The University of Denver hockey team, fresh off an NCHC split at Minnesota-Duluth last weekend, wraps up finals week by hitting the road to play what appears to be a vastly improved Wisconsin team.

Here is a look at the Pioneers’ former WCHA rival:

Season update: The good news for the Badgers is they’re one win away from equaling their total from all of last season. The bad news is their 4-26-5 record last season was the worst in the program’s history. At 3-4-3, the Badgers have won three of their past four games, including a 3-1 decision at North Dakota. Like DU, Wisconsin made a two-teams-in-two-days trip to Boston earlier this season. Boston College routed UW 6-0, and Boston University beat them 4-1. (DU lost two one-goal games).

Offense: The Badgers rely heavily on underclassmen — eight of their 11 players with more than one point are freshman or sophomores. The exceptions are junior forwards Grant Besse and Jed Soleway and senior defenseman Kevin Schultze. Besse, an Anaheim Ducks draft pick, has a team-leading 10 points (four goals, six assists). Soleway has five points and Schultze has four assists. … Wisconsin scores just 2.3 goals per game, but gets a lot of shots (30 per game) on net.

Defense: UW is fairly stingy, allowing just 2.8 goals per game, and goaltender Matt Jurusik has a lot to do with that. The freshman is 3-3-2 with a 2.66 goals-against average and .913 save percentage.

Special teams: The Badgers kill off 88 percent of their penalties and they get more than a third of their goals on the power play (8 of 23 overall).

Bottom line: Wisconsin is much improved, and their style is to keep games close and preferably low-scoring, then capitalize on other team’s penalties. Unlike last season, most of their games (outside of Massachusetts) have been close. However, they have not won a game when trailing after either the first or second periods.

@MagnessMayhem