Wisconsin (11-3, 0-2 Big Ten) vs Rutgers (8-6, 1-2 Big Ten)

Date/Time – Monday, January 6, 6 p.m.

Arena – Jersey Mike’s Arena (8,000)

Watch – FS1 (Alex Faust and Bill Raftery)

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

Series – Wisconsin leads 11-6 (Rutgers leads 4-3 in Piscataway, N.J.)

Last Meeting - Wisconsin won, 78-66, in overtime on March 7, 2024, in Madison

Follow Online: The Badgers' Den

Twitter: @Badger_Blitz

Betting line: Wisconsin -1

Player to Watch: Blackwell is coming off a career-high 32 points (6-10 3FGs) vs. Iowa (1/3) adding eight rebounds and five assists. Over the last three wins, Blackwell has 15 assists with just two turnovers.

Player to watch: Named to the preseason All-Big Ten team without playing a college game, Harper ranks fourth in the nation in scoring and first among freshmen. He is the first freshman with a 35+ point game and a triple-double since Kentucky’s De’Aaron Fox in 2016-17.

Wisconsin is 8-6 against Rutgers since the Scarlet Knights joined the Big Ten in 2014-15

The Badgers have won two of the last three meetings on the road. Rutgers has won three of the last five meetings.

UW is 8-0 when scoring more than 65 points against Rutgers and 9-2 when holding the Scarlet Knights to 65 or fewer points

Rutgers has three ranked wins over the Badgers since joining the Big Ten (vs. No. 4 UW in 2015, at No. 14 Wisconsin in 2022, vs. No. 9/11 Wisconsin in 2024). That is the most ranked wins over any Big Ten team since joining the league.

The Badgers are 5-3 against the top two quadrants of the NET rankings, including two Quad 1 wins and zero losses outside the first quadrant. Tonight is a Quad-2 opportunity for Wisconsin.

Scoring 116 points in Friday’s 31-point win over Iowa, Wisconsin scored 100+ points in a Big Ten for the first time since a 101-87 win over Northwestern on 2/3/1993.

Wisconsin shot 40-for-62 from the field (64.5 percent). That's UW's best clip in a Big Ten game since shooting 64.9 percent against Minnesota on 1/3/87.

The Badgers went 21-of-31 in three-point attempts against the Hawkeyes. Their 67.7 percent shooting percentage is their best mark when attempting 10+ threes since an 8-for-11 (72.7 percent) output in a win over Indiana on 2/25/2010. Wisconsin's 21 threes were a Big Ten record.

Rutgers returns only three players (Jeremiah Williams, Jamichael Davis, and Emmanuel Ogbole) who were on the roster last season.

The Scarlet Knights are 75-19 at home since 2019-20, including 7-0 this season.

Harper and Bailey are the top two leading freshmen scorers in the nation. In NCAA stats dating back to 2011, no team has ever finished the season with the top two leading freshmen scorers playing for the same squad.

Rutgers has scored at least 66 points in every game this season, reaching 75 points eight times, and averaging 79.3 points per game this season. Under head coach Steve Pikiell, Rutgers has never averaged more than 69 points per game.

The University of Wisconsin has seen some talented scoring duos through its first three Big Ten games. The Badgers will see the best freshmen scoring duo in the country tonight.

Freshmen Ace Bailey and Dylan Harper will test the Badgers from a pure playmaking standpoint. Rated the No.2 (Bailey) and No.3 (Harper) players in the Rivals.com 2024 recruiting rankings, the duo has been the pulse of Rutgers’ offense.

Through 13 games, Harper is shooting 52.5 percent from the field over 34.3 minutes per game. He has his hand in everything, evidenced by him registering the school’s first triple-double since 1982 a week ago with 16 points, 12 assists, and 11 rebounds in a win over Columbia.

Harper missed Thursday’s loss at Indiana due to an illness but is expected in the lineup.

Without Harper, Bailey shined. He scored a career-high 39 points on 16-of-29 shooting to lead Rutgers. He also grabbed eight rebounds, made four of the Scarlet Knights’ six 3-pointers, and blocked four shots.

Harper and Bailey have combined for 535 points on 398 shots this season. The rest of the team combined has 575 points on 449 shots, which has been part one of the problems this season for the Scarlet Knights. Against Indiana, none of the other five players who scored had more than nine points. Rutgers also doesn’t move the ball consistently. The Scarlet Knights rank 193rd nationally in assists per game (13.9) with Harper being the only real facilitator.

Other problems include rebounding (Rutgers gave up 34 second-chance points without Harper in Thursday’s 10-point loss at Indiana) and defense, ranking second-to-last in the league in defensive scoring. UW just hung 116 points on the last-place team Friday. The Scarlet Knights are also 276th nationally in three-point percentage defense, meaning the Badgers are bound to get plenty of looks from the perimeter.

It's been tough for UW to win at Rutgers, hence the pick’em point spread. It should survive as long as UW didn’t waste all of its offense on Iowa and can play defensively like it did the final 30 minutes instead of the first 10.

Worgull’s Prediction: Wisconsin by 10

Record: 11-3 (10-4 ATS)

Points off Prediction: 128 (9.1 per game)

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