Wisconsin basketball adds home-and-home series with Tennessee

In an agreement that bolsters their respective non-conference schedules, the Wisconsin Badgers and Tennessee Volunteers added a home-and-home series starting in the 2019-20 season.

The Badgers will first travel to Knoxville as the road squad on Dec. 28, 2019. The Volunteers will come to the Kohl Center the following year for the 2020-21 season opener on Nov. 11, 2020.

The addition of Tennessee to Wisconsin’s schedule should only help the resume, as the Vols continue to improve under head coach Rick Barnes. After a 15-19 first season, the Volunteers went 26-9 in 2017-18 and have continued the upward trend into this season. Tennessee (13-1) is currently ranked third in the AP poll and fifth in KenPom.

The most recent meeting between the two programs was in 2016 at the Maui Invitational where Wisconsin won 74-62 before eventually falling to North Carolina in the tournament finals.

The history between the two programs is very brief with the all-time series tied at 2-2. Tennessee won the first two match-ups in 1981 and 2000, while the Badgers took the latter two in 2001 and the aforementioned 2016 contest.

A match-up of this quality is great to land in the non-conference. Wouldn’t it be nice if SEC football would be willing to do the same as basketball?