Back from a third-place finish at the Las Vegas Invitational, Wisconsin (4-2 overall) will host Virginia (4-2) Wednesday as part of the ACC-Big Ten Challenge.
During the inter-conference series, each team is pitted against an opponent form the opposing conference, and the conference whose teams win more games, wins the challenge.
The Big Ten lost the first 10 years of the challenge before winning its first in 2009, when Wisconsin contributed with a win over then-No. 5 Duke, 73-69, at the Kohl Center.
While the Big Ten has won each of the last three series, the Badgers lost their matchup last season, 60-57, in Chapel Hill, N.C., against the then-No. 5 Tar Heels. Senior forward Mike Bruesewitz said that although there is a sense of conference pride on the line, the Badgers’ approach will not change Wednesday.
“We’ve got a good opponent coming in,” Bruesewitz said. “They’re long, they’re athletic, they can shoot. Virginia’s an NCAA tournament team.”
The Cavaliers are the third team from last season’s NCAA tournament Wisconsin will face in its first seven games. Although the Badgers have tripped up a couple times in the early stages of the season, Bruesewitz said he would rather the team “learn from the hiccups” than play in games where it blows out the opponent.
“We just gotta keep taking these learning experiences and moving forward, because we got some young guys that don’t quite have the minutes,” Bruesewitz said. “But they’re learning things quickly and picking things up.”
Perhaps no player is picking things up quicker for Wisconsin than freshman forward Sam Dekker, who scored a season-high 19 points on 7-of-13 shooting against Arkansas Saturday. The Sheboygan, Wis., native is one of four Badgers scoring in double-digits (11.5 points per game).
Associate head coach Greg Gard credited part of Dekker’s early success to pure instinct, saying the freshman simply understands how to play the game.
“There’s things he makes mistakes on offensively, but he’s skilled enough and has a high enough basketball IQ that he just makes up for it,” Gard said. “Sometimes he’s scoring by accident.”
Despite never coming off the bench in his career until arriving in Madison, Dekker said he’s accepted his role, providing a spark off the bench.
“It’s what I do now,” Dekker said. “If that’s going to help us win, then I’ll do that as long as I need to.”
The Cavaliers play at a similar pace to the Badgers, averaging just under 63 possessions per game to Wisconsin’s 65. Gard said that even if the two teams try to play at the same tempo, the basis of Wisconsin’s game plan would not change.
“Maybe the pieces of their puzzle are a little bit different,” Gard said. “But in terms of what we will try to do defensively, minimizing the amount of easy looks and high percentage shots that a team gets, that’s not gonna change from now until we play our last game of the year.”
Tip is set for 6 p.m. Wednesday.
