Dominating the Rivalry: Wisconsin Basketball vs. Nebraska

The hiring of then-Milwaukee head coach Bo Ryan yielded little fanfare outside the city of Madison.

Other than an improbable run to the Final Four in 2000, there had been few bright spots since the Badgers hung their 1947 Big Ten championship banner. Not only were there no Big Ten titles over that 54-year stretch, but Wisconsin also had four times as many losing seasons (32) as top-four finishes in the league (eight). There were just four NCAA tournament appearances, including 47 straight seasons without one.

So, when Dick Bennett abruptly retired in November 2000, he took with him some of the excitement as the Badgers stumbled to a 13-loss season and a first-round upset. Ryan and associate head coach Greg Gard didn’t wait long to change the culture.

Winning back-to-back Big Ten titles in their first two seasons, the Badgers have been dominant in winning 71.0 percent of its games during Ryan’s 14 seasons as head coach and in the last six-plus seasons under Gard (498-203 through Jan.21). UW has won eight Big Ten titles, appeared in 18 of the last 19 NCAA tournaments, and advanced to two Final Fours.

Since Ryan and Gard arrived, Wisconsin has the most Big Ten wins and the best winning percentage in the conference at 247-115 (.682) and has flipped many conference rivalries that had long been one-sided affairs.

Over the course of this Big Ten season, BadgerBlitz will examine Wisconsin’s series with the 13 other conference teams, what it was before Ryan and Gard arrived, what the series looks like now, and some memorable moments along the way.

Today, we look at Wisconsin’s series with Nebraska.

RELATED: Iowa | Maryland | Ohio State | Northwestern | Michigan State |

Pre 2001-02: Nebraska led 10-6

Since 2001-02: Wisconsin leads 14-4

Ryan’s Record vs. Nebraska: 6-1 (3-1 in Lincoln, Neb., 0-0 neutral)

Gard’s Record vs. Nebraska: 8-3 (4-1 in Lincoln, Neb., 1-1 neutral)

Record when both teams were ranked: Ryan 0-0; Gard 0-0

When Wisconsin was ranked, Nebraska was not: Ryan 4-1, Gard 5-0

When Nebraska was ranked, Wisconsin was not: Ryan 0-0, Gard 0-0

When both teams were unranked: Ryan 2-0, Gard 3-3

Nebraska didn’t join the Big Ten until 2011, but the two schools had been playing one another since 1904. It started out decent with the Badgers winning five of the first seven between the beginning and 1955, including a 34-4 beatdown in 1908. It’s the fewest points UW has allowed in a game, a record that will likely stand forever.

But starting with the Huskers winning the 1956 game as the end of a home-and-home series, Nebraska won eight straight over a 35-year period. That included sweeping two home-and-home series, winning in Lincoln in consecutive years (90-91), and being 4-0 in one-possession games.

When the Badgers beat Nebraska in the fifth-place game of the 1998 Top of the World Classic in Fairbanks, Alaska, it marked the fifth different city the two teams had squared off in (Honolulu, Lincoln, Madison, Milwaukee).

Under Ryan: It wasn’t quite as one-sided as the football team’s rivalry with the Huskers, but was close. The Badgers rudely welcomed Nebraska with a 64-40 victory in the Huskers' first conference game in 2011, a run of five straight Big Ten victories for Wisconsin in the series. UW won those games by scoring in the 70s, 60s, 50s, and 40s. Welcome to the Big Ten.

The only loss Ryan experienced to Nebraska was in the regular-season finale in 2014, a nine-point road loss in a raucous Pinnacle Bank Arena to a Huskers team that needed the victory, boosting what turned out to be its first NCAA tournament appearance since 1998. UW righted the ship the next year in sweeping the Huskers on the way to a Big Ten title.

Under Gard: Interim Gard won his first meeting against the Huskers but in his first game without the interim label, Nebraska knocked the Badgers out in the second round of the Big Ten Tournament. UW lost two of the next three against the Huskers (the only win being a one-point overtime victory in 2017), but the Badgers have rattled off wins in the last six meetings, all but one of those victories being less than 11 points.

Overall, Ryan/Gard went 2-0 against Doc Sadler, 8-4 against Tim Miles, and 4-0 against Fred Hoiberg.

Wisconsin rarely, if ever, went more than 75 minutes before a game under Ryan. It was rumored that some of Wisconsin’s opponents, including the Huskers, had practiced as long as three hours at the Kohl Center to prepare for the Badgers. Ryan offered this response when asked about preparing his team prior to games.

“We never prepared any differently for one team than we did other teams. If you’ve been taught that and then your assistants have been thought that, then you have a staff who is pretty consistent with how they prepare. We’d figure out (the opponent’s) strengths and go halfcourt and break it down, but we’d never go half speed. People stopped making that mistake when they asked what we did in our walkthrough. Walkthrough? We never “walked” through anything. If we were going to be on the floor, we were going to practice. Guys were going to be ready.”

There haven’t been many in the brief 10 seasons these two have played together as conference foes. Arguably the best game was the 2014 regular-season finale in which the Huskers erased a seven-point deficit in the second half and pulled away late. However, a different game in Lincoln stands out with a more favorable result.

Nigel Hayes scored 18 of his 20 points in the second half and overtime, including the go-ahead 3-pointer with 18.4 seconds left in overtime that lifted No.7 Wisconsin to a 70-69 victory.

Zak Showalter made 4 of 6 3s and finished with 15 points, Bronson Koenig added 12 and Ethan Happ blocked Tai Webster's shot with two seconds left, giving No. 7 Wisconsin a 70-69 victory.

"As Ethan and I like to say to one another, big players make big-time plays," Hayes said. "I'll never lose confidence in myself. I could have missed my last 30 3s and I knew I was going to make that one."

The Huskers had lost seven of their last eight entering the game but held Wisconsin to 36.5 percent shooting and outrebounded the visitors, 50-37. The Huskers had the momentum entering overtime after Nebraska’s Michael Jacobson hit a 3-pointer with a tenth of a second left to tie the score and carried it into the extra session, scoring the first basket and leading until Hayes’s shot.

Webster tried a shot from underneath with 3.3 seconds left, but Happ blocked it, got the rebound, and was able to call time out before falling out of bounds. Nebraska couldn't get off another shot.

_________________________________________________

*Chat about this article in The Badgers' Den

*Check out our videos, interviews, and Q&As on our YouTube channel

*Subscribe and listen to the BadgerBlitz.com podcast (as seen on Apple, Google, Spotify and wherever you listen to podcasts)

*Follow us on Twitter: @McNamaraRivals, @JakeKoco, @TheBadgerNation, @RaulV45

*Like us on Facebook