Byline: JIM POLZIN The Capital Times jpolzin@madison.com
One of the more contentious moments in the rivalry between the University of Wisconsin and Iowa football programs didn't happen at Camp Randall Stadium or Kinnick Stadium.
It occurred inside the Hawkeyes' indoor practice facility on Oct. 27, 2000, when a flag football game between the teams' managers was stopped late in the second half because a skirmish had erupted.
'There weren't any punches thrown,' said Rick Nelson, who injured his hamstring early in the game and admits his trash talk from the sidelines didn't help matters. 'But there was a lot of pushing and shoving and guys in a pile on the ground.'
Welcome to the rivalry within the rivalry between the Badgers and Hawkeyes that will resume tonight in Madison.
Long before there was a Heartland Trophy, the statue of a bull that the teams began playing for in 2004, there was another symbol of competition in the series. The battle for the Rusty Toolbox began in 1991 and was the brainchild of John Chadima, who at the time was the director of football operations under coach Barry Alvarez, and his counterpart at Iowa, Bill Dervich.
Chadima, a former manager at Iowa who worked under Dervich, and his former boss thought it would be fun to start a friendly game between the team's managers. Little did Chadima and Dervich know the series would still be going strong 18 years later - or that it would become so emotionally charged at times.
The 16th installment of the game is scheduled to begin at 10:30 tonight inside the McClain Center - just more than 12 hours and a stone's throw away from where UW and Iowa will meet for the 85th time Saturday at Camp Randall.
'You hear about it and everybody gets you excited, but when you actually play you realize it's a little bit more than just a flag football game,' said Daron Jones, a manager for the Badgers from 1999 to 2003 who now works for the UW Athletic Department as an event manager. 'I think that's probably the reason why some years it took on a life of its own as far as the physical play.'
The series got off to a controversial start. After Iowa won the first meeting in 1991, the game wasn't played the next season because of friction between Alvarez and Hawkeyes coach Hayden Fry. Early in the week leading up to UW's game at Iowa, Alvarez had wondered aloud during a news conference whether Iowa had violated NCAA rules by not counting a running session on Sunday as a practice session. Fry, who counted Sunday as the mandatory off day for the players, felt he was within the rules because no coaches were present while the players were running.
Needless to say, Fry wasn't happy with Alvarez and played a role in the game between the managers being called off.
But it resumed in 1995 - Iowa didn't appear on UW's schedule in 1993 and '94 - and has been going strong ever since. UW enjoyed some early success, winning three times in four seasons between 1995 and '98, but it has been all Hawkeyes ever since. Iowa has won nine of the last 10 games, and even the Badgers' win during that span was controversial.
Iowa accused UW of bringing in a ringer for the 2003 game, which the Badgers won 18-0 thanks largely to the play of Thomas Hammock. A former standout running back at Northern Illinois, Hammock played defensive end for the UW managers and spent the better part of the game in Iowa's backfield.
Chadima received a number of angry e-mails from Iowa the next week but stood his ground. Although Hammock later would become a graduate assistant on the football staff, he was technically filling in as a manager at the time of the 2003 game and thus was eligible to play.
It wasn't the first time there was a serious side to what started out as a friendly game.
'We were told that we had to win,' said Matt Klein, a manager at UW from 1994 to '98. 'It was a serious thing. We wanted to win for us, obviously, but we wanted the players to see it the next day because they were always asking. It was a very prideful thing.
'It built up from a friendly flag football game into kind of a big deal.'
Even Klein was surprised how big. The game now includes referees - part of the crew that does the Sun Prairie-Verona high school game will officiate the Rusty Toolbox game tonight - and sometimes has more than 100 spectators.
The one huge advantage Iowa has is its managers play together in a recreational flag football league on campus.
'They're pretty good,' said Greg Morris, Iowa's equipment manager. 'They usually only lose one or two games a year.'
UW has had some notable players in the series, though they're hardly regarded for their athleticism. That list includes Klein, who serves as the right-hand man to coach Mike McCarthy in his role as football administration coordinator for the Green Bay Packers; Bill Nayes, a manager at UW from 1989 to '93 who's in his first year as the special assistant to San Francisco 49ers coach Mike Singletary after a three-year stint as UW's director of football operations; Brett Schroedel, the general manager of the Eau Claire Express, a rival of the Madison Mallards in the Northwoods League; and Nelson, who served as an administrative assistant under coach Bill Callahan when the Oakland Raiders went to the Super Bowl following the 2001 season and is the younger brother of former UW safety Scott Nelson.
'I know John (Chadima) and (equipment manager Mark Peeler) didn't hire guys to be managers because they're good athletes,' Nayes said. 'Somebody recommended them because they're really good workers.'
UW will try to end a five-game losing streak tonight and regain the Rusty Toolbox, which is filled with seashells and sand from Iowa's trip to Miami for the 2003 Orange Bowl and Chadima's hair that was shaved off after UW's victory in 2003.
'After the games you can kind of be buddy, buddy,' said Rick Nelson, a manager at UW from 1996 to 2000. 'But during the game, I always kind of looked at it like that game set the tone for the whole weekend.'
CAPTION(S):
Submitted photo
Iowa owns an 11-4 advantage in the battle for The Rusty Toolbox. The Hawkeyes have won five straight in the flag football game between UW and Iowa managers.
