Having finished off the regular season in style with three
straight conference victories, Wisconsin men’s basketball now heads down to
Indianapolis to begin what they hope is an extended postseason run. Just a year
after being upset in the Big Ten quarterfinals by Penn State, the Badgers (12-6
Big Ten, 23-8 Overall) will likely enter Friday’s quarterfinal matchup with
Indiana (11-7 Big Ten, 25-7 Overall) as a slight underdog.
Although UW was able to defeat the Hoosiers in Madison back
on January 26th, IU will no doubt have an advantage with the game
being played at Indianapolis’ Bankerslife Fieldhouse. Just 2-6 outside the
state of Indiana, the Hoosiers are 23-1 in their home state, with three of
those victories coming against top-5 opponents.
“The crowds {in Bloomington} have been so fantastic and I
have no doubt that it is going to carry over there…” Indiana head coach Tom
Crean said Monday. “I know our guys thrive on it.”
Beyond the Hoosier home court advantage, the Badgers will
have to overcome the demons that inevitably accompany a team that hasn’t won in
Indy since the 2008 championship game, a run of three consecutive losses in the
conference’s postseason tournament.
While UW will be trying to exact revenge for its recent
struggles at the renamed Bankerslife Fieldhouse, the Hoosiers will no doubt be
out to prove that they let one get away back in Madison.
One of the reasons that the Hoosiers felt that way was the
sub-standard play of freshman forward Cody Zeller. The Big Ten’s freshman of
the year, Zeller finished the regular season averaging 15.4 points and 6.4
rebounds per game. But against the Badgers, Zeller managed just seven points
and three rebounds while struggling through foul trouble for most of the game.
“He got a foul called on him the second possession of the
game,” Crean said after that game. “There were a couple times we tried to get
the ball to him but they three-quartered him, and we didn’t give him the chance
to post up like he is used to.”
Outside of a bad night in Madison, Zeller has been one of
the best players in the Big Ten. The Washington, Ind native has been a major
factor in Indiana’s 13-game improvement over last season and would figure to
play a pivotal role should the Hoosiers make a run through the postseason.
“You could tell from his bloodlines how good he could be,”
UW head coach Bo Ryan said of Zeller. “Sometimes potential is a curse but not
in his case, not with what he has been around.”
While it seems likely that Zeller’s numbers will begin to
regress toward their mean, UW junior forward Jared Berggren has been a
kryptonite of sorts for the Zeller family this season. Before holding the
younger Cody to his second-worst scoring of the year, Berggren held older brother
Tyler to just 12 points in Wisconsin’s 60-57 loss at North Carolina back on
November 30th. The elder Zeller was just 3/5 from the field, his lowest
single-game shot total of the season.
Unlike some teams headed to Indianapolis, the Badgers have the
NCAA Tournament to look forward to next week. But with a conference
championship on the line, there is no doubt that their focus will be on the
task at hand.
"We are who we are and now we go on to ‘next’,” Ryan said.
“And next is the Big Ten Tournament.”
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