Legendary Wisconsin coach and former athletic director Barry Alvarez came to the defense of current Badgers coach Luke Fickell after chants of “Fire Fickell!” rang out from the student section during Saturday’s 27-10 loss to Maryland at Camp Randall Stadium, with boos cascading as Wisconsin headed to the locker room trailing 20-0 at halftime.
“I think it’s embarrassing,” Alvarez said Monday on ESPN Madison. “I think it’s terrible, despicable. They’re spoiled rotten. Here’s a team that you’ve got young players trying to come on, they’re competing, they’re going to have a chance to get better, and you flip on them. We’re early in the season and you flip on them and you’re chanting for the coach (to be fired).”
The loss dropped Wisconsin to 15-15 overall under Fickell, who took over the program before the 2022 season after a successful six-year run at Cincinnati. The Badgers are just 8-11 in Big Ten play during Fickell’s tenure, and the 2024 campaign ended with a 5-7 record that snapped Wisconsin’s 23-year bowl streak — the third-longest active streak in the nation at the time.
Before Alvarez’s remarks, current Wisconsin athletic director Chris McIntosh had already offered his backing for Fickell, telling the Wisconsin State Journal, “When you have kids that have given it all and are faced with, as a program, adversity like this, I think it’s a time for our people to come together. I think it’s a time for me to express my support.”
Saturday’s defeat elevated frustrations. Maryland entered as a 10.5-point underdog but took advantage of early miscues to build a commanding halftime advantage. The result only fueled restlessness from fans already uneasy with the program’s trajectory.
“How do you think that makes the players feel?” Alvarez said of the boos. “That’s disrespectful, it’s not loyal, you’re not a fan. If the person sitting next to me is booing — ‘Get your ass out of here. We don’t need you in here. You don’t want to watch this? Go someplace else. Go boo in a bar.’ That really upsets me.”
Alvarez’s strong defense comes months after he publicly voiced his own frustration with the program. Back in February, following Wisconsin’s first losing season in 23 years, he said on ESPN Madison that “these guys have to fight their ass off to get back in that groove” and emphasized the urgency for Fickell’s team to reclaim the program’s identity.
Fickell, who signed a seven-year contract in November 2022 and has since been extended through 2031, is not an easy coach to move on from. His deal calls for him to be owed 80% of what is left, meaning his buyout would sit at around $25 million at the end of this season. That would rank among the largest in the sport’s history.
Wisconsin is on a bye week before resuming Big Ten action on Oct. 4 at Michigan, the first of five AP Top 25 opponents currently on the remaining schedule. For Fickell and the Badgers, the road ahead is daunting — and the noise around the program isn’t likely to quiet anytime soon.
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