The Badgers had won 11 of 12 games down the stretch of Big 10 play before losing back-to-back games entering the tournament and landing a seventh seed.
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They lost their last two games in the league and are looking to bounce back in a big way against Pittsburgh. They were a Final Four team in 2014 and, a year later, reached the national title game. What I hope wasn’t the case was those guys getting minutes because they are seniors.
The Pittsburgh Panthers take on the Wisconsin Badgers in one of the college basketball March Madness games on Friday, start time at 6:50 PM ET, at Scottrade Center, St. Louis Missouri.
“It’s easy to play for a guy like that who, I tell my friends and family how much time he puts in watching film of other teams, not only that, but practice film of us”, Happ said of Gard. “When a guy cares that much, it’s easy to play hard for him”. “Everyone has their opinions”. “It was little rebounds and stuff like that and we have to hit free throws at the end, basically”.
Pittsburgh was 21-11 on the season, 3-1 on a neutral floor and 12-17 against the spread. Hayes finished 3-for-17 from the field.
The play of redshirt freshman forward Ethan Happ was key for the Badgers in the victory, especially in the second half.
Trailing 40-39, guard Bronson Koenig’s layup didn’t fall. “I think the fact we can shoot that poorly and still find a way to win gives us some momentum going into Sunday”. “And to get to this point they’ve forged their own identity, written their own story”.
Dixon has the edge in experience, but his record the last two seasons (39-26) isn’t impressive and the Panthers have struggled in the NCAA Tournament. But the Panthers coach acknowledged Thursday there is a different feeling to this trip simply because of the complexion of his team.
“We wanted to limit his touches”, Pittsburgh coach Jamie Dixon said.
“In reality – and coaches don’t want to admit it – that’s what basketball boils down to”, Badgers assistant coach Lamont Paris said. We had a lot of opportunities to win the game.
Newsflash for Badgers fans: Xavier is not Pittsburgh. “It’s something we have to contain”. They shot 25 percent from the field, including a 2-of-9 mark from 2-point range, and grabbed only three offensive rebounds off their 18 misses and scored a paltry 0.57 points per possession. They average 21.2 free-throw attempts per game and are shooting 75.4% from the line. “We were all pretty embarrassed”, he said, “just because of the culture of the program, and the start in the Big Ten wasn’t exactly what we planned on”. It took a 3-pointer by Brown in the final minute just to get within 22-16 at the break.
And, although Wisconsin didn’t shoot the ball particularly well, they didn’t turn it over (six for the game).
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Showalter didn’t get any credit for any part of that play in the box score, but kept the play alive that led to the tide-turning shot. We’ll just try to smack the ball out of the air and run the clock out. They were whistled for four fouls in the first 98 seconds and put Wisconsin in the bonus less than five minutes into the half. Not big as in the Badgers are loaded with 7-footers, but rather big as in they look like they have spent a lot of time in the weight room. A few weeks ago, Dixon said that the team was playing its best basketball of the year.
