Coach Barry Alvarez's Biography:
In the decade of the
1990s, the Wisconsin football program has been elevated from laughing
stock to a perennial bowl participant. Energetic ninth-year head coach
Barry Alvarez is the person credited with overseeing that resurrection.
Alvarez, who turned 52 two days prior to the Badgers' Rose Bowl game
last January (a 38-31 victory over UCLA), has raised spirits and
expectations for a once-moribund gridiron program. Alvarez, who enjoyed
immense success as a player at Nebraska and as an assistant coach at
Iowa and Notre Dame prior to his appointment in Madison, has turned the
football fortunes around at a school that won just nine times in the
four years before his arrival.
 He
was named head football coach on Jan. 2, 1990, just after Notre Dame
(where Alvarez was assistant head coach) defeated Colorado in the Orange
Bowl to win the national championship. Alvarez' record at Wisconsin
entering the 1999-00 season was 60-42-4 (.585). During his tenure,
Alvarez reversed the fortunes of a program that had hit rock bottom.
After a 1-10 rookie season, Alvarez guided the UW to a Big Ten
co-championship and Rose Bowl triumph in his fourth year. Only two
coaches in Big Ten history, Alvarez and Ohio State's Wes Fesler
(1947-49), took last-place programs their first year and turned them
into eventual league champs. Besides the obvious on-field improvement,
home crowds have increased by more than 36,000 per game since his
arrival. The Badgers have ranked in the top 10 nationally for attendance
the last five seasons and have played in front of 25 more-than-capacity
crowds in the last 28 games at Camp Randall Stadium.
Coach Alvarez' Awards:
 Barry
Alvarez' Coaching Awards - American Football Coaches Association
National Coach of the Year, 1993 - Bobby Dodd Foundation National Coach
of the Year, 1993 - College and Pro Football Newsweekly National Coach
of the Year, 1993 - College Sports Magazine National Coach of the Year,
1993 - Big Ten Conference Coach of the Year, 1993 Alvarez earned his
B.S. degree in '69 and an M.A. degree from Nebraska in '71.
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