With the Big Ten soccer tournament only two weeks away, the UW men’s team looks to its match this weekend against Northwestern University as a chance to boost their seeding.

The Saturday home contest marks the closing of the Badger’s Big Ten regular-season campaign. The team currently stands in second to last place, tied with Michigan, holding a 2-3 conference record. Their opponent, Northwestern, is the perennial cellar-dweller and this year the Wildcats are 0-4 in conference play.

While the result is meaningless for the Wildcats’ future, this game has a great deal of importance for the Badgers. A win to close out the Big Ten regular season would guarantee the Badgers a .500 season putting them at 8-8-0 overall.

More importantly, a win this weekend would put the Badgers in a four-way tie for second place in the league, and then it would be up to the computers to decide the seedings of each of the teams in the tournament.

The Badgers are coming off of a big win last week at Michigan State, led by strong defensive performances from senior Jon McGrady, sophomore Eric Hansen and freshman C.J. Lipinksi.

“Those have guys stepped it up,” said first-year Badger head coach Jeff Rohrman. “We’ve had to gut it out, roll up our sleeves and get the job done.”

Providing the scoring was freshman Phil Doeh, who now has five goals for the season, and sophomore Nick Van Sicklen, who leads the team with seven goals. The Badgers seem to have finally regained their offensive firepower as four different Badgers have scored each of the teams last four goals.

“Our forwards are dangerous,” Rohrman commented. “Each of them brings something unique to our attack and when we can find them and give them opportunities, we do well.”

The Badgers are one of the hardest working and well conditioned teams in the Big Ten and their form as of late has proven this. They have regained the momentum that they had earlier in the season, scoring goals, defending well, and yielding beneficial results. This turn around, after four straight losses, started two weeks ago in the second half against Michigan, when the Badgers regained their confidence with two goals in the final 20 minutes.

The Badgers have a way of getting results when they need them most, and this weekend will feature one of those games, especially since it is their last Big Ten game before the tournament starts in two weeks.