Preview: Wisconsin Looks For Eighth-Straight Win Over Minnesota

Minnesota (8-7, 0-4 Big Ten) vs. Wisconsin (12-3, 2-2 Big Ten)

Date/Time – Friday, January 10, 6 p.m.

Arena – Kohl Center (16,838)

Watch – Peacock (Chris Vosters and Stephen Bardo)

Radio – Badgers Radio Network (Matt Lepay and Brian Butch), Sirius 106 or 195, stream online on iHeartRadio.

Series – Wisconsin leads 108-104 (Wisconsin leads 68-34 in Madison)

Last Meeting – Wisconsin won, 61-59, on January 23, 2024, in Minneapolis

Follow Online: The Badgers’ Den

Twitter: @Badger_Blitz

Betting line: Wisconsin -13

Player to Watch: Tonje is shooting 46.0 percent from the floor. He is second in the Big Ten shooting 93.5 percent at the FT line and is second on UW at 37.7 percent on three-point field goals.

Player to watch: Isaac Asuma continues to shine as a freshman for the Gophers. Against Ohio State, the rookie added 18 points, which bettered his previous best of 11 he set against Wake Forest in November. He played 40 minutes and was 7-of-11 with three treys, all career bests.

Wisconsin and Minnesota will be playing for the 213th time on Friday, making the Gophers the most-played opponent in UW history.

The Badgers have won seven straight games against Minnesota, 16 of the last 18 meetings, and are 36-9 since 1999.

Wisconsin is 12-2 overall against Minnesota under head coach Greg Gard.

A total of 16 points decided the past five Badgers-Gophers contests.

UW’s roster features 5 players from Minnesota: senior Steven Crowl (Eagan), sophomore Nolan Winter (Lakeville), redshirt freshman Jack Janicki and true freshmen Daniel Freitag (Bloomington) and Jack Robison (Lakeville). Winter’s father, Trevor, played basketball on Minnesota’s 1997 Final Four team, and his mother, Heidi, played volleyball at Minnesota.

In five career starts vs. Minnesota, Crowl is averaging 15.2 ppg and 5.2 rpg, shooting 31-49 FG (63.3 percent).

Wisconsin ranks 12th in the nation in offensive efficiency per KenPom. UW’s mark of 121.1 would rank as the school’s fourth-highest mark in the KenPom era (1997).

Three different Badgers have scored 25+ points in a game this season, and the Badgers have four 30-point efforts already: John Tonje (41 vs. ARIZ, 33 vs. Pitt), John Blackwell (32 vs. Iowa, 30 vs. UTRGV), and Max Klesmit (26 pts vs. Montana St).

The Badgers lead the NCAA shooting 85.5 percent (272-for-318) from the free throw line. At this rate, UW is on pace to shatter Villanova’s NCAA record of 83.0 percent and the Big Ten record – which UW set at 81.8 percent in 2010-11.

UW is holding opponents to 30.5 percent from 3-point range this season. Only five of UW’s 15 opponents have hit 35 percent or better from deep.

Winter averaged 2.4 points per game last season. His points per game increase of 8.8 points per game is the fourth-largest increase in the Big Ten, trailing Penn State’s Trey Kaufman-Renn (+11.4), Northwestern’s Nick Martinelli (+10.6), and Ohio State’s Devin Royal (+9.9).

Minnesota has 10 seniors on its team this year, tied for the most in the Big Ten with USC. The Gophers have an average team age of 22.3. The breakdown of the season is 10 seniors, one junior, three sophomores and two freshmen. Eleven of the 16 players began their college careers at another school.

Minnesota’s scoring defense ranks fourth in the Big Ten. Minnesota has allowed 66.7 points per game (1,000 total) in its 15 games into the season, which trails only UCLA, Maryland, and Northwestern.

Minnesota holds the Big Ten lead in blocks averaging 5.4 and that ranks 20th nationally. They also rank third in assist/turnover ratio (1.62).

Dawson Garcia was the first player since Jordan Murphy in 2017-18 to lead the Gophers in both points (17.6) and rebounds (6.7) during the 2023-24 season. He leads the Gophers in both categories this season.

Minnesota had a chance to build its first momentum in Big Ten play on Monday. Having a good Ohio State team on the ropes, the Gophers shot 45.7 percent from the field and 12-for-29 from three-point range. The problem was free throws, a glaring issue since the start of the season. Minnesota went 12-for-27 from the line, including three of four in the final minute of regulation. The result was a double overtime loss, another gut punch, and a fifth straight loss to a Power-Four team.

The Gophers should be better. Garcia is putting up career numbers in his final season of college basketball, shooting a career-best 49.4 percent from the floor and is a three-point threat (35.6). Head coach Ben Johnson has a group that guards aggressively and force over 11 turnovers a game. Minnesota average 68.8 points per game (316th in Division-1) but that’s partially due to its methodical pace, ranking 360th nationally in adjusted tempo.

Can the Gophers slow Wisconsin? UW ranks 11th in adjusted offensive efficiency. The best offensive unit the Gophers have played to this point is Purdue, which is ranked one spot behind UW. Minnesota held Purdue to 28 points in the first half, but saw the Boilermakers drop 53 on them in the second half eight days ago. Purdue shot 50 percent from the field, 44 percent from the perimeter, and averaged 1.421 points per possession.

I expect a similar result, a close game early that Wisconsin blows open in the second half.

Worgull’s Prediction: Wisconsin by 17

Record: 12-3 (11-4 ATS)

Points off Prediction: 130 (8.7 per game)

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