Wisconsin Badgers welcomed Penn State to Kohl Center, a place that hadn’t been friendly to Nittany Lions since joining the Big 10. Penn State is a stunning 0-17 in Madison and 0-14 at Badgers home gym. It’s not a place that Penn State succeeds at. The first half looked good for Nittany Lions, but the second half looked much better for Wisconsin. They roll with a huge 20 minutes to finish this game winning 82-55. Badgers continue to look like the cream of the crop in the Big Ten.

Night and Day
Very interesting to see this team in the first half compared to the second. Penn State came out firing making their first six of 10 three pointers which held them close with Wisconsin. Greg Gard did not seem pleased heading into the locker room, and the speech must have been good. Wisconsin awoke on both sides of the court. Before anyone knew it, Wisconsin led by double digits and never looked back.

Swiss Army Knife Hayes strikes again
Nigel Hayes had another strong effort with doing more on defense than he did with his offensive production. Hayes finished with nine points and eight rebounds plus a couple of assists as well. Hayes isn’t the primary scorer on this team, but he’s such a valued asset. He does a lot of the little things you want during a game. Hayes holds the water for this Badgers defense.

Badgers need this Vitto Brown consistently
After two points versus Minnesota, Vitto Brown came up with 16 points and six rebounds. Brown looked like he was everywhere on the court with some great hustle plays that didn’t show up in box scores. This is the second time Brown responded after a putrid game with a strong double-digit effort. Badgers need more consistency though.

Player of the Game: Vitto Brown (Wisconsin), Tony Carr (Penn State)

Next Up:
Wisconsin goes to Madison Square Garden to play Rutgers, New York’s one true team. Badgers had some early issues much like this game with Penn State versus Rutgers. Don’t know what the crowd will be like… I’m leaning towards a 50-50 split, but who knows. Interested to see if this works for Rutgers because my assumption is they’ll try MetLife for a football game.