Fred Hoiberg addresses how preparation changes facing teams a second time

The Nebraska Cornhuskers are getting ready to host the Wisconsin Badgers on Thursday night. For head coach Fred Hoiberg, it’s a second chance to get a big win against a tough Wisconsin team.

Ahead of the game, Hoiberg broke down how the team’s preparation is changing the second time they’re meeting.

“Well, you have plenty of examples from the first time of what went well and what didn’t,” Fred Hoiberg said. “Offensively, we had some pretty good possessions. Defensively, we didn’t have very many.”

In the first meeting between Nebraska and Wisconsin, the Badgers won 88-72. That game was in Madison and saw Wisconsin score 51 points in the first half. Finding a way to slow down that offense is going to be vital for Fred Hoiberg and Nebraska.

“I guess that’s the biggest thing. Obviously, you can look back on the first time but you’ve got to make adjustments from things that you did well and things where you got exposed. So, that’s been the big thing is going back, watching a lot of film. This is the first time we’ve had three days prep actually on the floor. We had an off day and then had three days to prepare,” Hoiberg said.

“So, we were able to watch a lot of film with our team. Now, we’ve got to go out and execute. Execute the gameplan, have enough self-discipline, and if you do that we should have a chance.”

Fred Hoiberg on the need to play physically

Ahead of the Wisconsin game, Fred Hoiberg emphasized how he’s been trying to get Nebraska to be a more consistently physical team.

“We’ve had three really, really tough days in a row and I really didn’t care what their loads look like. We’ve got the analytics and the sports science department, and I pay a lot of attention to that. We’re very fortunate to have them, but when they lay out a load plan for me, I crumple it up and throw it in the garbage and I said, ‘We need to go hard. We need to go physical,’” Hoiberg said.

“And that’s exactly what we’ve done the last three days. I don’t care what their legs are like tomorrow. We had to get after it. The coach issued football pads, we were just short of going out and doing that. So, we’ll see how we respond to it tomorrow. I know these guys are sore, but again, I didn’t really care. We’ve got 10 games left and we need to get right and more consistent from a physicality standpoint. If we don’t, it’s going to be a bad second half of the Big Ten season.”