BY MIKE LUCAS
UWBadgers.com Senior Writer
MADISON, Wis. — Mike Lucas had a front-row seat as second-seeded Wisconsin knocked off 10th-seeded Indiana 70-60 at the Big Ten Tournament in Washington, D.C. on Friday. Here is what he saw from courtside.
NEXT MAN UP
An aggressive Nigel Hayes took advantage of his matchup against 6-foot-10 Thomas Bryant by scoring six of Wisconsin's first nine points. Hayes hit a couple of mid-range jumpers and drew two fouls on Bryant who went to the bench a little over four minutes into the game. But 20 seconds later, Hayes joined him on the sidelines after picking up his second personal. This was familiar territory for the Badgers. In their final game of the regular season against Minnesota, they were forced to play a majority of the first half without Bronson Koenig who had gotten into early foul trouble. "Whenever one of us goes down, someone else picks them up," Koenig said, "and that's what Meech did again."
Meech is freshman D'Mitrik Trice who logged 13 minutes in the first half against Indiana while Hayes was limited to just four. In addition to Trice, UW coach Greg Gard juggled his combinations and the rotation included Alex Illikainen, Brevin Pritzl and Khalil Iverson. On his role in Hayes' absence, Trice said, "I tried to help the team in any way I could, whether that was knocking down shots — and I hit a couple early — or finding teammates (for shots). It just feels good to come in and play confident. For us to be leading with one of our star players sitting on the bench for most of the half was a big thing."
Trailing 22-19, Wisconsin went on a 9-0 run sparked by Vitto Brown who scored on a post-up move and knocked down a triple. While they were Brown's only points of the game, they were timely during that critical stretch (without Hayes) in which the Badgers outscored the Hoosiers, 14-5, to take a 33-27 lead at intermission "That was huge," Brown said of playing with the lead, "especially for us to recover after he (Hayes) went out like that and to not let it suck us down, but rather bring us all together and make us go a little harder. Once he got back in the second half, he was ready to go."
Upon returning to the floor, Hayes stayed aggressive on defense and the glass (nine rebounds) without picking up another foul. "It wasn't that hard at all," Hayes said of getting back up to speed after sitting so long. "My teammates kept telling me to stay focused, stay in the game, stay with us and be ready for the second half. So that's what I tried to do. Even though I didn't get to play the full game, like I wanted, I still tried to impact the game as much as I could and tried to be a leader."
A NOTE TO QUOTE
The Badgers had five players score in double-figures (between 10 and 16 points) for the first time against a Big Ten opponent this season. (They had six with 10 or more points at Marquette in mid-December.) "That's a testament to sharing the ball extremely well," Hayes said. "We made the extra pass and found the open guy … it's always good when the ball is going in. We've been saying all year that we haven't shot it the best, but as long as we bring our defense, we'll always have a fighting chance. And when we combine that with shooting the ball fairly decent, we can be a pretty dangerous team as long as we stick to the little things, take care of the ball and play together."
DID YOU NOTICE?
- The Badgers were able to sustain their offensive momentum from one game to the next. They were 13-of-26 from the field against Minnesota in the second half. They were 13-of-26 from the field against Indiana in the first half. In those two halves, combined, they were 13-of-19 from beyond the arc. In fact, they ended up with 10 triples in each win: 10-of-18 (Gophers) and 10-of-22 (Hoosiers).
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- Once again, the Hoosiers had no answer for Ethan Happ who made 7-of-9 shots (14 points) and grabbed 12 rebounds. In the two previous games, he was 16-of-21 from the field against Indiana's trio of low-post defenders, Juwan Morgan, De'Ron Davis and Thomas Bryant. In one sequence, Happ poked a loose ball to Koenig and the Badgers reversed it from Koenig to Trice to Hayes to Happ for a basket.
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- With the Badgers clinging to a 64-60 lead, Koenig went to work on Indiana's Josh Newkirk with the shot clock running down. Instead of settling for a jumper — and he was 4-of-7 from the 3-point line — Koenig beat Newkirk off the dribble to score at the rim with 48 seconds remaining. "That was absolutely a dagger," said IU coach Tom Crean. "I'm not sure he's ever gotten the credit in this league that he deserves. He doesn't play a game that promotes himself. He plays a game that wins."
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- Late in the first half, the Badgers forced back-to-back shot clock violations on Indiana. "It was a confidence-builder on the defensive end for us," said Zak Showalter. "Shot clock violations are one of the hardest plays to get because someone is usually going to get a shot off no matter how good the defense is. That really fueled our team and got us going."
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- Since going scoreless at Ohio State (Feb. 23), Showalter has scored in double-figures in four consecutive games (15-11-12-12 points) after scoring 10 or more points only four times in the first 15 Big Ten games. During this recent span, he's 9-of-18 from the 3-point line and 19-of-31 from the field. He also has nine steals. Moreover, he has not had a turnover the last two games (71 minutes).
A QUOTE TO NOTE
After seeing his record fall to 2-16 against the UW while at Indiana, Crean praised the Badgers and Koenig. "They play inside/outside basketball very well. At the end of the day, they've got Koenig. He makes a huge difference. Just as we went through the stretches where some of our guys weren't as healthy affected us, it probably affected them when he wasn't as healthy. He's a big-time player … it's ridiculous how much he affects winning. I say that in a good way."
THE SKINNY ON NORTHWESTERN
Up next, the Badgers will face No. 6 seed Northwestern on Saturday. The Wildcats' first-ever trip to the Big Ten tournament semifinals (UW's 11th) will tip at 2:30 p.m. (CT) on CBS.
The Wildcats stunned Maryland (and a partisan crowd) in the second half by shooting 58 percent (14-of-24) in rallying for a 72-64 win. Vic Law and Scottie Lindsey each had 17 points. Bryant McIntosh had 16 to go along with a rock-steady floor game (6 assists and 2 steals). Melo Trimble had 20 points to lead the Terps. But Trimble and his backcourt partner, Anthony Cowan, were guilty of 11 of Maryland's 14 turnovers and the Wildcats turned those mistakes into 25 points.
Lindsey was recovering from a bout with mono and didn't play against Wisconsin in Northwestern's 66-59 victory at the Kohl Center (Feb. 12). McIntosh was the best player on the floor. Not only did he score 25 points on a variety of contested shots, but he had seven rebounds and seven assists. He played all 40 minutes. Koenig had only two points (1-of-8; 0-of-5 from the arc). Sanjay Lumpkin put an exclamation point on the win with a flush at the buzzer that didn't go unnoticed.
GARDO SEZ
"I told them before the (Indiana) game, 'March is for players. Go play. This is your time of the year … I'm not going to reinvent the wheel here. There's probably nothing I'm going to say in this pregame speech that you haven't heard for the last four or five months. Here are a few keys, go play and have some fun with it."
