Wisconsin Basketball

No. 8 Seed Wisconsin Stuns The Reigning National Champs

... 1. Bronson Koenig is not done collecting shining moments. A year ago this weekend, Koenig authored the tournament’s first buzzer-beating dagger, a corner three as time expired to knock off No. 2 seed Xavier in St. Louis. Almost exactly 12 months and some 700 miles away from that shot, he again proved his March mettle. On Thursday, he shook off first-half stomach discomfort that often left him breathing heavy and hunched over to set a new school record with eight three-pointers in a win over Virginia Tech, many of them contested pull-ups. Against Villanova, he buoyed an offense playing without a foul-addled Happ for much of the first half, including a pull-up jumper that sent the Badgers into halftime up by four. In the second half his two threes could not have been much better timed: the first, from the corner, tied the score at 57 to complete a seven-point comeback with 3:27 left; the second put the Badgers up three at the two-minute mark. Koenig, a 39.3% shooter from three on the season, is 11-for-23 from deep over ...

Where Did Nigel Hayes Finish His Career In The Wisconsin Record Books

... Zak Showalter (3) and forward Ethan Happ (22) during the first half of an NCAA East Regional Sweet 16 game at Madison Square Garden in New York, Friday, March 24, 2017. M. P. KING, STATE JOURNAL. Buy Now. M. P. KING, STATE JOURNAL. Florida Gators guard Ke Vaughn Allen (5) dunks the ball during the first half of an NCAA East Regional Sweet 16 game against the Wisconsin Badgers at Madison Square Garden in New York, Friday, March 24, 2017. M. P. KING, STATE JOURNAL. Buy Now. M. P. KING, STATE JOURNAL. Wisconsin Badgers head coach Greg Gard argues a foul called on forward Nigel Hayes (10) during the first half of an NCAA East Regional Sweet 16 game against the Florida Gators at Madison Square Garden in New York, Friday, March 24, 2017. M. P. KING, STATE JOURNAL. Buy Now. M. P. KING, STATE JOURNAL. Wisconsin Badgers ...

Wisconsin's Bronson Koenig Ready For Madison Square Garden

... apiece. After months of getting criticized for being down this season, the Big Ten has made a statement in March. The conference has produced an 8-4 record thus far in the NCAA tournament and has UW, Michigan and Purdue still standing heading into the second weekend. “Our league is very good,” Purdue coach Matt Painter said. “Obviously, we have very good coaches. Lot of times people compare it. For us as coaches and players, it’s hard to talk about it. You guys seem to get a theme, whether it’s good or bad. “Tell them to go play Michigan. People that don’t think our league is any good, tell them to go play Wisconsin. They’re not an 8 th seed. I don’t understand that. You don’t understand basketball if you put Wisconsin as the 8 th seed. Wisconsin is one of the toughest teams in the country, period.”. Gard agrees with Painter that the Big Ten was better than it got credit for this season. “I don’t know if we had a marquee team that maybe went roughshod ...

What's Next For Wisconsin Basketball

... per game and was passed by Trice in the rotation, while Moesch played only 40 minutes. With UW needing depth in the front court, juniors-to-be Khalil Iverson , Charles Thomas ,  Alex Illikainen  and  Andy Van Vliet  will all be looked at to have an expanded role. Iverson averaged 3.9 points and 3.3 rebounds in 35 games, and his 53.2 percent shooting percentage was the highest among the reserves. His athleticism is his biggest weapon, but he has to polish his outside game and his intangibles. Thomas played in only one of UW’s final eight games, Illikainen played no more than six minutes in his final 10 appearances and Van Vliet played a total of nine minutes once conference play started. The Badgers will certainly need more. There's also the question of what forward  Aleem Ford  will be able to do with his raw athleticism coming off his redshirt season, as the staff and teammates have praised his skill set. Other than Trice and Hill, UWs only other experience guard is  Brevin Pritzl , who was inconsistent in his first season removed from a broken foot and never found rhythm with his shot (35.2 percent ...

Decisive Play In Season-ending Loss Provides 'what Ifs

... of ball screens had flummoxed a defense ranked among the top 10 defenses in the nation. But what made possession No. 2,392 so frustrating for the Badgers — junior guard Chris Chiozza ended it with a 3-point runner as time expired, giving Florida an 84-83 overtime win — was the odds were heavily stacked in UW’s favor. There were 4.0 seconds remaining after senior forward Nigel Hayes made two free throws to give UW an 83-81 lead. The Gators were out of timeouts and had to go nearly the length of the floor to tie the game or, as it turned out, deliver a dagger from which the Badgers couldn’t recover. Regrets, they have a few. Let’s pause here to give credit where credit is due: There aren’t a lot of players who can get the ball up the court that quickly, but Florida had multiple players who fit that bill. It just so happened Chiozza got the ball and earned ...

