With less than one week left before the official start of the college basketball season, the Wisconsin Badgers released their 2020-21 schedule on Wednesday.

Greg Gard's team will play 20 Big Ten Conference games, starting on Dec. 21 against Nebraska.

“I’m happy to finally have a schedule put together and grateful to those who put a lot of time and effort into something none of us have ever navigated before,” Gard communicated through a release. “That includes Marc VandeWettering from our staff, who has spent an immeasurable amount of energy on this puzzle."

The Badgers have six non-conference games on the schedule: Eastern Illinois, Arkansas Pine-Bluff, Green Bay, Marquette (road), Louisville (Big Ten/ACC Challenge) and Northern Iowa. Gard said more could be added down the road.

“We have six non-conference games on the schedule right now, but we are still looking to add one additional home opponent in the month of December," Gard said. "Overall, with our non-conference schedule we tried to create the safest environment possible and having so many games at home allows us to have a little more control over some of the variables. As we all know, even this schedule could be fluid given the times we’re in.

"But today is confirmation that opening day is just a week away and I know our players will be excited to get on the floor and start playing games.”

Wisconsin starts the season ranked No. 7 in both the preseason AP Top 25 and Coaches Poll. According to the release, UW returns at least 77% of its scoring (78.7%), rebounding (83.6%), assists (86.1%), steals (79.7%), blocks (88.6%) and minutes (77.5%) from its 2019-20 squad.