In this week's episode of The Wisconsin Sportscast, Oates is back from his Hawaiian excursion, and after updating us on his adventures dives into Olympic Hockey. Both the men’s and women’s US teams took home the gold this year, and it feels particularly good for us in Madison. Olympic women’s hockey was dominated by Badgers this year, with both current and former Badgers playing for both Team USA and Team Canada. The women’s gold medal game was a phenomenal game and a true statement to how Mark Johnson has influenced Olympic hockey. For years now, there have been Badgers on both Team USA and Team Canada, and partly thanks to the Badgers women’s hockey has taken off in the past decade. Just look at someone like Hillary Knight, who’s become such a beacon for women’s hockey in the US that there are current Badgers who have childhood photos of themselves standing next to her. Then you add in some of the current Badgers like Hillary Knight and Laila Edwards and there’s no denying Mark Johnson’s impact on the sport as a whole. The Badgers have eight championships under Johnson now, and while not everyone is always happy about statues, something should be done to recognize the impact he’s had both in Madison and globally. 

Turning to Badgers Men’s Basketball, they handily defeated the Iowa Hawkeyes Sunday night. Hawkeyes coach Ben McCollum is known as a defensive coach, and he had a plan to stop Nick Boyd at the beginning of the night. But Boyd turned out to be unstoppable and could make his way to the rim whenever he wanted. Wisconsin’s offense seems designed to help Boyd get to the rim, and that ends up helping the entire team. Austin Rapp has taken a particular step forward, as long as he stays healthy. But he’s a guy who can reliably make 15-20 points when you need him to and has established himself as a true difference maker on the team. Boyd, Rapp, Blackwell, and Winter have all put themselves together to make a very good basketball team. But are they better than last year? It’s hard to say, it is certainly a different team. But with several must-win games on the horizon, they need to stay consistent, especially in their three-point shooting. 

The Wisconsin Sportscast with Lucas & Oates is a Cap Times podcast produced by Nate Wegehaupt. Find it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.