Some Wisconsin basketball fans may already be looking to the men’s basketball showdown with No. 16 Illinois at the Kohl Center next Wednesday night, but they must be careful not to overlook this weekend’s matchup.
The creaky old Williams Arena, with its bench seating and field-house atmosphere, houses a tough Minnesota team that will try to spoil Wisconsin’s party Sunday afternoon. Historically, Williams Arena hasn’t been kind to the Badgers; Minnesota holds a 58-27 all-time advantage there.
“There’s a lot of tradition there,” Kirk Penney said. “They have a different set-up with the court raised. It’s a tough place to play.”
On Feb. 16, 2002, however, Penney elevated his game on the strangely elevated Williams Arena floor, scoring 30 points on 9 of 13 from the field to polish off a season sweep of the Gophers with a 67-62 victory. A win Sunday would give Wisconsin another sweep over Minnesota, but to do so UW will have to exercise its road ghosts. However, the team is 4-5 away from the Kohl Center this season.
“The crowd fuels the fire,” Penney said of playing on the road. “It gives a team intensity, it gives a team the ability to pressure you just because of adrenaline. I think it’s as simple as that.”
Back in the friendly confines of Madison Jan. 15, UW defeated Minnesota 66-50 for its first Big Ten win of the season. Minnesota star forward Rick Rickert, a preseason Big Ten player of the year candidate, was limited to 14 points on 6-of-13 shooting while mired in foul trouble for much of the game. As a team, the Gophers shot just 36.2 percent.
That kind of frustration characterized the early part of the conference season for the Gophers, as Rickert struggled and the team sputtered to a 1-4 Big Ten start. But since that point, they’ve resurrected themselves from the ashes, winning seven of eight games at one point in the season.
However, with this in mind, a loss at Michigan State Wednesday night has the Gophers at 8-5, alone in fifth place in the Big Ten and teetering on the tourney bubble.
“Every team gets better,” UW forward Alando Tucker said of Minnesota’s improvement. “Around this time of year every team has gone through their ups and downs, so every team gets better around this time. You really know what to expect. They know what to expect from us, and we know what to expect from them. We just want to stay consistent. If we stay consistent, we can win.”
As the Gophers have gotten better, so has Rickert. He leads the team with 15.8 points and 6.3 rebounds per game, good for ninth and seventh in the conference, respectively.
With 6-foot-11 Rickert, 6-foot-11 sophomore center Jeff Hagen, 6-foot-10 senior center Jerry Holman and 6-foot-8 junior forward Michael Bauer, the Gophers bring much more size than the Badgers.
This is the same old story for UW forwards Tucker and Mike Wilkinson, who have battled bigger players all season and more than just lived to tell about it. In the two teams’ first meeting, Bauer, who averages 12 points per game, was the only one of the four big men to score at least 10 points besides Rickert.
In addition to its size, Minnesota also has depth. It’s not uncommon to see head coach Dan Monson change five players at a time, and 10 Gophers have seen more than 10 minutes per game this season.
Earlier in the year, this may have been a bigger issue for UW. But with the emergence of guards Boo Wade and Clayton Hanson and big men Andreas Helmigk and Dave Mader off the bench, it’s not much of a concern anymore.
Williams Arena has stood since 1928. That is still four years older than Wisconsin’s last back-to-back Big Ten titles, in 1923 and 1924. A win Sunday at Williams Arena would give UW the opportunity to do so once again against Illinois next Wednesday.
