Sports

Badgers learn quickly: They’re in

Looking for a print version?
Simply use your browser’s ‘Print’ command and a printer-friendly document will be generated automatically.

Related stories:

• UW remains undefeated after Big Ten, Big 12 challenge (September 7, 2005)
• Badgers hit by upset train at Purdue (January 28, 2008)
• No. 6 volleyball ready for postseason (November 6, 2001)
• Wisconsin hopes to end losing streak against Iowa (January 20, 2009)

Also by Lars Russell:

Sharing tools:

E-mail this article:

Your e-mail address:

Recipient e-mail address:

Optional message:

Share on:

• Facebook
• Digg
• Newsvine
• reddit
• StumbleUpon
• delicious
• Google
• Yahoo! My Web
• BlogMarks
• Linkroll
• Simpy

• Spurl
• Connotea
• Fark
• Feed Me Links

• Magnolia
• BlinkList
• Sphere
• LinkedIn

• Furl
• Technorati
• AddToAny
• Permalink

Wisconsin’s men’s basketball team did not have to wait long to find out its NCAA tournament placement Sunday. UW will play St. John’s Friday in the first round of the East Region in Washington, D.C.

The selection broadcast revealed the Badgers’ region first, taking any suspense out of Bo Ryan’s first Division I NCAA tournament experience as head coach.

“If it was further into the program I think we would have been better for the media with our responses,” Ryan said. “I just don’t think we were ready for being the third school announced.”

Ryan led UW-Platteville to three Division III titles before coaching two seasons at UW-Milwaukee. Ryan never qualified for the NCAAs with the Panthers, and this is his first year at Wisconsin.

“So this is what it’s like. Okay, we’ll get ready for St. John’s,” he said.

Players echoed his “business-first” feeling.

“It was weird because as soon as the show started, we were right there,” senior point guard Travon Davis said. “So it was like, ‘All right, let’s go downstairs and see what we need to do and get on with it.’”

Badger fans who want to see the games will have to wait out a ticket lottery early this morning. Students must be at the ticket office inside the Kohl Center’s Gate B by 9:45 a.m. to be eligible for NCAA tournament tickets, and the drawing will take place at 10 a.m. The number of tickets the athletic department distributes will depend on how many donors to the university’s Coach’s Club order tickets. The department gives those contributors first priority.

Students selected by the lottery can buy up to two first-session tickets.

It is not certain how many fans believed the Badgers would be in this position.

“We showed from the beginning of the year when we had all these doubters that all that really matters is the guys in the white-and-red jerseys and the coaching staff in their suits and ties that match really well,” Davis said.

Still, even the coaches conceded UW’s tournament selection and seeding were bonuses, considering the preseason expectations.

“After we lost Andreas [Helmigk], Latrell [Fleming] and Julian [Swartz], if somebody in early November would have said, ‘We’ll give you an eighth seed,’ would we have taken it? We all just laugh.

“Of course.”

Earlier Sunday, women’s basketball coach Jane Albright congratulated Ryan and the men’s team on its selection. The women also earned a No. 8 seed.

The at-large bid is the fourth straight for the UW men, adding to the record set when last season’s squad earned a No. 6 seed under Brad Soderberg. Wisconsin’s two seniors will be the first Badger class never to miss an NCAA tournament, an experience that has begun to be common place for the team.

“It’s never an old hat when you go to the NCAAs,” captain Charlie Wills said. “It’s exciting to get there.”

After Soderberg, Ryan becomes the second consecutive first-year coach to take the Badgers to the NCAA tournament.