Wisconsin Badgers: Long week for men is over, women host Northwestern
By Joey Lovell
The Wisconsin Lady Badgers hope to use their last game against Valparaiso, a 59-44 victory on Wednesday evening, as a spring board as the back-half of conference play. Sitting at 12th place in a tie with Minnesota, Wisconsin has an overall record 7-14 and 2-7 on the conference slate. Northwestern is in last place, winless in the conference and 7-13 overall.
Forming a very potent 1-2, inside-outside tandem, Wisconsin senior guard Julie Pospisilova and freshman forward Serah Williams look to have a big day against a Northwestern team that averages giving up 71.4 PPG. I expect Pospisilova, who leads the Badgers in scoring with 12.6 PPG to have about 14 points but perhaps set a season high in assists. Williams, right be Pospisilova with 12.4 points, could have a MONSTER as Northwestern’s interior defense would never be accused of being stingy.
Northwestern counters with their own inside-outside duo of sophomore forward Caileigh Walsh and senior guard Sydney Wood. The only two Lady Wildcats averaging more than 10 PPG, Walsh goes for 12.3 points and 5.3 rebounds per game, and Wood puts up 11.1 points and 4.8 boards a contest.
One of the Badgers other strong-points is also one of their greatest weaknesses. Freshmen guard Matyson Wilke, Senior guard Avery LaBarbera and junior guard Brooke Schramek also all average over 10 points a game. Unfortunately, that is there the depth of the squad lies, as they really only go 7 deep. This slight defiency in depth was evident in Wisconsin’s last loss to Penn State. They took a 50-47 lead into the 4th quarter, only to lose 74-69.
Tip-off is this afternoon in the Kohl Center at 1 p.m. (CST). Go support our girls as they try and start to change the whole season around in the second half.