Even with four seniors set to play in their final home game of their careers later this week, the No. 22 Wisconsin Badgers (11-5 Big Ten, 22-7 overall) are never too experienced to go back to basics.
After two road losses last week to Ohio State and Michigan State in which UW surrendered more than 80 points, Wisconsin is re-emphasizing some of its basic principles on defense as they look to rebound Thursday at home against Iowa (8-8, 16-13), a young team with high potential.
While the Badgers might have tied a season-high for points allowed Sunday in their 84-74 loss to Michigan State, head coach Greg Gard actually saw improvement in his team’s defense.
Gard noted that UW’s aggressiveness and physicality was better than it was in their 83-73 loss to Ohio State Thursday. The mistakes they made are easily correctable, Gard said.
“We’ve had some breakdowns as far as our team defense,” associate head coach Lamont Paris said. “Just some breakdowns in rules that we have ... even today we wanted to go back to some of those rules with some drill work and just refreshing our minds on some very basic principles within our defense.”
Among the topics discussed were UW’s transition defense. The Badgers allowed the Spartans to score 15 points in transition Sunday, the most UW’s given up since Dec. 12 in their win over Marquette.
That issue only popped up Sunday though. Against the Buckeyes last Thursday, the Badgers didn’t give up any fast break points.
On the other hand, in Wisconsin’s loss to Ohio State, Gard said that they allowed OSU to gain confidence early by giving them clean looks. And once the Buckeyes got into a rhythm, they were tough to stop.
“We’ve kind of gotten back to some old ways in terms of allowing guys to be too comfortable, to have too much space to run free,” senior forward Vitto Brown said. “We need to try and tighten up the defense for [Iowa] and knowing that they’re a team like us that can shoot the ball and also penetrate as well.”
The Hawkeyes enter Madison Thursday with one of the most inexperienced teams in the Big Ten. Seven of Iowa’s top-eight leaders in minutes are underclassman. The remaining player though is senior forward Peter Jok, the conference’s leading scorer, averaging 20.6 points per game.
“Their young guys are really, really good,” Paris said. “I think they have an inside presence and play with a lot of energy there.”
The energy can be observed from the swift pace at which the Hawkeyes play. Gard made it clear that while the Spartans are fast, Iowa is faster.
Freshman point guard Jordan Bohannon, the younger brother of former Badgers Zach and Jason Bohannon, leads the Hawkeyes in assists and is their third-leading scorer. In Iowa’s road win over Maryland this past Saturday, Bohannon led the Hawkeyes, scoring a career-high 24 points.
With Iowa’s inexperience, UW recognizes the importance of diminishing their confidence early.
“They’re young, but they play really hard,” senior guard Bronson Koenig said. “They play with an awful lot of momentum so we can’t give them anything easy to get them going.”
And even amidst a stretch in which the Badgers have lost four out of five, sticking to what’s worked in the past has been UW’s top priority.
“The best message you can send is to be consistent,” Gard said. “And continue to teach and correct and encourage and adjust the things we need to get better at, but also reinforce and throw positive accolades at other things we did well.”
The game tips off from the Kohl Center at 8 p.m., Thursday.
