The Badgers had an ugly collapse at home to snap a five-game winning streak.
On a five-game winning streak, the Wisconsin Badgers suffered an ugly collapse in the second half, dropping a 77-73 loss in overtime at the Kohl Center on Saturday, putting a major blow to their Big Ten Championship hopes.
It was a slower start for the Badgers in a back-and-forth affair with the Ducks, but a surge midway through the first half created a double-digit lead. Oregon made a major comeback in the second half, cutting a 17-point lead to force overtime with a rapid push in the final minutes, leading to the nail-biting finish.
Then, in overtime, the Ducks relied on center Nate Bittle and the Badgers had no answer, struggling to put together success on the offensive end.
With the loss, Wisconsin dropped to 21-6 on the season and 11-5 in conference play, falling to fifth in the Big Ten standings behind the Maryland Terrapins.
Here are three quick takeaways from Wisconsin’s 77-73 overtime loss to the Oregon Ducks on Saturday.
Coming into Saturday, the Badgers were seen as 8.5-point favorites over the Ducks. Still, some viewed the game as a potential ‘trap’ game, given that Oregon was coming in on a three-game winning streak and had shifty guards such as Jackson Shelstad that could give Wisconsin some problems.
Well, it was a competitive battle over the first eight minutes, as Wisconsin saw success inside, but couldn’t get any of their triples to fall, while Oregon had three threes in the early minutes to get them out to a 17-14 lead with 11:15 to go in the period.
From there, though, Wisconsin dominated the half, going on a 24-4 run, which was what they had in the first half of their home win over the Indiana Hoosiers, taking a 38-21 lead with two minutes left in the period.
It was a dominant stretch from the Badgers, who saw success in a number of different areas on the court. As expected, star guard John Tonje led the way with 16 of those 24 points, scoring 13 straight at one point to ignite the spark for Wisconsin.
The Badgers have played strong complementary basketball throughout the season. But, it’s runs like these that end up separating them from their opponents.
The impressiveness of that first-half run made the second-half collapse even more of a struggle, as the Badgers seemed to have all the momentum going into halftime and couldn’t capitalize on the stretch at home.
As the Ducks slowly chipped at the Badgers lead in the second half, Wisconsin sputtered offensively, as they couldn’t put together the type of run that they had in the first half.
But, the true collapse came over the final five minutes, where Wisconsin struggled to break Oregon’s full-court press, while also turning the ball over in the half-court.
Wisconsin held a 62-47 lead with just under eight minutes to go. That was cut to seven points within the final five minutes, and disaster started to strike.
The Badgers had six turnovers over the final 4:45, with center Steven Crowl committing three, and they really struggled to close out the game over the final minute. Normally, this is a situation that Wisconsin would like to end in, as their strong free throw shooting has closed out close games a couple of times this season.
But, the Badgers never got to those free-throw shooting moments, turning the ball over four times in the final two minutes, and the Ducks took advantage with two three-pointers, including the game-tying shot from Jackson Shelstad with 12 seconds remaining.
This collapse is one that isn’t expected by a veteran-laden Wisconsin team filled with experience and ball-handling. But, that was the outcome on Saturday, and the Badgers sputtered at the worst time, failing to recover after that.
Changing the gameplan
Looking back at the first half, while three-pointers weren’t falling at their usual rate for the Badgers, Wisconsin saw success when putting the ball in the hands of John Tonje and Steven Crowl.
Tonje worked well going downhill, going 4/5 inside the arc, while hitting both of his free throws en route to a 16-point first half.
And Steven Crowl won the battle against Nate Bittle, getting 10 first-half points while also going 4/5 inside the arc. Crowl forced three fouls against Bittle in the period, limiting Oregon to just seven minutes in the period.
However, the Badgers shied away from that in the second half, not setting Crowl much in the post to give him opportunities against Bittle. And that proved costly.
Not only could Wisconsin not get much rhythm offensively as Crowl had just two shot attempts in the period, but Bittle really started to get going offensively, scoring 12 second-half points before getting six of Oregon’s 11 in overtime.
The Badgers needed to keep the Ducks center in foul trouble. While they had a couple of dribble drives from the guards that didn’t fall, they didn’t ride the hot hand with Crowl and that proved costly, especially early in the period, as Bittle got into a rhythm and took over the game for Oregon.
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