Wisconsin Coach Greg Gard After Losing Ncaa Tournament Heartbreaker To Florida

... dribbled the length of the court and hit a buzzer-beating three-pointer to give the Gators a 84-83 win at Madison Square Garden. Here’s what Badgers coach Greg Gard had to say after the defeat, including Zak Showalter’s own wild 3-pointer. That send the game to overtime before Florda had its own crazy shot. On what his team could have done better on Florida’s final possession, which ended in a buzzer-beater from Chris Chiozza. “Well, (Zak) Showalter hits — obviously we hit a desperation three and they hit a desperation three. So we were going with something else and they took it away on Showalter’s play and he was able to get loose and have it go in. “On the last play there, the end of overtime, we needed to turn him one more time, we allowed him to — the little bit of a replay I’ve seen, he obviously caught the ball in stride and going towards his rim. And with four seconds, I mean he can get rim-to-rim in four seconds, let alone get to the three-point line. But we need to do a better job of making him have to come back to catch ...

Wisconsin's Vitto Brown Has Quite The Skill Set

... Angelo said. “I was like, ‘If you just shoot a three, I will give you $20.’ He wouldn't even shoot a three — all through his freshman year he never shot a three. As a matter of fact, I don't think he shot a three his sophomore year, either, so I never had to pay him.”. Angelo laughed. “He was very timid,” he said. “But he would get rebounds. He would block shots and do a lot of stuff, but he just would not shoot the ball. I think it was part of being timid and a little bit of nervous not wanting to mess up.”. Eventually, once he became an upperclassman, Brown got more comfortable on the offensive end of the floor, which meant he actually shot the ball. And he played AAU ball, which helped get him noticed by multiple Big Ten programs. Brown chose Wisconsin, a place he knew he would force him to be a bit more aggressive and where he could grow as a player. As if following a script, Brown has done just that, developing ...

This Wisconsin Team Always Managed To Surprise Us

... take) athletes can step out in front of the world after the worst possible outcomes and answer semi-ridiculous (and fully ridiculous) questions with poise and grace. Anyone who watched the game knows that Wisconsin’s failure to hit free throws in overtime contributed heavily to the loss. So did the team’s collective failure to redirect Florida guard Chris Chiozza— incidentally, one of the fastest athletes in college basketball—to eat off more time before his game-winning shot. So did the aforementioned mental lapses that led Gators guard Ke Vaughn Allen to rack up free throws at the end of the first half seemingly at will. These are the mistakes that we who watched the game know affected the outcome; those who made them know that better than the rest of us ever could. Questions are asked. Questions are answered. Robert ...

Athletic Trainer Henry Perez-guerra Always Has Players' Best Interests In Mind

... holds teammate Matt Ferris (4) in a gentle headlock as the friends spend time in their locker room with media after an open practice at Madison Square Garden in New York, Thursday, March 23, 2017. The Badgers will play Florida in an NCAA East Region Sweet 16 game Friday night. M. P. KING, STATE JOURNAL. Buy Now. M. P. KING, STATE JOURNAL. Wisconsin Badgers forward Nigel Hayes (10), left, holds teammate Matt Ferris (4) in a gentle headlock as the friends spend time in their locker room with media after an open practice at Madison Square Garden in New York, Thursday, March 23, 2017. The Badgers will play Florida in an NCAA East Region Sweet 16 game Friday night. M. P. KING, STATE JOURNAL. Buy Now. M. P. KING, STATE JOURNAL. Wisconsin Badgers guard Bronson Koenig (24) speaks during a press conference at Madison Square Garden in New York, Thursday, March 23, 2017. Wisconsin will play Florida in an NCAA East Region Sweet 16 game Friday night. M. P. ...

Wisconsin's Success In Football And Basketball Still Is Missing Something, Badgers The Underdogs And More

... the most money for the university. It truly is, as former basketball captain Josh Gasser tweeted, good to be a Badger these days. Yeah, it's been a good year for the #Badgers. #On Wisconsin 👐 __link__/YP 8 a Bqwefh. — Wisconsin Badgers (@UWBadgers) March 21, 2017. And yet, from the outside looking in, there is still a big “yeah, but” attached to all that success. Yeah, Wisconsin has gone to 19 consecutive NCAA tournaments, but it still hasn’t won a national title since 1941. Yeah, it’s great that the Badgers have been in a bowl game every year since 2002, but the trophy case is still void of a national championship. If all Wisconsin does is win, as suggested by Colin Cowherd of FOX Sports, shouldn’t coming up short in the pursuit of reaching the pinnacle of its sport be considered a disappointment. All Wisconsin ( @UWBadgers ) does is win in every sport __link__/MUU 7 a L 80 F 7. — Herd w/Colin Cowherd (@The Herd) March 20, 2017. For those of a certain age, that question might seem preposterous. If we went back to 1989, the year before Barry Alvarez ...

Off The Court, This Friendship Runs Deep

... "Those were all different places that we've lived together … I consider him my best friend here on campus. It's awesome to have that type of relationship with your roommate.". Gotta love @Sensei Swat 33. — March Madness TV (@March Madness TV) March 21, 2017. Although they hail from different parts of the Midwest — it's a six-hour drive (400 miles) between Happ's home in Milan, Illinois and Brown's in Bowling Green, Ohio — they bridged any differences when they roomed together the summer before Happ's freshman year. "Even before I got here," Happ said, "I was texting him about things I needed for college and he has been helping me out ever since.". Going into his sophomore year, Brown was planning on renting an apartment with some UW teammates. "But things changed and some guys wanted to live alone," said Brown, who roomed with. Nigel Hayes. , a fellow Ohioan, as a freshman. "I saw that Ethan was the only scholarship athlete coming in, so ...