Thursday, September 7 Badgers on solid ground By Jeff Potrykus Special to ESPN.com

At times in 1999, it appeared as if the spread offense had touched every college football program in America.

Penn State coach Joe Paterno was praised early on when he vowed to add a bit of pizzazz to the Nittany Lions' normally bland attack. Sports Illustrated examined the growth of the spread offense and basically declared that any coach not joining the trend was a fool.

	Ron Dayne and Wisconsin proved you can win by running the ball.

The key to success in the new millennium? A quarterback with a bionic arm, a healthy dose of speedy receivers and several athletic linemen to keep the quarterback standing.

University of Wisconsin coach Barry Alvarez clearly isn't a subscriber, either to the theory or the magazine. For the second consecutive season, Alvarez proved that ground troops remain a viable force. The fourth-ranked Badgers held off No. 21 Stanford, 17-9, Saturday in the Rose Bowl because they ran the ball effectively when they needed to and because they eliminated Stanford's running game and turned the Cardinal offense into a one-dimensional attack.

"Everybody wants to use four and five wide receivers," said former National Football League quarterback Dan Fouts, who provided analysis of the game for ABC-TV. "Wisconsin wins games with traditional football. They out-rush their opponent. They win the time-of-possession battle. They win the battle for field position.

"It is, in an odd way, kind of refreshing. Five or six years ago, wide-open offenses were new because everyone tried to run the ball. Now, what's old is new again."

Winning championships with a powerful running game and a stingy run defense isn't exactly a new idea. Nebraska perfected the formula in the '90s under Tom Osborne and the '99 Cornhuskers beat Tennessee in the Fiesta Bowl largely because they rolled up 321 rushing yards to just 44 for the Volunteers. When Alvarez, a former linebacker at Nebraska, came to Wisconsin prior to the 1990 season, he vowed to build a winner by running the ball and stopping the other team from doing the same.

Consider how the Badgers parlayed that two-pronged attack into a second consecutive Rose Bowl title and their third in seven seasons.

Despite a gallant effort from Stanford's much-maligned defense, Ron Dayne capped his remarkable run at Wisconsin by rushing 34 times for 200 yards and a touchdown. It was his 14th 200-yard rushing performance for the Badgers, including bowl games. Stanford held Dayne to three or fewer yards on 16 of his 34 carries, but Dayne kept pounding away until Stanford's defense eventually broke.

"He's a Heisman Trophy winner, an All-American," Alvarez said of Dayne. "He's won three MVPs in bowl games. We've come to expect him to play well so it's no surprise to us."

With Dayne doing just enough damage on offense, Wisconsin's defense turned the nation's No. 5 offense (467.1 yards per game) into a one-dimensional threat by pushing the Stanford runners backward. Stanford offensive coordinator Bill Diedrick prefers to start out with two backs and a tight end and use the ground game to set up the team's more dangerous passing attack. But Diedrick isn't afraid to use four-receiver sets to spread the defense out, either.

However, Diedrick's options were limited because the Cardinal carried 27 times for minus-5 yards against the Badgers, a Rose Bowl record for futility. The output was nearly 160 yards below Stanford's regular-season average of 153.6 yards per game.

"To be honest," defensive line coach John Palermo said, "I didn't know that we could play this well defensively against them. To hold them to nine points and minus rushing yards, to be able to do that against a fine team is probably the best defense we've played since I've been here."

Knowing the Cardinal had to throw the football, Wisconsin went after Stanford quarterback Todd Husak and recorded four sacks. Husak had been sacked just six times in 308 attempts during the regular season, or once every 51.3 attempts. With no running game and a quarterback generally under fire, Stanford mustered season lows in total yards (259) and points (9).

"We lost because of an inability to run the football," said Stanford coach Tyrone Willingham, a graduate of Michigan State. "We didn't have the luxury to be different, and Wisconsin was able to pin down what we were going to do. Their defensive linemen, quite honestly, played a little better than I saw them on film."

Diedrick added: "(Wisconsin) just dominated the line of scrimmage. We ended up back where we were a year ago, dropping back all the time. I felt we'd have more success running the ball coming in."

If that last comment sounds strikingly similar to the comments of UCLA offensive coordinator Al Borges, it should. Borges thought the Bruins could run the ball on Wisconsin last year in the Rose Bowl. The Bruins entered the game averaging 188.1 rushing yards per game. The Badgers held the Bruins to 120 yards in 38 attempts, 3.2 yards per carry. Wisconsin got 246 yards from Dayne and won.

Alvarez's plan worked against UCLA and it worked against Stanford. As a result, the Badgers became the first Big Ten team to win consecutive Rose Bowls.

Perhaps one day Michigan or Ohio State or Penn State will win back-to-back Rose Bowls. But if that happens, they will be the second school, not the first, to accomplish the feat.

"When we found out we had a chance to make history, that became one of our goals," Alvarez said. "There is nothing like doing something no one else has done. Not many people have an opportunity in their lifetime to do that."

Dayne bids farewell
Now that Dayne has played his last game for Wisconsin and will turn his attention to the National Football League, it seems an appropriate time to do a bit of math.

With his 200-yard performance in the Rose Bowl, Dayne became the first Division I player to rush for more than 7,000 yards. Counting his four bowl appearances, Dayne finished with 7,125 yards. Discounting the bowls, Dayne's all-time NCAA rushing record stands at 6,397 yards.

Dayne became just the third player in Rose Bowl history to be named Player of the Game twice. He joined Southern California's Charles White (1979-80) and Washington's Bob Schloredt (1960-61).

His 4-yard touchdown run in the third quarter not only helped the Badgers take the lead for good, but it also gave Dayne the Rose Bowl record for most points in a career with 30. The previous mark of 25 was shared by Travis Hanson, a kicker at Washington from '91 to '93, and Michigan's Neil Snow, who played in 1902.

When Dayne arrived at Wisconsin in 1996, the Badgers were coming off a 4-5-2 record. With Dayne in the backfield, the Badgers went 37-13, including 21-3 in the last two seasons, and won three bowl games.

Dayne knows it is time to say goodbye.

"It's like leaving home," Dayne said. "Everybody has been so great, the fans, my teammates, coaches. So to me it's like another home. I left home my freshman year, and now I feel like I'm leaving home again. It hasn't really hit me yet."

Jeff Potrykus of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel is a regular contributor to ESPN.com.