For the second year in a row, the Badger football team will be without its top running back for an extended period of time. The latest reports on senior Anthony Davis, who suffered an eye injury in the second quarter of last Saturday's win against the University of Central Florida, states that he is expected to miss at least three weeks. Davis will be sidelined with an injury yet again, as ankle problems kept him off of the field for the majority of last season.
The Badgers, who are already extremely thin at the running back position with the off-season loss of junior Dwayne Smith to a heart condition, will call on sophomore Booker Stanley to handle the bulk of the carries. Stanley filled in as Davis went down in the opener and joins freshman Chris Pressley as the only backs on the roster with actual game experience.
Stanley rushed 12 times for 47 yards against Central Florida, while Pressley carried eight times for 22 yards but fumbled twice.
The coaching staff may need to call on another freshman, Jamil Walker, who at 6'1\ and 205 lbs. could provide a nice compliment to power backs Stanley and Pressley.
Another avenue offensive coordinator Brian White might explore is bumping versatile junior fullback Matt Bernstein to tailback, thus providing more experience to the unit.
Coaches during spring practice seemed to foresee this problem occurring as they rushed the development of both Pressley and Walker, and threw out the idea of redshirting either player early during camp.
Pressley seems to have the most immediate upside of the two.Standing at 6'1"" and 262 pounds, the young freshman has already drawn comparisons to past Badger great Ron Dayne.
Similar to Dayne, he will be given a chance as a freshman to make an impact due to the loss of Davis.
For the time being, Davis will be withheld from practice and games for at least three weeks, and will be reevaluated thereafter to see if the vision in his eye improves.
Along with this weekend against UNLV, Davis is expected to miss the Badgers' game at Arizona and the Big Ten opener against Penn State. At the earliest, he would be ready for the Badger's second conference game against Illinois.
