The Wisconsin men’s basketball team opened up play Saturday night when it beat UW-Stevens Point in an exhibition game, 80-54.
One of the game’s standouts was redshirt junior Jared Berggren, who scored 12 points and grabbed five rebounds for the Badgers in just 22 minutes of action. Berggren, who will be the starting five-man for Wisconsin this year, must play well if this year’s team hopes to reclaim success. After losing of Jon Leuer, Keaton Nankivil and Tim Jarmusz from last season, the front-line will be mostly new, and head coach Bo Ryan has stressed that replacing them will be vital to success.
“In the front line we’re looking to replace, as I’ve said many times, the defensive read-and-reacts that the three guys that moved on this past year in the front line gave us, and we’ve got a lot of work to do,” Ryan said.
Despits improvements Berggren has made to his strength and agility in the offseason, Ryan believes that he still has a long way to go on reacting on defense and defending the basket.
“The main thing is [Berggren] has to work on helping on the screening situations and stopping smaller guards and forwards from getting to the rim,” Ryan said. “He’s been a little better this year, but we need him to get a lot better before we get into the Big Ten.”
Berggren still has some time to get acclimated to the starting position as the Badgers face relatively soft opponents in their first five games. Wisconsin hopes this period of games can get him ready because if he is not, the Badgers will be in a lot of trouble on Nov. 30 when they travel to Chapel Hill, N.C. to face the No. 1 Tar Heels and their talented front line.
While the front line’s defense still has some work to do, Ryan has been impressed by the defensive play of senior guard Jordan Taylor, but has also been surprised by the play of freshman guard Traevon Jackson.
“Defensively [Taylor] played really well, and you might say, ‘Yeah but that’s against Stevens Point.’ No. Stevens Point is a very good offensive team,” Ryan said. “Systems [like Stevens Points] are difficult to play against, and I thought Jordan did a very good job of understanding what Giordana wanted to do and the other, Tilema, that he was matched up against.”
Jackson received some substantial playing time Saturday night and has definitely found favor with Ryan for his ability to pick things up on defense, not unlike last year when then-freshman Josh Gasser was able to pick up playing time because of his ability to pick up the defensive scheme.
“Traevon has developed very quickly and has adopted our reads a lot quicker than some of the other guys, and that’s why he’s got the potential to get more minutes,” Ryan said. “Traevon played because he’s learned a lot of things and he’s using them.”
The Badgers will now prepare for their first regular season game of the year when the take on their first Division 1 opponent in the Kennesaw State Fighting Owls Saturday at the Kohl Center. This game, though not expected to be that close, will be the first real test for Berggren and the rest of the Badgers as they look to remain an elite team this year.
