On a day primed to celebrate the No. 12 Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball feel-good season, the Penn State Nittany Lions came to Madison and royally spoiled it, defeating the Badgers 86-75.
Heading into Saturday’s game, Wisconsin’s goal was simple: win to secure a double-bye in the Big Ten Tournament. After the troubling defeat, Wisconsin will be forced to play in the earlier portion of the tournament, and is left with more questions than answers as they head to Indianapolis.
It was Penn State’s first win ever at the Kohl Center, and first in Madison since 1995.
“We’ve gotta regroup here and dust ourselves off from this,” head coach Greg Gard said after the loss. “This one stings for our seniors and for our fans and everybody, not the performance that we wanted or desired. We're better than this.”
Before the game, Wisconsin honored its six seniors — Markus Ilver, Carter Gilmore, Kamari McGee, John Tonje, Steven Crowl and Max Klesmit, who did not play — with a ceremony recognizing the group’s accomplishments and putting a bow on a regular season that put the Badgers in the national spotlight. With a game against the Big Ten’s 17th-best team looming, no one would have expected the outcome.
“It would have been great to get this senior night win and all that stuff, but this is just another part of the road, and we just gotta learn from this adversity and be ready for next week,” Tonje said after the game.
Wisconsin was led by the combo of Steven Crowl and John Blackwell, who each scored 19 points on 15 shots. John Tonje added 13 points, shooting only 2-13 from the field, and grabbed seven rebounds. Kamari McGee scored 11 points, 10 of them coming in the first half.
Meanwhile, guard D’Marco Dunn led Penn State with 25 points, shooting an incredible 10-12 from the field and 4-5 from three. Forward Yanic Konan Niederhauser added 15 points, with 11 rebounds and five blocks, playing a huge role on both sides of the court. Forward Zach Hicks scored 14 points, and guard Nick Kern contributed 12.
On the heels of the pregame ceremony, the Badgers started the game strong. Clicking offensively, after a Crowl bucket, Kamari McGee, Nolan Winter and Crowl all hit 3-pointers. When Jack Janicki checked into the game, he provided an immediate spark, collecting two steals and an assist, and the Badgers a 16-3 lead only four and a half minutes into the game.
But down 13 points, Penn State didn’t back down. Over the next four minutes, the Nittany Lions hit four 3s, and eight of 10 field goals, rapidly clawing their way back into the game. Three-pointers by Tonje and Blackwell continued to pace the Badgers, who saw their lead shrink to six points, 26-21, with 11:02 left in the half. At that point, Wisconsin and Penn State had gone a combined 10-12 from three.
Soon, as Wisconsin worked to limit Penn State’s 3-point opportunities, the Badgers settled in defensively and gradually built their lead back into the double digits. In the first 10 minutes of the half, Penn State scored 23 points but were held to only five points over the game’s next seven minutes.
Offensively, Tonje showed his knack for getting to the free-throw line, Crowl successfully utilized post-moves, and Blackwell continued to provide energy. When Tonje hit a three with 4:15 left, it gave Wisconsin a 40-27 lead.
Tonje’s triple would be the last first-half points Wisconsin scored, as the Badgers went 10 straight possessions without scoring. Penn State refused to bend the knee, slow-churning an 8-0 run over the final three minutes of the half. The Nittany Lions found themselves at the free-throw line three times in the next three and a half minutes and despite their six attempts, made only three.
But a lay-up by Dunn broke Penn State’s nearly five-minute field goal drought, and a late-shock clock 3-pointer by Baldwin Jr. with eight seconds left in the half brought Penn State within five, making the score 40-35 heading into the half.
“That back half of the first half, and specifically the last five minutes or so, set the tone for just pouring confidence into what they [Penn State] were doing and that's where the tide started to turn,” Gard said of this stretch.
Penn State’s resurgence continued beyond halftime. In the first 4:40 of the half, the Nittany Lions outscored Wisconsin 16-7, scoring from the perimeter and paint while slowing Wisconsin’s offensive attack with increased pressure defensively. Konan Niederhauser provided the most noticeable boost, scoring four points, grabbing four rebounds and picking up two blocks.
More troubling for Wisconsin was the foul trouble Janicki and McGee found themselves in. Already without starting point guard Klesmit, Janicki and McGee had picked up three fouls with 15:08 left in the game. Meanwhile, after a put-back dunk with 16:40, Winter clutched his shoulder and went to the locker room. Luckily for the Badgers, he returned to the game with 12:34 left with a shirt that appeared to have protective shoulder padding.
With a tenseness already in the air, back-to-back buckets from Kern gave Penn State a 57-51 lead. But after a wide-open lay-up by Gilmore, followed by a tip-in dunk from Crowl, the Kohl Center crowd understood their assignment, turning the general uneasiness that had crept over the arena into roars that seemed to will the Badgers back to life.
After a Konan Niederhauser reverse dunk, Crowl hit a 3-pointer to bring the game within one point, before a Blackwell mid-range jumper gave Wisconsin the lead, 60-59. However, as they had done all afternoon, Penn State continued to battle, as Dunn hit back-to-back 3s to restore the Nittany Lion lead to five and silence the Kohl Center crowd.
Another Dunn field goal gave Penn State a 69-62 lead with 5:33 and brought the tenseness to a peak. With the Badgers in need, Blackwell put the team on his back, scoring Wisconsin’s next eight points, making it 72-70 with 3:43 to play. Unfortunately for Wisconsin, McGee and Janicki each picked up their fourth fouls in this same stretch.
After the final media timeout, which came with 3:36 left, it was clear Wisconsin didn’t have what it took to finish the job. The Badgers couldn’t come up with cherished defensive stops and folded on the other end, failing to find efficient shots.
The result was an embarrassing loss to the Big Ten’s second-worst team, sobering Wisconsin as they head into postseason play. After a regular season ripe with promise, the Badgers now seem to be their shakiest at the worst possible time. Whether this game is indicative of Wisconsin’s team as a whole or if it will be something Gard’s squad will bounce back from will remain to be seen.
