In the last regular-season matchup, the Wisconsin women's basketball team fell to No. 14 Ohio State 75-53.
Although Wisconsin (6-12 Big Ten, 16-13 overall) earned a 54-51 win over Michigan State last week, the Badgers couldn't stop the three-game win streak the Buckeyes (13-3, 22-5) had coming into the game. Wisconsin gave up a season-high 75 points to Ohio State Thursday night.
""We were very disappointed defensively at half time,"" Wisconsin head coach Lisa Stone said. ""We talked about us not having a solid defensive possession the whole first 20 minutes. And then that's coupled with some missed layups and we sent three back in the second half, so from a rebounding standpoint, we were going to give that up because we wanted to make sure we got back in transition.""
Wisconsin shot 23-of-63 from the field for just 36.6 percent while OSU sunk 28-of-52 for a 52.8 percent record. The Badgers went into the second half down 40-29 and could not manage to get within much reach from that point on as the Buckeyes led by as many as 23 and maintained an 18-point lead for the remainder of the half.
""We had opportunities offensively to score and missed a ton of layups, rushed our shots and a lot of that has to do with Ohio State's defense,"" Stone said.
Wisconsin sophomore guard Alyssa Karel, who averages 13 points a game, led Wisconsin again with 13 points—all in the first half—and Teah Gant had 11 of her own, shooting 3-of-4 from the line. Rae Line D'Alie added 10 with five boards.
Although Wisconsin only gave up 11 turnovers compared to Ohio State's 14, the Buckeyes scored 15 points off of those turnovers, while the Badgers only managed six. Ohio State racked up 33 defensive board compared to Wisconsin's 19.
OSU freshman center Jantel Lavender, who is a Big Ten Player of the Year contender and leads the conference with 20.6 points and 10.5 rebounds a game, scored 21 with 13 boards. Senior forward Star Allen added 17 and senior guard Ashlee Trebilcock contributed 11. Freshman guard Samantha Prahalis got nine of Ohio State's 15 assists and had just one turnover in 28 minutes.
""[Prahalis is] a play-maker and a crowd favorite because of what she does,"" Stone said. ""Nine assists to one turnover, that's pretty impressive. In my opinion, she's the freshman of the year in our league, there's no doubt about it. She's led this team, a very young Ohio State team, to another conference championship and they're pretty good, there's no question about it.""
With this loss, UW secures an eighth seed in the Big Ten Tournament. The Buckeyes have now partially clinched the Big Ten title and with a win over Penn State on Sunday, they could have it for themselves for the fifth straight season.
""The bottom line is, the end of the regular season is here, they're going to crown Ohio State the conference champion once again and we've got to get back to some basics and understand that we don't play this weekend, but we're going to practice tomorrow,"" Stone said. ""We're going to get after it and we're going to get ready for next week because we have to find that chip back because we've got a lot to prove in the Big Ten Tournament.""
The rest of the Big Ten will finish up the regular season Sunday, while the Big Ten Tournament kicks off in Indianapolis at the Conseco Field House March 5 and runs through March 8.
—uwbadgers.com contributed to this report.
