Offensive excellence drives Badgers men’s basketball’s successful season
By Brendan Wolf | Feb. 12Reaching No. 16 in the latest AP Poll, it’s safe to say the Wisconsin men’s basketball team’s season has been successful.
Reaching No. 16 in the latest AP Poll, it’s safe to say the Wisconsin men’s basketball team’s season has been successful.
The last time the No. 21 Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team (19-5, 9-4 Big Ten) met with the Iowa Hawkeyes, it was an offensive barn-burner.
Heading into Tuesday night’s match-up, the No. 21 Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team (18-5, 8-4 Big Ten) had not lost to the now 14–9 (5-7 Big Ten) Indiana Hoosiers at the Kohl Center since 1998.
Balancing player development, recruitment and signing transfers in this new age of NIL and the explosion of the transfer portal is, to say the least, not an easy task. Wisconsin men’s basketball head coach Greg Gard has nearly perfected it.
It wasn’t pretty for the No. 17 Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team on Saturday, but with big games from John Tonje and Carter Gilmore, the Badgers battled their way to a gritty 75-69 road win against the Northwestern Wildcats.
Heading into Wednesday night’s road matchup with the Maryland Terrapins, the No. 17 Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team was coming off perhaps their most complete game of the season. But Wisconsin couldn’t replicate its success, running out of gas and falling to Maryland 76-68 at a sold-out XFINITY Center in College Park, Maryland.
Expectations were low for the Wisconsin men’s basketball team heading into the 2024-25 season.
For the No. 18 Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team (16-4), Sunday was one of those days where everything clicked. Playing with an edge, the Badgers got on top of the Nebraska Cornhuskers (12-8) early, played consistently sound defense and let the threes fly, dominating Nebraska for most of the 40-minute game that ended in an 83-55 victory.
The No. 18 Wisconsin men’s basketball team is 5-3 in the Big Ten Conference after a win and a loss against USC and UCLA this past weekend. After their 70-68 win over Ohio State on Jan.14, head coach Greg Guard earned his 200th victory, and Wisconsin still shows no signs of slowing down.
Unable to mount a late-game comeback, the Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team saw their seven-game winning streak come to a screeching halt as they fell to the UCLA Bruins 85-83 Tuesday night in Los Angeles.
A three-star recruit from Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, John Blackwell ranked as the 29th-best combo guard in the nation and the third-best prospect in the state of Michigan coming out of Brother Rice High School.
The No. 18 Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team have already surpassed preseason expectations with a 15-4 record. While several returning players have flourished in bigger roles, the driving factor of the Badgers’ success this season is University of Missouri transfer guard John Tonje.
The Wisconsin Badgers (15-3) continued to play consistently sound basketball on Saturday, solidly defeating the USC Trojans (11-7) 84-69 in Los Angeles. More than halfway through the season, the Badgers seem to be firing on all cylinders.
The Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team took a 17-point lead into halftime, but it took all 40 minutes of the game on Jan. 14 to fend off the pesky Ohio State Buckeyes at the Kohl Center 70-68 to win their sixth straight game and improve to 14-3 on the season and 4-2 in the Big Ten Conference.
Behind a balanced scoring attack and diligent second-half defense, the Wisconsin men’s basketball team overcame a slow start to handily defeat the Minnesota Golden Gophers 80-59 on Jan. 10.
With only one game in the previous 18 days, the Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team could’ve been forgiven if it came out of its midseason hibernation sloppy. But instead of starting the rest of conference play with a lull, Wisconsin did just the opposite. The Badgers scored a Kohl Center record 116 points, hit a program record 21 three-pointers and thoroughly throttled the Iowa Hawkeyes 116-85.
A few weeks ago, the Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team learned firsthand the damage that dual seven-footers can do to a team.
With an 86-80 loss to the Illinois Fighting Illini in Champaign, Illinois on Tuesday night, No. 20 Wisconsin has now lost three straight games.
The No. 11 Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team entered Fiserv Forum on Saturday with the goal of keeping their three-game winning streak over their in-state rival, the No. 5 Marquette Golden Eagles. But they were unable to contain Marquette star Kam Jones and his pesky cast of supporting scorers. The Badgers head back to Madison having relinquished their in-state bragging rights, falling 88-74 in front of a packed arena.
The No. 11 Wisconsin men’s basketball team couldn’t keep their spark alive Tuesday night to beat the Michigan Wolverine in a hard battle, falling 67-64.