The Wisconsin Badgers (2-5 Big Ten, 6-11 overall), not the Minnesota Golden Gophers (4-3, 12-6), have dug themselves a deep borough that they soon hope to pop out of.
Coming off its dramatic, last-second victory over Michigan State, Thursday night’s trip to University Park looked like it could potentially be a trap game for Wisconsin. Though Penn State made things interesting down the stretch, the Badgers were able to hold on to pick up a road win and earn back-to-back Big Ten victories for the first time this season. Redshirt freshman forward Ethan Happ scored a career-high 20 points and grabbed 11 rebounds to record his seventh double-double of the season, as Wisconsin (3-4 Big Ten, 11-9 overall) outlasted the Nittany Lions (2-5, 11-9) 66-60. The Badgers led by as much as 17 in the second half, but a late, furious Penn State rally cut the deficit as low as three.
With home losses to Western Illinois, Milwaukee and Green Bay it became almost inconceivable to think that Wisconsin had much of a chance to defeat potential Final contender Michigan State last Sunday.
The end of the No. 2 Wisconsin Badgers’ (16-1-1 WCHA, 22-1-1 overall) 18-game winning streak at the hands of North Dakota right before the winter break did not slow them down at all at the start of the second half of the season.
The Wisconsin Badgers are trying to build the championship culture that the Maryland Terrapins currently have.
After losing two close games to No. 14 Penn State last weekend, Wisconsin welcomes archrival Minnesota to the Kohl Center in a series that could change the course of its season.
It’s rare for head coach Bobbie Kelsey to give her team a motivational speech before games. While her players likely could have used a little more inspiration in the locker room after two consecutive lethargic starts, Kelsey fully expects her team to be ready to go in their toughest challenge yet against Maryland (5-1 Big Ten, 16-2 overall) Wednesday at the Kohl Center. The Badgers (2-4, 6-10) are not worried about an accomplished Maryland team and its deep roster, but instead are more concerned with their own performance. “Anybody can beat anybody on any given day,” Kelsey preached to her team at practice Monday afternoon. The Badgers, though, will likely need to play their best game yet to upend a Terrapins team that has made the Final Four two consecutive seasons, something the Badgers are hoping to one day accomplish. “We’re trying to build a championship culture,” Kelsey said.
After losing five games by three points or less this season, Wisconsin (10-9 overall, 2-4 Big Ten) finally received a break as it upset No. 4 Michigan State (16-3, 3-3) 77-76 in a thriller at the Kohl Center Sunday.
From the moment he took over as interim head coach, Greg Gard has been fighting an uphill battle. Taking over for a coach as iconic as Bo Ryan was always going to be tough, but replacing him in the midst of the Badgers’ worst start in 14 years made his task all the more difficult. A radical shift in philosophy was never going to be on the table for Gard, who spent 23 years as an assistant under Ryan, but there have been significant changes in the way he coaches this team when compared to his predecessor. Of these changes that Gard has made since taking over in late December, none have been more pivotal than the switch back to a swing offense and an increased reliance on the bench. For years, the swing offense was a staple of Bo Ryan-coached teams.
Throughout the Badgers’ (2-4 Big Ten, 6-10 overall) season, when the team finds itself trailing, it usually finds a way to wage a tenacious and heartfelt effort to climb its way back into games.
Following a tough, hard-fought loss against Michigan State last Saturday, the Badgers (1-2 Big Ten, 5-8 overall) looked to climb back over .500 in the Big Ten standings.
After opening the Big Ten season with a win earlier in the week, the Badgers (1-1 Big Ten, 5-7 overall) struggled in the first half of Sunday’s game en route to losing their first conference game of the season to the Michigan State Spartans (1-1, 10-3) 77-67. After trailing by a mere five points after the first quarter in East Lansing, Mich., the Badgers scored only nine points in the second period and went into the break down 14 points, a deficit that was too great for UW to overcome. Not only did the Badgers miss senior guard Tessa Cichy, who sat out her second consecutive game due to an illness, but also played almost the entire first half without Dakota Whyte due to foul trouble. Whyte picked up her second foul of the game with 7:43 to go in the first quarter and spent the rest of the half on the bench.
Wisconsin has had its difficulties closing out opponents at home this season, but thanks in large part to a career day from redshirt junior guard Zak Showalter, there was no drama at the Kohl Center Saturday afternoon. Showalter was a perfect 8-8 from the field, including 4-4 from behind the arc, to finish with a career-high 21 points.
After a momentous win for the football team in the Holiday Bowl less than 24 hours earlier, the Wisconsin women’s basketball team won its biggest game of the season, defeating Indiana, 73-69, in its Big Ten opener Thursday afternoon in Madison. Many expected senior guard Tessa Cichy to perform in a similar manner as her brother, Jack Cichy, did in the Holiday Bowl, but Tessa missed UW’s conference opener with an illness.
SAN DIEGO, Calif. - Back-to-back-to-back. It’s not a new Drake diss track, but it did come from a Wisconsin defender who was charged up.
SAN DIEGO, Calif. - The Badgers’ 23-21 win over USC in the Holiday Bowl Wednesday was a great send-off for the UW seniors, as they were able to ride off into the San Diego sunset on top.
Omnipresent in Bo Ryan’s career was his high level of intensity, an insatiable desire to continually get better from play to play and, above all else, success. Another more impactful constant in Ryan’s coaching life has been Greg Gard.
After nearly four decades as a coach at the collegiate level, Bo Ryan has finally decided to hang up the whistle for good. Ryan, who turns 68 next week, announced his immediate retirement during an emotional postgame press conference following Wisconsin’s 64-49 win over Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Tuesday night. “Extremely hard telling the players, as you can imagine,” Ryan said.
Often lost in the craziness of all the bowl games and national title talks is just how interesting the matchups can be.
Coming off one of the biggest wins in program history against Minnesota last weekend, the No. 1 Wisconsin Badgers (12-1-1 WCHA, 18-1-1 overall) suffered their first letdown of the season this weekend. Wisconsin failed to score a goal against the No. 9 ranked North Dakota Fighting Hawks (8-5-3, 11-6-3) in either game, losing 3-0 Friday and tying 0-0 Saturday, winning the shootout to earn an extra point in the standings.
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