EVANSTON, ILL — After Saturday’s 69-51 loss, the Badgers were left admitting that the Northwestern Wildcats (9-11) had outplayed and out-coached the Big Ten’s top ranked team.
“The perimeter game wasn’t the best tonight,” UW point guard Devin Harris said. “We should have got the ball inside a little bit more, but they played an extremely smart game and they got what they wanted out of their offense.”
Through the majority of the first half, Wisconsin failed to run its potent swing offense effectively, relying instead on lackluster perimeter jump shots. Making only five field goals from inside the three-point arch, the Badgers were digging themselves into a bigger deficit with each set of possessions.
The most telling sign of the Badgers’ offensive inefficiency was that they failed to get to the free throw line even once in the first half and only made it there a season low nine times on the day.
Northwestern’s 2-3 zone began wreaking havoc on UW’s offensive set, as the Badgers seemed rushed and anxious to try and make something happen.
Just one game removed from scoring the fourth-highest point total in school history, Harris made just four of 18 field goals, including just one after halftime. While his 16 points led the team in scoring it was his team-low 22 percent shooting and three turnovers that led the team’s offensive stagnancy.
“The shots were there; they just didn’t fall tonight,” Harris said. “I’m not going to score 30 points every game.”
With 7:13 remaining in the first half, Northwestern would be on a 22-3 scoring run, and it appeared as though Harris was becoming flustered by the Northwestern defense as it keyed in on UW’s star player. Missing three shots on three straight Badger possessions
Harris looked as though he began to force things.
Throughout the day, however, Harris tried to help the team the best he could without scoring from the floor, hitting 6-7 free throws and dishing out a team-high six assists.
“I don’t think Devin got frustrated,” Ryan said. “He’s a competitor and competitors get feisty. He needed some help. It was a team thing.”
With Freddie Owens still nursing an ankle injury and Boo Wade still in Madison, the Badgers entered Evanston needing Devin Harris to have at least an average game. Instead, UW found itself desperately needing another guard to step up. Playing Ike Ukawuba for five minutes near the end of the first half and giving Clayton Hanson 24 minutes throughout the game, Bo Ryan did not find the answers he needed as Owens,
Hanson and Ukawuba went 1-11, scoring just two points.
“I’m about as loyal as they get to players,” Ryan said. “I’d like to get [Owens] back 100 percent, but that’s why we felt the minutes had to be limited.”
As a team, the Badgers scored just 19 first half points and failed to play much better on the defensive side of the ball. Known for its tenacity the Badger defense yielded backdoor cuts, uncontested slam-dunks and wide open three-pointers as Northwestern built a 17-point halftime lead. Northwestern made 59.1 percent of its field goals and 55.6 percent of its three point tries through the first stanza as 6-foot-8 Davor Duvancic stepped out to hit 3-3 from behind the arch.
The second half began much as the first half ended for the Badgers, as Duvancic hit a three on Northwestern’s first possession and Harris turned the ball over on UW’s first touch. Although the Badgers were eventually able to establish their offensive set and get to the free throw line, their efforts proved to be too little too late.
As time ran down in the second half, the Northwestern student section began the chant of “just like football,” reminding UW that this was not the first time this school year that the Badgers had come to Evanston as favorites and left with a loss. In both cases it was Wisconsin’s inefficiency in doing what they had done all season that resulted in the year’s most disappointing defeat.
