[media-credit name=’DEREK MONTGOMERY/Herald Photo’ align=’alignnone’ width=’648′][/media-credit]CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — With guard Dee Brown landing a pair of death blows from beyond the arc in the closing minutes of play Saturday, top-ranked Illinois (25-0, 11-0 Big Ten) kept its record untarnished with a 70-59 win over No. 20 Wisconsin (16-6, 7-4) at Assembly Hall. Quiet for most of the game, Brown dropped 13 points on Wisconsin in the final 10 minutes to finish the game 5-for-8 from the field.

Yet, of all the looks converted by Brown in the second stanza, two long 3’s — with 3:09 and 1:45 remaining on the clock — dealt the most damage to the hopes of the upset-minded Badgers.

“That’s very tough,” Wisconsin swingman Alando Tucker said. “Man, it’s just a dagger that goes into you. You’re working so hard, we’ve been playing good ‘D’ for 30 seconds, and then it comes to five seconds — he puts up a shot and it goes in.”

Although Brown’s home-stretch heroics secured the victory, it wasn’t the only instance of an Illinois guard extinguishing a Wisconsin run. After surrendering the lead early in the second half, Brown, along with Illinois backcourt co-stars Deron Williams and Luther Head, nailed clutch baskets in shifts to hold the advancing Badgers at bay.

Williams was the first of the three Illinois guards to catch a hot hand in the second half. The junior drained back-to-back 3-point shots to reclaim the lead after Tucker hit a pair from the charity stripe to give Wisconsin a 28-27 advantage. The Illini extended their lead to as many as nine before the Badgers rallied back.

Ignited by a Tucker alley-oop lay-up on a feed from senior point man Sharif Chambliss, Wisconsin mounted a brief run, pulling to within five with 13:04 left on the clock. Although Illinois suffered through a three-and-a-half-minute drought from the field, Head dropped four of five from the line during the stretch and eventually snapped the cold streak with back-to-back buckets.

“In the first half, I thought he was playing too fast, but in the second half he slowed down, got to the bucket, got to the free-throw line and, you know, knocked those down,” Illinois head coach Bruce Weber said of Head’s performance.

Almost six minutes after Williams scored on a finger-roll lay-up with 15:46 left in the half, an Illini player other than Head finally got on the board, as Nick “Chainsaw” Smith converted on two shots from the free-throw line. On the following possession, Brown materialized on a baseline cut for the easy lay-up. Illinois led 47-38.

After the brief Illini resurgence, Tucker drained shots on consecutive possessions — the second of which was a 3-pointer to cut the lead to 49-43 with 8:40 remaining. Brown punched in on the following drive, responding quickly with a shot from downtown. Several minutes later, the Badgers worked the Illinois advantage back down to five with a run capped by a wide-open baseline 3 from forward Ray Nixon.

Once again, Brown had an answer. Following the Nixon trey, Weber called time to work out a play. The result of the helmsman’s designs placed the ball in the hands of the red-hot guard. Brown spotted up off a ball screen and converted on the deep look to give the Illini a 57-49 lead.

“Every time they made a run, we just made a shot,” Brown said after the game.

“They just don’t stop moving,” Wisconsin guard and defensive specialist Michael Flowers commented. “They use their screens off of (Roger) Powell and (James) Augustine, and it’s tough to get around those.”

With 1:45 left on the clock, Kammron “Twin-Kam” Taylor finished a penetrating drive with a finger-roll to pull within six.

Once again, Brown had an answer, shattering the comeback attempt with another good look from even further beyond the arc. The shot restored the Illinois lead to double digits with 1:45 left to play. Wisconsin proceeded to play the foul game, but the Illini managed to convert on all eight opportunities from the line.

“When a guy hits a 3 from that range, you don’t have an answer for that,” Ryan said. “Even if you do, it ain’t gonna be a four-point play, so you’re not going to gain ground.”

The Illini backcourt trio combined to score 57 of Illinois’ 70 points on the night. Head led all scorers with 26 and tied Tucker for the game high in rebounds, grabbing eight off the glass.

Tucker — the only Badger to post double digits in the scoring column — finished the game with 24, including 17 in the second half.

For the first time in 14 starts, Wisconsin senior forward Mike Wilkinson failed to score more than 10 points. Illini forwards Jack Ingram and James Augustine held Wilkinson to just four looks on the night, all of which he hit.

“[Our forwards] did a great job [on Wilkinson],” Head said. “He’s a big part of their offense — the key to it, I think.”

“He didn’t get the ball that many times, and when he did get it, he was off of where he would normally catch it,” Wisconsin head coach Bo Ryan said. “Every scouting report in the country would say this is what you do to post players — get them to catch it out of their comfort zone, get ’em to do this, get ’em to do that, and then do it.”

In the opening half, Wisconsin jumped out to an early 8-4 lead thanks to successive 3-pointers from Taylor and Chambliss. With the Illini guards firing, Illinois stormed back to reclaim the lead. A Brown 3-pointer from the top of the key gave the Illini their biggest advantage of the half at 14-8 with 11:18 left on the clock.

After a three-minute Illinois drought, Wisconsin chopped the margin down to one point with 8:07 left in the period. For the next five minutes, the two squads traded baskets as the score climbed to a 27-24 Illinois advantage.

Both teams ended the half with a string of unsuccessful looks from the field. With just seconds left on the clock before the half, Tucker pulled down a long rebound after a “Chainsaw” miss and ran the length of the floor for a breakaway dunk. Wisconsin entered the break trailing Illinois just 27-26.

The Badgers out-shot the Illini from the field by a margin of 5.6 percent and held a small advantage on the boards (18-16) in the opening stanza. In the second period, the accuracy of the Illinois shooters improved 57.9 percent and 62.5 percent from the perimeter.

With the win, Illinois became the first team to sweep Wisconsin during the Ryan administration. Since Ryan arrived three years ago, the border rivals have split every season, with Wisconsin claiming the lone match on neutral ground.

“We’re excited deep down that we beat ’em,” Brown said. “Honestly, out of all the teams, Wisconsin’s not my favorite. It feels good for me just to beat those guys.”