The Wisconsin basketball team made a serious statement about its season Tuesday night at the Kohl Center, defeating Michigan State 64-53. The win pulls the Badgers within a game of first place in the Big Ten, while it leaves the Spartans with little breath in conference.
Kirk Penney, Mike Wilkinson and Devin Harris all had 14 points for the Badgers, who were able to overcome a poor shooting night by getting to the free-throw line and pulling ahead of the Spartans.
The game was tied at 48 with 5:27 remaining in the second half, but Kirk Penney charged to the hoop with a long runner off the glass to break the tie. After a series of Penney free throws and an Alando Tucker three-pointer, the Badgers had taken a 55-48 lead that they did not surrender.
The Spartans pulled within four, 57-53, with a minute remaining in the game after a three-pointer by Erazem Lorbek, but junior Freddie Owens and Harris went a collective 5-of-6 from the line down the stretch as the Badgers prevented the Spartans from scoring to pull away and seal the win.
As time expired, Harris picked up a long rebound from Kelvin Torbert and turned it the other way on a fast break, flicking up an alley-oop lob to Tucker for an exclamation point on the victory.
But the dunk left Spartan head coach Tom Izzo upset with the Badgers, as his team was instructed not to foul on the prior possession, thus conceding the victory to Wisconsin.
“I would never allow that,” a visually upset Izzo said.
In defense of his players, Bo Ryan stated that he had talked to Harris about his inappropriate etiquette.
“If I were Tom, I’d be [unhappy] too,” Ryan said. “You’ve got to remember that it was just two young men who finished the game with an exclamation point against a Michigan State team they were excited to play against.”
Lorbek lead the way for the Spartans, scoring all 19 of his points in the second half. Michigan State’s frontcourt was decimated with foul trouble, pushing Aloysius Anagonye and Paul Davis to the bench with three fouls each early in the second half. Lorbek found his shooting touch while making quick moves to the basket for many easy baskets in the post. By slipping from the top of the key to the post while Chris Hill made a cut around the perimeter towards the ball, Lorbek found the passes he needed. The Badger defenders bit on Hill’s movement, leaving Torbek ample room to catch the post entry pass and move to the hoop.
“[The Badgers] were stepping up on the screens and really taking away Chris Hill; they did a good job on him,” Izzo said. “The slip guy was open and Torbert and Hill both gave some good passes in there to him and he got layups. We played good enough to bounce back in, but in critical times we kind of ran out of gas. That and the foul trouble really affected us.”
Wisconsin was able to draw the fouls they needed to overcome their 37 percent shooting performance from the floor. The Badgers made 22 trips to the charity stripe, knocking down 17 of their attempts. The Badgers also limited the Spartans to only 10 trips to the line.
Statistically, the Badgers also dominated the turnover department, only committing five to the Spartans’ 15.
“Any time you can force a team like them into taking some of the shots that they ended up taking (is a good time),” Ryan said. “If you can get them to turn it over 15 times, I think you have got to be happy with most of the execution.”
With the win, Wisconsin keeps its perfect Big Ten home game record in the Bo Ryan era intact. The Badgers have won 22 of their last 23 home conference battles, including their last 13 in a row.
“Any time you’ve got that kind of support, the hearty boisterous noise in there, take advantage of it,” Ryan said. “People got their money’s worth, the ones that did get in there, because they certainly sounded like every seat was filled.”