Wednesday night at the Kohl Center marks the end of another basketball regular season. However, the buzz around the locker room is unlike that of any regular season game.
The men's basketball team (10-5 Big Ten, 17-11 overall) has been playing with a postseason mentality and are focused to close out the regular season with their sixth straight conference victory and avenge a 64-53 loss to the Michigan Wolverines (5-9 Big Ten, 10-15 overall).
However, there is much more at stake than that. With losses from Ohio State and Indiana Tuesday night, the Badgers now have something larger to play for'a share of the Big Ten Championship.
Coming into this game, the Badgers have a perfect Big Ten record on their home court and look to slow down the fast-paced Wolverines to finish a stellar 6-0 at home. In such a even, tough conference, establishing home court dominance is necessary to having great success.
Coach Amaker's Wolverines came out in a Feb. 2 game and implemented a new lineup with a faster, quicker paced game that in turn energized the crowd. Michigan jumped all over UW early, and the Badgers had a tough time playing catch up.
The Badger players recognized this and emphasize the importance of doing the same, in return, Wednesday night. Junior guard and leading scorer Kirk Penney explains how the team must set the tempo.
\Similar to how they came out and jumped all over us at the beginning of the game last time, we must do the same on Wednesday,"" Penney said. ""We have to set our tempo, take control, execute and then see what happens. Like they used the crowd on us, we must do the same on them.""
Michigan is a team that presents some match up problems for the Badgers. The Wolverines are lead by junior Forward LaVell Blanchard and his 14.3 points per game. With their quickness and versatile post players, the Badgers will have their hands full.
""There is no doubt that they are lightening quick and have the big men that can come out and shoot the three,"" Penney said. ""We must control them and play our game.""
A key match up will be Blanchard versus Penney, however the more important match up will be that of team chemistry.
The talk of the Big Ten the past few weeks, the Badgers have found a variety of ways to win the big games. Within the past five games alone, the Badgers have shown their depth with three different players leading the team in scoring.
Freshman Forward Mike Wilkinson emphasizes the importance of team play, hard work and everyone understanding their roles on the team.
""This is a team game and we play as a team,"" Wilkinson said. ""When you are a team, everyone knows their roles and steps up when they need to. We have worked real hard all season and the coaches have conditioned us well for this time of the year.""
However, Wilkinson and Penney both reiterated the importance of not overlooking Michigan and getting caught up in the success of what may happen.
""We have not accomplished anything yet. We have not won anything,"" Penney said. ""We have to continue to win and not look at the standings. We just have to play our game.\
