With the potential to take first place and secure a home playoff series in the WCHA, the University of Wisconsin men’s hockey team will host Denver for a two game series at the Kohl Center this weekend.

The Badgers are just hoping it will go better than last time these two programs faced off.

“That really hurt — going in already 0-2 — we lost those to make us 0-4,” sophomore defenseman Brendan Smith said. “Just knowing what that felt like when we couldn’t buy a win, and they scored a bunch of goals on us, we definitely have a huge revenge factor right now.”

In sweeping the Badgers, the Pioneers were able to score 13 total goals, including six against Wisconsin’s No. 1 goaltender, senior Shane Connelly. However, with Connelly coming off one of the best series of his career against Minnesota, head coach Mike Eaves thinks his starting net minder will be better equipped to handle the Denver offensive attack.

“Well [Connelly] was unbelievable in the first period (against Denver),” Eaves said. “A lot like Minnesota they fired a lot of shots, and he seemed to get tired. As a result, we weren’t that good in front of him, he got tired and the pucks started going in behind him. He is in better game condition now, he has gotten back in the flow of things, so those are things I think will help him out.”

Denver comes to Wisconsin having scored a league-leading 82 goals for a 3.57 goals-per-game average, and boasts three players in Anthony Maiani, Rhett Rakhshani and Patrick Wiercioch who average over a point a game in conference play. With Wisconsin a close second in scoring in the conference, the red light may be flashing quite a bit this weekend.

“They are a good skating team, they are a team that has transition, they play hard and they are well coached,” Eaves said of Denver. “And for some reason they seem to have success here in the Kohl Center. So we are concerned about all of those things.”

To have success against the Pioneers, the Badgers hope to carry over the momentum from their recent sweep against Minnesota. Just coming off a bye week though, Eaves can’t be certain how the team will respond.

“Are there concerns about coming out (slow) against Denver after a week off? Absolutely,” Eaves said. “We always talk about that first period after a week off. We have to monitor that and make sure … that we are back into game speed.”

After missing the past eight games with a wrist injury, the Badgers will be aided by the return of Smith to the lineup. Despite missing nine total games on the season, Smith is second to only to Jamie McBain in points scored by a defenseman. An integral part of the Badgers league-leading power play, Smith will be thrown onto the first line once again.

“I’m a little nervous, sure,” Smith said. “I have only had a week and a half really of stick handling and puck moving. I guess coming out I don’t want to make to many mistakes with the puck. So I guess I’m a little nervous.”

Eaves’ team trails both Denver and North Dakota by a mere one point with six games remaining in the WCHA. Despite going 16-5-2 in their last 23 games, the team still finds itself ranked 15th in the PairWise Rankings — right on the bubble for the NCAA tournament.

“We have talked about it,” Eaves said of the PairWise Rankings. “And the thing is as we look at that, the things that we can do to help ourselves is keep the focus where it has been. Just get points. If we get points which means we are winning or tying than we are doing good things.”