Badgers Take Down No. 11 Indiana
January 31, 2008 | Men's Basketball
The 13th-ranked men's basketball team took care of No. 11 Indiana 62-49 Thursday night at the Kohl Center. Led by Marcus Landry's double-double of 14 points and 11 rebounds and Trevon Hughes' 16 points, the Badgers improved to 17-3 on the season and back into a first-place tie in the Big Ten at 7-1.
For a look back at the game read Brian Lucas' postid=588"> --> Courtside Blog .
Wisconsin got off to a hot start and never looked back en route to winning their seventh-straight game at the Kohl Center against the Hoosiers. UW jumped out to a 16-6 lead after playing a little over nine minutes and held that ten point lead throughout the first half, going into the locker room up 30-20.
Landry's career-high 11 boards and his first double-double of the season was the x-factor against the Hoosiers. Marcus was able to match up with the Big Ten's leading rebounder D.J. White and bother him throughout the contest while giving his team a big boost on the offensive side.
The second half was a different story even though the Badgers opened it up the same as the first. After UW moved into a 46-26 lead, the Hoosiers responded like any tough Big Ten team would. IU went on a 17-2 run and cut the lead to five with just under eight minutes to play.
Wisconsin responded with a little 11-4 run to put the game out of reach in the final minutes. Hughes was 6-of-6 from the charity stripe in the final three minutes while Joe Krabbenhoft had three of his 12 rebounds in the same time period.
Not to be overlooked were performances from Michael Flowers, Brian Butch, Greg Stiemsma and Hughes. Each played a key role in the Badgers' 17th victory of the season.
Flowers scored ten points and grabbed five rebounds while hitting all four of his free throw attempts. Butch also played tough defense against White, while fellow big man, Stiemsma pulled down five rebounds (four offensive) and had two key blocks on the defensive end.
Down the stretch, Hughes was the man who had the ball in his hands and it paid off as he was 9-of-10 from the free throw line on the night. The man that is everywhere, Joe Krabbenhoft, was one rebound short of his career high in after grabbing 12 on the night to go along with five points and game-high five assists.
The Hoosiers were led by White who had another huge night with 22 points and 17 rebounds in the losing effort. The Badgers were able to somewhat control the Big Ten's leading scorer, Eric Gordon, to 16 points, 12 of which came in the second half as the team was shooting a lot of three-pointers.
Neither team shot the ball well as UW ended the night 20-of-58 (35%) and IU was 18-of-54 (33%). Indiana did out-rebounded Wisconsin 41-40, but the Badgers were able to beat the Hoosiers down low, out-scoring them 34-22 in the paint.
With the loss, Indiana falls to 17-3 on the season and 6-1 in the Big Ten. The Hoosiers return home on Sunday to host Northwestern at 11 a.m. CT on the Big Ten Network.
The Badgers go back on the road traveling to Minneapolis on Super Bowl Sunday to take on border rival Minnesota at 1 p.m. CT. Sunday's game can be seen live on the Big Ten Network as well as heard on affiliates of the Badger Radio Network.
Wisconsin Head Coach Bo Ryan
Post-Game Quotes
On the play of Joe Krabbenhoft: 'He just comes every day and I don't know what else you can say. There are just some people who come out and give a great effort every day. The results may vary, but its that effort that can help us get a game like this.'
On the play of Michael Flowers: 'I thought our guys did a great job and Michael Flowers was battling the flu, and you could tell by his facial expressions out there that he wasn't quite 100 percent. I thought he did a real good job handling screen situations and D.J. [White] is going to get some buckets but I really liked our defensive effort and trying to get them to take shots that they weren't quite comfortable with.'
On the aggressiveness of his team: 'I thought our guys worked on being aggressive and getting offensive rebounds and getting it out and forcing them to foul.'
On the play of Greg Stiemsma: 'He doesn 't change, he is going to go out there and give his effort on the glass and make his presence felt and that's what we ask him to do and that's what he 's trying to deliver and he'll try and do the same thing in our next game.'
Indiana Head Coach Kelvin Sampson
Post-Game Quotes
Opening comments: 'Wisconsin shot 34 percent, we shot 33 percent. Both teams played tough. Neither team could get many shots to go down. I thought a key part of the game was, after we were down by 20 and cut it to seven with a chance to get it to five and D.J. White was at the line with a one-and-one. It seemed like every time we had a chance to get the lead down to six or five we couldn 't finish.'
On Joe Krabbenhoft's value and on UW's overall talent: 'That [Joe] Krabbenhoft kid, I really like him. Kids like him are invaluable to your team. It seems that kids like him always make the right play and make the key play. He's tough. Wisconsin's good. In a lot of ways, they are better than they were last year. They don't have anybody as good as Alando Tucker, but that's a really good team.'
On Indiana's tough offensive day: 'We had a lot of looks. In the second half, I thought we had a lot of clean looks and a lot of good opportunities but just couldn't make the shots. We couldn 't buy one tonight. I'm disappointed we lost but not disappointed in our effort.'
On Eric Gordon's frustrating game: 'That [Michael] Flowers kid is a tough kid. I thought [UW] really guarded [Eric Gordon] well. He had a tough time going to his left, obviously, and they kept sitting on his right hand. But I thought Eric played hard. He had to work for just about everything he had. The thing he has to start getting better at, that he was really good at earlier in the year, is that he has to return to getting to the free throw line more, because he can. We kept getting the ball inside to D.J. [White] and he did a great job of getting to the free throw line, but this team needs Eric to get to the free throw line more.'
