A Very Important Week for Wisconsin Basketball

So the Big Ten/ACC Challenge (I don’t care what it’s called year by year, that’s what I’m calling it) is here again. It was a tough night for the B1G last night, but tonight on paper looks better.

As we talked about yesterday, the Badgers have put their first eight games in the win column for the first time in 20 years. They’ve done this while playing a tough schedule, a schedule that doesn’t get any easier this week.

In fact, I’d say this is the biggest week of the non-conference schedule.

Let’s break it down a little bit.

Wisconsin heads to Virginia tonight to face a 7-1 Virginia team whose only loss came against VCU. Virginia is very tough at home, but yet, as the Hawkeyes showed in the NIT last year, are still beatable. After already getting resume boosting wins against St. John’s, Florida, and St. Louis, racking up a road win against a good team would be a perfect complement.

Then, on Saturday in the Kohl Center, the Badgers face those rivals from the east, Marquette. While Marquette appears to be a little down this year, it doesn’t matter in this series. A win against the Golden Eagles would be the second win against a Big East team this year and could potentially put Wisconsin at 10-0, which, you know, round numbers look good.

The Badgers then have three winnable non-conference games left before heading to Evanston to start B1G play. Facing UW-Milwaukee at home is a game that needs to be won, but the Panthers are 8-2 and always give the Badgers a good game. Following that, Eastern Kentucky comes to town at 6-2. There’s another great game that Wisconsin should win, but it won’t hurt the RPI.

The non-conference schedule then finishes with Prairie View A&M, which, well, they are bad. After this non-conference schedule, though, a game like that is fine to schedule.

That’s what makes this week so important. Win these two, and barring an upset, the Badgers will head to the B1G season 13-0 and ranked in the Top 5, at least. Lose them, and while this has been a historical season so far, the national attention will fade away.

Let’s see the direction the Badgers want to take.