Senior guard Bronson Koenig scored 21 points on five-of-seven shooting from three and senior forward Nigel Hayes added 15 points and four assists as yet again the No. 18 Wisconsin Badgers (3-1 Big Ten, 14-3 overall) bounced back from a loss, upending the Ohio State Buckeyes (0-4, 10-7) by a score of 89-66.
The Badgers shot a mere 14 percent from three in their 11-point loss to Purdue over the weekend, but Thursday night, in their last home game before classes resume, Wisconsin regained its three-point stroke.
UW, led by Koenig, made 12 of their 22 three-point attempts in what was one of its best offensive performances of the season. The Badgers took a season-high 73 field goal attempts, missing 37 of them, but were able to collect their own miss 21 times.
Sophomore forward Ethan Happ grabbed four of the Badgers’ 21 offensive rebounds and had seven more on the defensive end as UW handled the Buckeyes in dominant fashion.
While Ohio State was down just three points with 11:42 to play in the first half, the Badgers used a 9-0 run over the course of the next five minutes to increase their lead to 12. From there, UW continued to pull away, extending its lead to 18 as the teams headed to the locker room.
UW forced seven first half turnovers and relinquished the basketball only one time over the course of the game’s first 20 minutes.
While four Buckeyes scored 10 or more points, the Badgers held Ohio State to a pedestrian 40 percent shooting from the field and 25 percent from three.
Ohio State never led in its fourth consecutive conference loss and leaves Madison with major questions on both ends of the floor.
As a result of its big lead to begin the second half, Wisconsin, on the other hand, was able to allow its role-players to star.
Junior guard Jordan Hill had eight points on three-of-six shooting, while freshman guard D’Mitrik Trice tacked on seven points of his own. Five Badger reserves played at least twelve minutes, including sophomore forward Alex Illikainen and freshman guard Brevin Pritzl, who both saw extended playing time because of UW’s comfortable cushion.
Thursday’s victory also saw the naming of the Kohl Center floor. At halftime, UW Athletics announced that starting next season the Kohl Center’s floor would be named after Albert “Ab” Nicholas, a former UW basketball player and major donor to the University.
Nicholas, originally from Rockford, Ill., passed away in August of 2016 at the age of 85. In addition to dedicating the court in his honor, UW raised Nicholas’ No. 8 jersey number in the Kohl Center rafters.
UW hosts Michigan next Tuesday, on what next season will be known as the Ab Nicholas Court, hours after spring semester classes resume.
