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UW hoping to avoid injury bug

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Also by Mike Ackerstein:

UW's defense keys successes (March 11, 2008)
Wisconsin claims Big Ten title outright (March 10, 2008)
Rodgers' new job comes with price (March 6, 2008)
Seniors end final game at Kohl Center with a bang (March 6, 2008)

by Mike Ackerstein

Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Now midway through February, the season is starting to take its toll on the University of Wisconsin men’s basketball team. The Badgers are now working hard to avoid injuries as they enter the latter stages of regular season play.

“Well, I mean, you can’t stop practicing. That’s obvious,” head coach Bo Ryan said in his Monday press conference about the precautions the team takes. “But what you do is you just, you’re not going as long, but you always are going to play hard, and you’re always going to make sure you maintain the conditioning that you’re in. So you know, the practices, instead of being two hours, we’re usually down to about an hour-20, hour-and-a-half on the floor.”

Guard Jason Bohannon entered Saturday’s game against Minnesota as questionable to play after injuring his ankle in practice. Bohannon was able to play against the Gophers, but Trevon Hughes later went down with an injury and missed the final four minutes of action.

“You know, the longer you do something,” Ryan said, “the more chances there are that something doesn’t go right physically, no matter what it is.”

Hughes looked fine in Monday’s practice and should be ready to go Wednesday against Illinois. The guard missed Wisconsin’s game at Texas earlier this year after injuring himself during practice.

“Sometimes it happens early in the year to a guy, sometimes in the middle, sometimes at the end, but it’s not because physically they can’t handle it,” Ryan said. “But once you do tweak something — an ankle or something like that — it tends to hang around for a while, very difficult to get it totally recovered, and that’s the case with a few of our guys.”

One way of keeping the Badgers rested and healthy is playing a deep rotation. UW hasn’t gone to more than an eight-man rotation this season though, choosing to find rest for its players in other ways.

“You know, again, the game did change a little bit when the TV/media timeouts came in,” Ryan said. “So in a practice, if you really look at it, sometimes these guys are going harder than in the games because, a lot of times, in practice, you don’t get the 2 1/2 minutes every four minutes or how many or what it comes out to.”

Although freshman Jon Leuer and Greg Stiemsma have logged serious minutes at times during the season, it hasn’t come on a consistent basis. But Ryan is confident in the ability of his team to find production past its first six guys.

“So you know… physically, everybody is pretty much going through the same thing,” Ryan said. “In practice, we’re rotating on the scout team, and we’re rotating on the team of guys that are playing a lot, so they learn to pick one another up and to try to make the best use of the minutes that they have.”

Leuer steps in on defense

Jon Leuer has come in and made his presence felt on defensive end so far this season. The forward has played tough for the Badgers despite a rather thin frame.

“Well, you know, unfortunately for Jon, physically he’s not an Eric Gordon or a [Robbie] Hummel,” Ryan said. “You know, he’s not as strong yet.”

Leuer had a late growth spurt before coming to UW, but Ryan doesn’t think the freshman is getting any taller, so he’ll have to eventually improve his bulk if he wants to take the next step as a defender.

“I think he’s done growing vertically now,” Ryan said, “so he’s got to develop in other ways physically, and he’s working at that, and

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