Mega Friday Night Wisconsin Badgers Athletics Open Thread And Game/Match/Dual Previews!

This is one of the busiest sports nights for the Wisconsin Badgers that I can remember. On Friday night we have:

• Volleyball vs. No. 9 Purdue
• Women’s soccer vs. Butler in the first round of the NCAA Tournament
• Men’s hockey at No. 15 Notre Dame
• Wrestling vs. Little Rock at the Battle of the Bluffs in La Crosse

That’s not even including the men’s basketball game against Green Bay where Bo Ryan is being honored at halftime (or the USMNT vs. Mexico World Cup qualifier, but I’ll shout about that elsewhere). What I’m trying to say is, you’re going to need multiple screens tonight.

We have already set up a separate thread for the men’s hoops game here but use this thread to discuss the rest of the action that is going on in Badgerland on this cold and kind of snowy Friday night.

Volleyball

• vs. No. 9 Purdue Boilermakers
• streaming on BTN+
• 7 p.m. CT first serve
• Here is a quick preview from Bremen!

After a Halloween day horror show loss for the Badgers, No. 4 Wisconsin (12-2 Big Ten, 20-2 overall) gets a shot at revenge Friday night against the No. 9 Purdue Boilermakers (10-4, 18-5) at the Field House in another huge match for UW in the conference title race.

Last time out against Purdue, the Badgers were blocked 16 times, seeing their offense hampered early and often to give the Boilermakers an early two-set lead. Freshman Julia Orzoł in particular struggled with the block early which seemed to dampen her confidence for long stretches of the match.

UW was able to bounce back, but not before the damage was done. The Badgers will hope their home cooking — Wisconsin is unbeaten in 30 straight games at the Field House — and solid performances against Northwestern and Iowa will give them a boost to beat Purdue and stay on top of the Big Ten standings.

This seems like an obvious call, but look for fifth year middle blocker Dana Rettke to do some damage early after she struggled last time out against PU, hitting for her lowest percentage of the season.

First serve is at 7:00 p.m. Central time in what will hopefully be a rocking Field House atmosphere.

Men’s hockey

• at No. 15 Notre Dame
• airing on NBCSN
• puck drops at 6:30 p.m. CT

• UW skates in its seventh and eight consecutive games against ranked opponents this weekend at No. 15 Notre Dame. UW’s prior six games came against No. 3 St. Cloud State (road), No. 2/3 Michigan (road) and No. 5 Minnesota (home). UW has gone 2-4-0 during that stretch.
• Notre Dame posted a home sweep over Holy Cross, winning 5-2 and 4-1 last Thursday and Friday. They are 0-2 in Big Ten conference play, having dropped two games to Minnesota 4-1 and 3-2.

Wrestling

• vs. Arkansas Little Rock, in La Crosse
• streaming here
• first grapple (???) at 7 p.m. CT

Women’s soccer

• vs. Butler, in the first round of the NCAA Tournament
• streaming for free (!!!) on BTN+
• kickoff is 6 p.m. CT

• This marks the 23rd time that UW has qualified for the NCAA tournament and the Badgers are 20-21-2 all-time in NCAA tournament contests.
• UW has advanced to the NCAA second round the last four times its qualified for the NCAA tournament (2016-19) and looks to advanced to the second round for the 14th time in program history.
• UW is 6-4 in their last 10 NCAA tournament games.
• Wisconsin is one of six Big Ten Conference teams that made the NCAA tournament this season, joining the likes of Rutgers, Michigan, Purdue, Penn State and Ohio State. Only the ACC (nine) and SEC (seven) had more teams in the Big Dance.
• UW faced nine of the 64 teams in this year’s NCAA tournament and picked up two wins against NCAA tournament teams in Milwaukee and Providence while earning draws against Michigan, Ohio State and Loyola.
• The Bulldogs will make their third-ever appearance in the NCAA tournament on Friday and went 15-4-1 this season and had a 7-2-1 record in Big East action. Katie Soderstrom, a three-time first-team All-Big East selection, leads the Butler attack with 12 goals and 7 assists. Freshman Emma Martin has started 19 games in net for the Bulldogs and has nine shutouts this season.
• The winner of UW/Butler will face the winner of No. 2 UCLA and UC-Irvine next weekend in the second round of the NCAA tournament.