State Sports Roundup: Badgers football got no love from the pollsters after clinching Rose Bowl berth

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The Wisconsin football team did not get much love from the pollsters after winning the Big Ten title and its third straight Rose Bowl berth. The Badgers returned to the U-S-A Today coaches’ poll yesterday at Number-23. But Wisconsin was not ranked in the A-P media poll. And they didn’t show up in the BCS Standings, either, after getting a spot in one of the top BCS bowl games. Wisconsin will take an 8-5 record to Pasadena, when it plays Pac-12 champion Stanford on New Year’s Day. Stanford won its league title on Friday night with a three-point win over U-C-L-A. The Badgers crushed Nebraska 70-31 for the Big Ten crown. Stanford is making its first Rose Bowl appearance since 1999 – when the Cardinal lost 17-to-9 to Barry Alvarez’s Badgers. Stanford is 11-and-2, with a Number-Six B-C-S ranking.

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U-W Oshkosh will play at Saint Thomas of Saint Paul on Saturday in the semi-finals of the N-C-A-A Division-Three football playoffs. The Titans ended Linfield’s 25-game home winning streak on Saturday, with a 31-to-24 overtime victory in Oregon. Oshkosh has now won 15 straight games – the nation’s longest active streak. The fifth-ranked Titans are 13-and-0 this season, and will face a Number-Four Saint Thomas team that’s also 13-and-0, after crushing seventh-ranked Hobart 47-to-7 over the weekend. The semi-final winner will move on to the Amos Alonzo Stagg Bowl against either top-ranked Mount Union or Number-Two Mary Hardin Baylor. The D-Three title game is set for December 14th in Salem Virginia.

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The Wisconsin men’s basketball team handed California its first loss of the season, with 81-56 rout in Madison yesterday. The Badgers went up by 13 at halftime, with the help of two runs of 14-and-0 and 12-and-0. And the Badgers put together an 11-0 run early in the second half. Allen Crabbe opened the second by making two free throws that put the Golden Bears behind by 11 – and that’s the closest they would get. Four Badgers scored in double figures, led by Ben Brust with a season-high 22. Crabbe scored 25 for California, which fell to 6-and-1. The Bears failed to go 7-and-0 for the first time since 1959. The Badgers out-shot California 52-to-38 percent – and Wisconsin took advantage of 23 Bears’ turnovers, while committing just 13 themselves. But the biggest applause from the Kohl Center crowd was given to football coach Bret Bielema. He and running backs Montee Ball, James White, and Melvin Gordon hoisted their Big Ten trophy to the crowd during the first time out. Bo Ryan’s Badgers improved to 5-and-3, and will host Nebraska-Omaha tomorrow night.

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The Milwaukee Bucks will play at New Orleans tonight. It will complete Milwaukee’s two-game season series against the Hornets, after the Bucks won a 117-to-113 shootout at home on November 17th. Hornets’ rookie Anthony Davis had 28 points and 11 rebounds in that game – but the Bucks won’t have to worry about him tonight, because he’ll be out for another week with an ankle injury. Meanwhile, Bucks’ forward Larry Sanders has been his team’s shining star. The third-year pro had 18 points and 16 rebounds in Milwaukee’s three-point home win over Boston on Saturday night. And Sanders tied a Bucks’ record with 10 blocked shots as part of a triple-double at Minnesota on Friday night. Coach Scott Skiles gave Sanders the chance to start on Saturday night, but Sanders turned it down. He said he’d rather come off the bench as a role player.

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Baseball’s Winter Meetings begin today in Nashville – and the Milwaukee Brewers do not expect to make a big splash. There’s been talk that the Brewers would try to sign free-agent slugger Josh Hamilton from Texas – or perhaps try to re-acquire starter Zack Greinke from the Angels. But both those players are expected to command deals of over 100-million-dollars. And Brewers’ general manager Doug Melvin says he expects owner Mark Attanasio to cut the payroll, after the team lost money in 2012 with its first 100-million-dollar salary total on Opening Day. Melvin expects around an 80-million dollar payroll to start next season. But he’ll “never say never” to anything – and he says it’s possible to come up with something creative to sign a big money free agent. In any event, the Brewers expect to have a financial reserve in case a top player crops up down the line.

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Madison golfer Steve Stricker tied for eighth during the weekend at the World Challenge in Thousand Oaks California. Stricker shot a two-under-par 70 in his final round yesterday, to finish at six-under-par 282 for 72 holes. Graeme McDowell won the 18-player tournament by three strokes. McDowell finished at 17-under-271.

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The Wisconsin women’s hockey team was shut out 2-to-nothing at top-ranked Minnesota yesterday. The Badgers held the Gophers scoreless for 49 minutes, until Mira Jalosuo scored on a slap shot with 10:46 left. Madison area native Amanda Kessel scored Minnesota’s other goal into an empty net in the final minute. The Badger offense could not get anything going, and it ruined a 36-save performance by Alex Rigsby as Wisconsin fell to 6-6-2-and-2 in the W-C-H-A and 10-6-and-2 overall. Unbeaten Minnesota improved to 12-and-0 in the conference, and 18-and-0 overall.

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