GREEN BAY — UW-Green Bay had never come out on the winning side in its first 15 shots at in-state rival Wisconsin. For them, the 16th chance was the elusive number they were searching for.
Even if it took overtime to seal the 88-84 win over the Badgers.
After UW senior guard Trevon Hughes missed a driving circus shot with regulation time winding down and his team trailing by two points, his junior teammate Jon Leuer was able to clean up the mess with an offensive rebound and put back to tie the score.
But, behind 22 points from junior guard Bryquis Perine and 48.3 percent shooting from the field as a team, the Phoenix shocked a Wisconsin squad that was fresh off an upset over Duke and blowout win over Grambling State last week by holding it to one field goal during the overtime session.
Over that same stretch for UW-Green Bay, the Phoenix hit 2-of-5 shots, including a clutch 3-pointer from senior guard Troy Cotton, and 8-of-10 free throws to seal the win while only turning the ball over once.
Afterward, their fans celebrated with the team on the Resch Center court as UW-Green Bay snapped UW’s three-game winning streak.
“We just approached it as a regular game,” Perine, who connected on 8-of-19 shots in the game, said. “We didn’t change anything. There was no different routine and we came in here like it was any other team and treated it like they were all the same.”
This time around though, there was one result that was different from all the rest in the series. And that UW-Green Bay win had plenty to do with the fact the Phoenix shot 50 percent from beyond the arc while connecting on nine 3-point shots during the contest.
“They made some tough two’s early,” UW head coach Bo Ryan said following the game. “But it was the three’s that really hurt us. If you’re taking away one thing, you tend to expose something else. But when you shoot 50 percent from three, something else has to really go well for you.”
For the Badgers, though, it did not. After committing only 15 turnovers all of last week, the Badgers coughed the ball up 17 different times against the Phoenix leading to 17 points off turnovers.
Perhaps the fact that UW-Green Bay opened with a quick 11-3 run over the first four minutes of the tilt had something to do with those hiccups. Even though Wisconsin kept fighting back in an attempt to seize control of the game showed resiliency, UW-Green Bay had none of it and eventually pushed its lead back up to at least seven on 14 separate occasions.
In essence, the Badgers were trailing the entire game save for a few very short instances. And that led to some sloppy play.
“We outrebound them and outscore them in the paint,” Ryan said. “The turnovers? That’s guys trying to hurry, and I think that was part of us always trying to climb out of the hole and they put pressure (on).
“I think we sped up just a little too much.”
The Badgers only lead in the second half came following a stretch where Hughes dominated the game and scored 15 straight points for Wisconsin. After that personal run cut the Phoenix lead to one point with less than eight minutes to play, Leuer gave UW a 61-60 lead following an easy dunk shortly thereafter.
“We definitely thought we had some momentum right there,” Leuer, who scored 26 points, said. “They came back like a good team does and got a good shot and were able to stretch it right back up to three or four.
“That just took away our momentum.”
For Wisconsin, the loss is a low point in a young season that generated so many highlights. All the success from Maui and inside the Kohl Center a week ago was dimmed by a defeat in snowy Green Bay.
“It’s a frustrating loss,” UW senior guard Trevon Hughes, who scored a game-high 27 points, said after the game. “We should have had this one. They came in ready to play from the jump. We came halfway.
“You can’t do that.”
