalued, didn't get sniffed by Notre Dame. These kids had one chance to go to the cathedral and play their asses off against the Irish. There was never a chance that Notre Dame was going to win that game by four touchdowns. And they didn't end up winning it all. You have a Wisconsin team full of kids that are either from Wisconsin, many from the surrounding states. You hav