MADISON, Wis. -- Wisconsin's Big Ten championship game appearance ended in disappointment and embarrassment Saturday night. A day later, the Badgers learned their postseason bowl fate and can now begin the process of trying to make amends for that performance.
No. 18 Wisconsin (10-3) will play No. 19 Auburn (8-4) in the Outback Bowl in Tampa, Fla., on Jan. 1 at 11 a.m. CT. The game marks the Badgers' 13th consecutive bowl appearance -- and fifth straight January bowl game -- and will be televised by ESPN2. Alabama is the only other program to have appeared in a January bowl game in each of the last five seasons.
"It's consistently having very good players, a tradition of excellence and winning a bunch of football games," Badgers coach Gary Andersen said on a teleconference with reporters Sunday night. "We will make sure that all of our recruits and everybody that cares about Wisconsin football definitely knows that. I think it's very important, and it's a great accomplishment."
Wisconsin is coming off a 59-0 loss against Ohio State in the Big Ten title game in Indianapolis, which marked the Badgers' worst loss since 1979. Ohio State, meanwhile, was so impressive in the blowout that the College Football Playoff committee moved the Buckeyes into the four-team playoff on the strength of the resounding win.
Auburn opened the season 7-1 but lost its final three Southeastern Conference games to Texas A&M (41-38), Georgia (34-7) and top-ranked Alabama (55-44) to finish in fourth place in the SEC West division. Auburn coach Gus Malzahn even fired defensive coordinator Ellis Johnson after the Alabama loss and said Sunday night that he had not yet named who would coach the defense in the bowl game.
Auburn shares one common opponent with Wisconsin this season: LSU. Auburn defeated LSU 41-7, while Wisconsin lost its season opener 28-24.
Badgers players already were looking ahead to the prospect of playing in a bowl game following Saturday's loss.
"I think the group of guys that we have won't really have an issue bouncing back," Badgers quarterback Joel Stave said. "This one's going to hurt for a while, but that's what happens. We were fortunate to be in this situation. I think we had a very good year, won 10 games to give us an opportunity to play in this game. So as disappointing as it is, there was a lot of positives from this season. We've just got to look at those, learn from this week and get as much as we can out of bowl prep."
This will mark Andersen's second matchup against Auburn in his head coaching career. While coach at Utah State, his Aggies nearly upended defending national champion Auburn in the 2011 season opener. Instead, the Tigers scored twice in the final 2:07 to escape with a 42-38 victory against the Aggies.
"We'll have to see if it's the same offense, if it's changed at all, which I'm sure they've grown and developed as all the spread teams seem to add two or three new tweaks a year," Andersen said. "It was very difficult to defend on that day. I'm sure it's going to be very difficult to defend again.
"The key is to look and see where the athletes are and try to contain them and still be sound. We showed in this last game that we were not prepared to deal with the athletes around the field. We were not prepared scheme-wise to be able to handle it."
Outside of the New Year's Six bowl matchups, the Outback Bowl represents one of just two bowl games to feature two top-20 teams. This will mark Wisconsin's fifth appearance in the Outback Bowl. UW defeated Duke 34-20 in 1995 in what was then known as the Hall of Fame Bowl. In 1998, Georgia beat Wisconsin 33-6, and the Bulldogs again defeated the Badgers 24-21 in the 2005 version. Tennessee downed Wisconsin 21-17 in the Badgers' last appearance there in 2008.
Wisconsin last met Auburn in the 2005 Citrus Bowl and defeated the Tigers 24-10 in former Badgers coach Barry Alvarez's final game.
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