As the punditocrats filled out their Tournament Brackets, they quickly and dismissively scribbled a line through the names Wisconsin and Michigan State. In an age where glamor too often trumps substance, they shout from their glass houses that the Big Ten stinks.
The Long View
Over the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament, the success of the Wisconsin Badgers (31-4) and the Michigan State Spartans (27-8) serves as a clarifying reminder to take the myopic view of pundits who don’t let their ignorance of Big Ten basketball dissuade them from speaking in certainties with a grain a Mediterranean sea salt. Putting two teams in the Sweet 16 this season, one more than the Carolina-centric ACC, should invigorate the souls of basketball purists who appreciate player development, hard work, adherence to detail and, teamwork.
Without question, the conference is in transition with teams such as Michigan, Iowa, Minnesota and Illinois acclimating themselves to new coaches or in rebuilding mode. Still, Indiana was clicking on all cylinders until Kelvin Sampson’s past caught up with him and Purdue arrived one year ahead of schedule. Left unprepared to weather exodous of Mike Conley, Jr., Ohio State struggled to mix chemistry with their considerable talent until late in the season.
Guided by new coaches John Beilein (who left his West Virginia program in Sweet 16 condition) and Tubby Smith and Todd Lickliter (who left behind NCAA Tournament worthy programs at Kentucky and Butler respectively), the current bottom of the conference will soon bring a competitive parity within the league while putting 7 to 8 teams into the National mix year in and year out.
Sweet Spartans
After two wins that left the pundit class shaking their collective noggins, Tom Izzo leads his Spartans to their seventh Sweet 16 in the last 11 years. Understandably, expectations are customarily high amongst Spartan fans. Coming off a strong finish to last season, the Spartans were uniformly expected to reach the rarefied air of the nation’s basketball elite. They had coaching, talent and two stars, one established in senior Drew Neitzel and one emerging in sophomore Raymar Morgan. What they didn’t have was consistency.
After a solid conference pre-season blemished by only a five point loss to UCLA, the Spartans lost themselves somewhere between Iowa City and State College and they consequently stumbled badly to Indiana and Ohio State. But despite the late season mini-slide, in two Big Ten Tournament games, one a win against a tough Ohio State team and one a loss against Wisconsin, the Spartans, and Neitzel in particular, started to find their groove. To those who failed to watch the nuance of the Spartans’ season as an arc, such minor details as better post play, better passing and aggressiveness are lost in translation.
Defense Matters
Still, it was no surprise the streaking Atlantic 10 Champions, Fran Dunphy’s Temple Owls was the popular pick to beat Michigan State in round one. In round two, big, bad Big East Champion Pittsburgh was expected to hammer the Spartans. In an 11 point Sparty win, 65-54, Michigan State showed the resilience and confidence to withstand the Pitt comeback.
In both games, defense carried the day. Against Temple, the Spartans put the shackles on the trendy Owl combo of Mark Tyndale and Dionte Christmas, limiting the pair to a combined two first-half points and 7-of-26 shooting for the game. Against Pitt, the Spartans’ perimeter defense essentially eliminated star guards Ronald Ramon (1-of-9) and Levance Fields (1-of-5).
Michigan State has the talent, the depth and the mettle earned from a season of adversity in the Big Ten to beat number one seed Memphis. It’s right there for them. As it often does in the Tournament, defense will carry the day and thus far, the Spartans have acquitted themselves well. If they continue to defend, paying particular attention to the dribbler, a rematch against December victim Texas stands between them and the Final Four.
I’m Bored
“The team you don’t want to see is Wisconsin,” claims Washington Post/ESPN columnist Michael Wilbon, they’re “[N]ot fun.” Erstwhile Big Ten basketball guru, WFAN’s Mike Francesca says “Wisconsin is boring” and “Beasley will kill them.” Slate’s Robert Weintraub, sounding more like a five-year old on a rainy day, simply wants to be “entertain[ed].”
This small yet representative sample of drivel comes from the ill-informed who don’t truly grasp the college game. But, fortunately, Hoopraker is not on an island in its appreciation for Wisconsin or the Big Ten. One of America’s finest sportswriters and one who actually attends Big Ten games, the Chicago Tribune’s Skip Myslenski puts it like this:
“Wisconsin is a delight appreciated best by the aficionado or the coach doomed to face it. The casual observer cannot relish its work, and even those performers who must play it rarely comprehend fully just what they are about to confront. The Badgers are rife with nuance and subtleties, with basic fundamentals and old-fashioned rules. They do not dazzle with flash nor lop off a head with a broad axe. They just go about their business and stick an opponent here, nick an opponent there, jab an opponent until its blood is drained and all life has seeped from it.”
Like Michigan State, the Badgers’ accomplishments are undervalued. Despite consecutive 30 win seasons, they elicit little respect outside the knowledgeable fans that witness the effects of well-coached, fundamental basketball on a nightly basis in Dane County and around the Big Ten. In an age where attention spans are short and dunks by one and doners are considered more ESPN-ready than forty minutes of team hoops, most casual observers can muster little more than a shrug of their slumped shoulders.
A Perfect Offense
Wisconsin wins. With Bo Ryan running what may be a perfect offense and the nation’s best defense, team-oriented and straight man-to-man, Wisconsin’s reign as an elite basketball program is built to last. Their spacing is beautiful, their passing is crisp, their defense is maddeningly consistent. They’re disciplined, smart, confident and resilient. The Badgers recruit kids who want to play in Madison and it shows. And Ryan develops players once they arrive on campus, from Trevan Hughes to Michael Flowers from Jason Bohannon to Joe Krabbenhoft and Marcus Landry .
On Wisconsin
As it has all season, Wisconsin has earned its way into the Sweet 16 with defense. The Badgers given little hope of escaping the 2nd round against with the Michael Beasley nebula-powered Kansas State or OJ Mayo’s USC Trojans. The Badgers throttled Kansas State 72-55, shut down Beasley to the chagrin of Francesca and through strong perimeter defense, forced Kansas State into an 0-13 night on three-pointers. In round one, the Badgers endured an out of body experience from Cal-State Fullerton’s Josh Akognon, a former Badger Kingpin Dick Bennett/Washington State recruit and thoroughly beat Fullerton 71-56.
Current media darling Davidson and its quick release shooting star 6-3 guard Stephen Curry stand between a Wisconsin trip to the Elite Eight in Ford Field on Friday night. Michael Flowers, who has plenty of experience defending great shooters, will challenge Curry as he’s not been challenged in the Tournament thus far. Kansas and Bill Self await provided they delay another NCAA meltdown against 12 seed Villanova.
BRILLIANT!
Left by Behr on March 26th, 2008