On Sunday the Buckeyes humbled what had appeared over the course of the conference slate and the previous three days to be a worthy if not equal foil. The Badgers of January, belying the deceptively close final score, soundly beat the Buckeyes at the Kohl Center. Two weeks ago, it took a front end miss by Kammron Taylor and a suspect no-call in Columbus to keep them from the season sweep. The Badgers of Friday sent a rapidly maturing, tournament ready Michigan State team to the showers with a double digit loss. And Saturday saw them exploiting every inch of the Illini team’s inadequacies en route to another thorough whipping.
But then there was Sunday. And on the seventh day came the rematch with the foe that had been winning per usual, but in unimpressive fashion, a foe that the Badgers appeared primed to match if not send into March Madness with an added blemish. Oh, it was not so, let me count the ways.
While Ron Lewis played like a Big Ten player of the year, carving and bouncing his way to 17 points on 8-10 shooting, Alando Tucker’s most active and assured moments Sunday came during player introductions and his shooting stroke abandoned him when his team needed it most.
Freshman Mike Conley, Jr. confidently quarterbacking the team and finding a multitude of ways to score at key junctures while senior Kammron Taylor adopted a remarkably passive, unsure pose throughout much of the game, shooting 2-10 from behind the arc, and hardly playing like a battle seasoned senior of his standing.
Playing only twenty-two minutes Greg Oden maximized every one of them with 12 points, 10 rebounds, 4 blocks, and his usual compliment of shot alterations and overall intimidation, while 6′11″ Greg Steimsma was too daunted by 6′4″ Ron Lewis and 6′8″ Matt Terwilliger to convert several point blank layups.
Though it didn’t appear in the box score, Jamar Butler turned in what was probably the game’s finest defensive game, spending thirty aggressive minutes at the top wing of the Buckeye zone, denying passing lanes and penetration. Meanwhile the Michael Flowers that had shut down Drew Neitzel and the Illinois backcourt on successive nights traded his customary physical, grill to grill, give no quarter defense for a restrained, hands-off, too respectful guarding style.
With Oden on the bench for a large swatch of the first half, the Badgers continued to give away possession after possession with turnovers and tentative play. When Oden returned to the floor in the second half, Bo Ryan’s Badgers failed to find ways to punch the ball inside and draw more fouls. Even normally fearless, do it all Joe Krabbenhoft looked like he didn’t want to be out there.
What’s to make of the aforementioned? What accounts for a supremely well coached and talented team that the previous two days had looked not only more than capable of taking the Buckeyes for the second time in three tries but deserving of a number one NCAA seed and a deep run? Was the Buckeyes’ 66-49 win the statement game Hoopraker had been awaiting from them all season? Did they finally shake their seeming apathy and play to their own steep potential?
As much as I would like to give all the credit to Ohio State and simply concede that it was a dominant performance by a superior team, the view from Section 122 suggested otherwise. Indeed, the Buckeyes played at a high level that needs to be acknowledged. They got solid performances from their top producers Oden, Conley, and Lewis. Butler played a fine defensive game and hit one of the Buckeyes patented thirty-foot jumpshots at a backbreaking point of the game. Every Buckeye appeared to have about two more speeds than even the quickest of Badgers. The trapping zone defense employed by Matta choked up the middle of the floor where Tucker likes to dribble, slash, and score.
But the real story of Sunday wasn’t any kind of long awaited, seldom seen Buckeye dominance but a Badger performance of startling aberrance. A team that in its two earlier meetings with Ohio State, the last only two short weeks prior, had proven itself an equal if not superior team, played completely out of character. A team that had, unlike the Buckeyes, played dominant, statement basketball in its first two Big Ten tournament games, looked possessed, from its Wooden Award finalist on down, by the spirit of the Steve Yoder era.
Is one to believe the Buckeyes in two weeks got that much faster and athletic than the Badgers? Do you accept that a matchup zone was an impenetrable mystery to a Bo Ryan coached team? Has Greg Oden made such quantum leaps in his game since their last meeting that the Badgers, like the Big Ten referees, were reduced to awestruck, callow spectators? Were the Badgers suddenly afraid of a team they’ve already beaten once and should’ve beaten in Columbus? Is Thad Matta a coaching genius who, unlike Tom Izzo and Bruce Weber, figured out the one way to slow down Alando Tucker?
As I watched from fifth row courtside of the United Center as the Badgers failed to execute even the most rudimentary basketball plays against the zone, as I saw them miss wide open looks, throw the ball out of bounds, commit shot clock violations, play flat-footed passive defense, I was mystified. Maybe it was fatigue from playing two straight against formidable defensive teams while the younger Buckeyes benefitted from their Friday game against a soft Michigan team. Perhaps, but it didn’t seem like an adequate explanation and didn’t explain the Badgers’ incompetent first half when they would’ve still been fresh.
The Buckeyes were certainly playing well, but not to an entirely new level. This wasn’t some kind of breakthrough elevation of the Ohio State game. It was an efficient Buckeye performance combined with a profoundly uncharacteristic game from the Badgers. It was one of those rare occasions when nearly all of the key players on a very good team choose the same night to play their worst game.
Of course, the Buckeyes deserve credit for continuing to win ballgames. They are definitely a team whose talent will not be easily overcome. But, before you use this game as proof positive of their dominance and Wisconsin’s inferiority and ill fitness for the NCAA, think again. I fully expect several games from the Wisconsin Badgers in the next weeks that prove Sunday wrong. This is a team that will redeem and then some.
[…] Well-traveled Lon Kruger and his UNLV Runnin’ Rebels are all that stands between Bo Ryan and the Wisconsin Badgers’ fourth Sweet Sixteen in the last eight years. This afternoon in the United Center, UNLV will need to overcome the masses of red clad Wisconsin fans singing and dancing along with Bucky Badger. They’ll also need to overcome Wisconsin’s sense of purpose. On the Ropes Fresh off a dispiriting performance in the Big Ten Tournament Championship to Ohio State one week ago, a season’s worth of respect and victories, as well as their own expectations, nearly went for naught on Friday afternoon for the Wisconsin Badgers. In its home away from home on 1901 West Madison, the Badgers were on the First Round NCAA ropes. But, having misfired on 21 of their first 24 shots, the Badgers did not lose their composure when confronted with adversity. Finding strength in each other and demonstrating well-earned confidence in their ballast and coach, the Badgers responded to an 18 point deficit by fighting, clawing and shooting their way back. Through it all they stayed within themselves and the Bo Ryan’s Wisconsin Swing system. Unlike Ohio State, which needed a last second shot by Ron Lewis and one large missed shove to the chest by Greg Oden, the Badgers outscored Texas Corpus Christi by 31 points over the last 25 minutes. Adversity confronted, faith resolved, lesson learned. […]
Left by Hoopraker · Hambone Ryan and the Vagabond on March 18th, 2007