SPORTS
Wisconsin ‘Dials’ up comeback win
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Also by Dave McGrath:
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- Ohio State's Dials, Wisconsin's Tucker go head-to-head (February 16, 2006)
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- Ohio State outlasts Wisconsin (January 19, 2006)
- Perimeter shooting woes doom OSU comeback attempt (February 28, 2005)
- Wisconsin looks to rebound in Columbus (February 25, 2005)
by Dave McGrath
Thursday, February 16, 2006
It was a true battle of the titans. Wisconsin and No. 12 Ohio State were caught in a heavyweight brawl and after 38-plus minutes of both teams giving it their all to bite, scratch and claw their way to victory, Wisconsin delivered the haymaker that allowed them to walk away with a 78-73 victory.
UW's Alando Tucker and the Buckeyes' Terrence Dials, the respective colossuses of each team, met in the paint. After banging for position, Dials received the ball with his team trailing by four and needing a basket badly, while Tucker was trying desperately to seal the Herculean Badger comeback — the team had trailed by nine at the half.
Dials faced up, edged in a little closer and then went for a two-foot jumper. Tucker blocked the shot of the OSU juggernaut, who had looked so unstoppable making 10 of his first 12 shots, and made the more super-human play. After deflecting Dials' shot straight up in the air, Tucker snatched the ball, sprinted down the floor and drew a foul.
He made the ensuing free throw to push the lead to five and Ohio State drew no closer the rest of the way.
"It had to be fun to watch," UW head coach Bo Ryan said. "I enjoyed his performance and his teammates did too."
"It's amazing to have a guy like [Tucker] playing on our team," senior Ray Nixon said of his roommate Tucker, who finished with 27 points and 16 rebounds, both game-highs. "Sometimes we get caught watching him do so much for our team that it can hurt us, but he is just great."
Dials finished the game with a team-leading 24 points.
Wisconsin (18-7, 8-4 Big Ten) overcame a nine-point halftime deficit by scoring 50 points in the second half — shooting over 55 percent — allowing it to squeak past Ohio State (18-4, 7-4) in one of the most hard-fought games of the season.
"There'll be a lot of sore guys tomorrow," predicted Ryan.
For all of Tucker's heroics and Dials' wasted efforts, it was the supporting cast that provided the difference in the game. Four Badgers, including Tucker, scored in double-figures, with sophomore Brian Butch (17 points), Nixon (13) and junior guard Kammron Taylor (12) all making huge contributions.
"We finally put it together," Tucker said of the total team attack. "This is what we have been talking about, game after game."
With Tucker's 16 boards as a base, UW as a team out-rebounded the Buckeyes by 11, a major development in the game according to Ryan.
It wasn't Tucker who hit the game's biggest shots, but Butch and Nixon who made the game-changing baskets. With just under six minutes remaining in the game and the Badgers trailing by four, Nixon got hot and scored 10 of Wisconsin's next 12 points.
"I thought that I was open," Nixon said. "It was a time that we needed to step up, we needed a couple of key baskets and I thought that I could hit those shots."
Then, one possession before Tucker would make the play of the game on Dials, Butch made a 3-pointer to give Wisconsin a four-point lead, hopping up and down on one foot, as he watched the shot pop up high off the rim before falling through.
"It definitely was a team effort," Butch said. "Everyone stepped up, everyone hit big shots, everyone had defensive plays when [they] needed to."
Wisconsin kept it close through the opening minutes, matching Ohio State basket for basket. However, with the score tied at 14, the Buckeyes went on a 12-2 run to take a 10-point lead and were able to push their lead to 13 at one point. OSU's Dials was perfect, making all five of his shots and both of his free throws to tack up 12 points.
It could've been worse for the Badgers, but Dials picked up his second foul with 6:11 remaining in the first half, forcing the 6-foot-9, 260-pound center to sit the remainder of the frame. As it was, Wisconsin went into the locker room trailing 37-28.
Once Wisconsin started to make a move in the second-half, the crowd soon got into the game and by the time Wisconsin took their first lead of the half with 2:54 remaining, the crowd noise was deafening.
"The crowd really liked it too," Ryan said. "The energy in that place — every time you think you've heard it at it's loudest — wow. That was electrifying that last six minutes, and the block was a part of that."
"It's a great feeling when you hit a big shot or make a great stop and you feel the building was about to erupt," Nixon said. "The fans just go nuts and you feel a surge go through your body."
And though the Badgers missed a few free throws late in the game, they were able to hold off the Buckeyes with more defensive stops.
"The recipe for defeat was unfolding, in that we missed some free throws," Ryan said. "Fortunately, they didn't hit shots down at the other end. We held on."
Anonymous (February 16, 2006 @ 10:22am):
I love Brian Butch and I just want to tell him if he is within 5 feet of the basket slam the rock
Anonymous (February 16, 2006 @ 10:25am):
It was a basketball game. Do you really need to compare the players to one of the 7 wonders of the ancient world, an avatar of Vishnu, a Greek demigod, and the precursors to the Olympian gods in the first 3 paragraphs? And, if you do, is it necessary to then describe a player as "super-human"?
Anonymous (February 16, 2006 @ 7:45pm):
It's a nice win, but don't get too excited about it. When you have a team that essentially has only 2 scorers on a poor offensive team to begin with, you don't have a great recipe there. Let's face it, all that happened was the Badgers successfully covered as 1 point favorites. In the Big Ten, everybody knows the home court is worth probably 8 points - at least. Not to get off topic though - I think that people make too big a deal about the academic problems in recruiting quality players. Case in point - look at Duke's program. The reason the Badgers won't ever be very good is essentially the reason that they have a pretty solid program - their coach. Ryan is a guy that doesn't appeal to a lot of star high school players. Don't get me wrong, the Badgers play GREAT team ball under Ryan, who gets more out of his talent pool (I would argue) than probably any other coach in the nation. The problem is, the best of the best want to play for a team that takes the cap off on the offensive end. A team like Villanova, for example, would appeal to me if I was a star in HS. As far as Big10 goes, I personally would go to Michigan St. over Wisc in a heartbeat. Albeit, Mich St. often plays at a level far below their ability, but that's another story. Bottom Line: Congrats on the win yesterday, just don't get too excited about the future. Ryan will maintain a fairly high level of play, but potential will always be limited with him at the helm.
