Wisconsin Basketball travels to Michigan State Friday night for a chance at moving into a tie with the Spartans and two other teams for first place in the Big Ten. What will the Badgers need to do to win on the road against a Michigan State team that is coming off a really bad loss?
Wisconsin Basketball has had quite the up and down season. They looked lost in November and December. Luckily the college basketball regular season doesn’t end until March. Wisconsin did get wins over Marquette and Indiana early on. The turning point came at the end of 2019 in a big-time road win over Tennessee. The Badgers have wins over three-ranked opponents with two of them coming on the road.
There’s no arguing that the Big Ten is loaded this season. 12 teams are in the NET top-50 at mid-week. Road wins were so hard to find back in December and still are. Wisconsin already has two. After a crazy half of January, Wisconsin is 4-2 and tied for second in the Big Ten with Rutgers and Illinois of all teams. Michigan State lost its first Big Ten game at its Achilles Heel, Mackey Arena. That means if Wisconsin can win at the Breslin Center Friday night, there will be a four-way tie for first place between Wisconsin, Michigan State, Illinois and Rutgers.
The Spartans are an interesting team. Cassius Winston has obviously led them to many victories this season and will continue to do so. The biggest knock on Michigan State is finding other scorers than Winston and Xavier Tillman. Why does that matter when both players are capable of scoring 20 or more per game. Tom Izzo has given up on letting Rocket Watts stay in the lineup and shoot until he makes one. Since then the Spartans occasionally get Gabe Brown and Aaron Henry to have a nice night.
I’ve told you the Big Ten is playing at historic pace right now and yet in Michigan State’s three conference wins since the New Year have an average margin of victory at 18. The two games before that came by 33 and 53. Then their beatdown by Purdue came from a 29-point loss. Michigan State hasn’t played in a close game since December 18 at Northwestern.
Wisconsin’s largest margin in any game since the New Year came against Penn State in a nine-point win. The Badgers already won in Columbus this year so traveling to Michigan State isn’t going to scare them. What will Wisconsin have to do to keep rolling in the Big Ten?