I hope you haven’t gotten completely in football mode yet.
While we have found out bits and pieces over the last couple months, the 2013-2014 Wisconsin Men’s Basketball schedule was fully released today.
Early on, it looks like there will be some tough match-ups, both in the Big Ten and in non-conference.
First let’s start with the conference schedule. The four teams the Badgers will only play once this year are Michigan State, Ohio State, Nebraska and Penn State. Historically, that’s two upper tier and two lower tier teams, which is a wash. Where Wisconsin comes out on top is the fact that both Michigan State and Ohio State come to Madison while the Badgers travel to Lincoln and State College.
It’s still the Big Ten, so no schedule will be easy, but I do like how their four single games fell. It is also kind of interesting how the first and only time Wisconsin will see Nebraska is in the last game of the season. Hopefully the Badgers will have their fate in their own hands by then, as its unlikely Nebraska will be playing for an upper tier spot.
February will be a tough month for the Badgers. With home games against Ohio State, Michigan State, Minnesota, and Indiana, there isn’t a gimme in the bunch. Add in road games at Illinois, Michigan and Iowa and it’s a tough month. This usually seems like the time of season a Bo Ryan coached team really gels, and they’ll need that to be the case if they want to finish at the top of the conference.
I won’t go into too much detail on the non-conference schedule as most of that had already been released. It’s a fun, tough schedule, with St. John’s, Florida, Virginia, Marquette and two games in Cancun. Oral Roberts is also not a team to take lightly as they are usually a solid mid-major. There are still a couple cupcakes, but not nearly as many as some teams have. This will help both in experience by getting to play tougher opponents, and also help the team’s RPI by playing tougher teams. If the Badgers can win both at Green Bay and Virigina, it would go a long way towards padding that RPI even more.
Bo also gets to face the school he put on the map in an exhibition game. It will be the first time he’s played against UW-Platteville since the school named the court after him.
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