When Marquette and Wisconsin-Milwaukee last squared off in men's basketball, Tom Crean was still learning under the tutelage of Tom Izzo at Michigan State, Brian Wardle was the Golden Eagles' leading scorer as a sophomore and Rob Jeter was an assistant coach under Mike Deane, who was in his final season at the helm of the Blue and Gold.

The year was 1998. Shakespeare in Love won the Oscar for Best Picture. Aerosmith topped the pop music charts with its Armageddon ballad "I Don't Want to Miss a Thing." Jesse "The Body" Ventura was elected governor of Minnesota.

Aside from all that, Marquette beat UWM 77-56 on Dec. 8 in what would be the final game of that intra-city men's basketball rivalry for the next nine years. On Friday, the Bradley Center will host the match-up's revival. As for the "rivalry" aspect, well, that still is to be determined.

"It's something that none of us have experienced since we've been here," junior guard Jerel McNeal said. "So it's definitely hard just to go out there, just because people are telling us it's a rivalry, and make it a rivalry."

By definition, a rivalry is "a competitive or antagonistic state or condition." The competitive aspect no doubt will be present Friday night. It's the antagonistic part that will be deficient.

Marquette owns a 34-0 all-time record against UWM when it

comes to men's basketball, so maybe that will fire up the Panthers a tad. But aside from that, the players don't have a whole lot else with which to stoke the flames.

In the near-decade since the two programs ended their relationship, both teams experienced rises in national prominence. Bruce Pearl took over the Panthers and made UWM relevant in the world of collegiate men's

basketball. Crean claimed the reins from Deane in 1999 and oversaw a Final Four run in 2003.

While Crean and the Golden Eagles maintained their perch on the national scene, the Panthers have not been so fortunate. Jeter led UWM to an NCAA tournament appearance during his first campaign as head coach in 2005-'06 after Pearl left for greener pastures at Tennessee.

However, Jeter's success came about largely because of the efforts of players Pearl recruited. The road since then has been a little more daunting.

UWM went 9-22 last season and is off to a 3-2 mark so far this year. Jeter dismissed Avery Smith—the Panthers' leading scorer in 2006-'07—on Nov. 6 for what the head coach described as "violation of team rules and conduct detrimental to the team."

So in addition to never having played UWM before, the Golden Eagles will match up against a shorthanded squad that may struggle to stay above .500 this season.

With the current plight of the Panthers in mind, Crean's attitude toward Friday night's match-up becomes more understandable.

"More important than who we're playing is the fact that we're playing again," he said.

By tip-off time, it will have been nine days since the Golden Eagles fell 77-73 to Duke in the championship game of the Maui Invitational. Crean said his team will spend the early part of the week addressing areas in need of improvement based on last week's play.

"We're not talking about rivalries," Crean said. "We're talking about playing a good team that we're familiar with that is coming across the street to play us."

Take out "good," and Crean might be on to something. As much as this city might want there to be a men's basketball rivalry between Marquette and UWM, one just doesn't seem to exist.