Wisconsin continues to own Tom Crean by winning in Bloomington

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Recap


Coming into this game, Wisconsin had won 13 out of their last 15 games against Tom Crean and the Indiana Hoosiers. They piled on another win tonight, winning 75-68 at Assembly Hall. The Badgers started the game with a bang, opening up a 13-0 lead. But the Hoosiers clawed their way back into the game and kept it close until the very end.

The Badgers were led by sophomore standout Ethan Happ. The budding star was in attack mode on both ends of the court, totaling 19 points, six rebounds, four assists, one steal, and a block. Bronson Koenig tacked on 17 points, hitting all five of his three-point attempts.

Observations


-Wisconsin is finally starting to look like a vintage Wisconsin team in terms of taking care of the ball. After struggling with their ball security all season, they only turned it over seven times today. That is a really promising sign.

– When Ethan Happ is in attack mode like he was today, he is as good as any player in the country. That’s not an exaggeration. He played like that in the NCAA Tournament last season, and we saw flashes of it in non-conference play this season. But today, he was aggressive from start to finish and Indiana had no prayer of stopping him.


Reminder: @BadgerMBB star @EthanHapp22 is 6-foot-10. https://t.co/atq2T3uNq9

— Big Ten Network (@BigTenNetwork) January 4, 2017


Hap's best skill might be his ball handling. Very confident dribbling in the paint. pic.twitter.com/uWcyxK1r1x

— Big Ten Geeks (@bigtengeeks) January 4, 2017


Layup don't lie. pic.twitter.com/DDNMVtpcVD

— Big Ten Geeks (@bigtengeeks) January 4, 2017


-This win was huge for the Badgers. Road wins in conference play are always tough, especially against teams as talented as Indiana. This was also their first victory this season over a likely NCAA Tournament team (although with Crean at the helm, you never know). In addition, this win puts them in the driver’s seat of the Big Ten title race, especially with Purdue sitting at 0-1.

-One negative today was shot selection. When Wisconsin was playing through the post and moving the ball, Indiana couldn’t stop them. But the Badgers stopped themselves quite a bit with bad shot selection. Bronson Koenig took a couple contested, deep two-pointers, Nigel Hayes tried a couple fadeaways, and Vitto Brown took a pair of jump shots with a hand right in his face. All of those were early in the shot clock, and most of them resulted in Indiana buckets on the other end.

-I love Greg Gard. I think he’s doing a great job. But I hate that whenever a player picks up two fouls, he sits them for the entire first half. A lot of coaches do it, but in the game today, it made no sense. Bronson Koenig is a senior point guard. He is smart enough not to pick up a third foul. To make matter worse, he was feeling it, having already drained 3/3 from beyond the arc. Sitting him for the last nine minutes of the half was a very poor decision that could have cost the Badgers a victory.

– Beating Tom Crean just never gets old. I really hope Indiana keeps him forever.


im sorry but this is my new favorite creanface. pic.twitter.com/gvP8uVPXJx

— Ben Goren (@BenG412) January 4, 2017










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Agree with the article that keeping Crean is probably on the wish list of a lot of Badger fans. For whatever reason, the Badgers have sort of owned him, even back to his Marquette days.

On one Badger site I lurk on they have taken to calling him Clappy the Clown because of his incessant clapping on the sidelines. A bit harsh, but kinda funny.

I did notice at the end of the game that he just blew past Greg Gard during the handshakes, barely shaking his hand and basically not saying anything. Kind of a quick blow-by. You can tell he's frustrated, but he'd be better off not showing that to the team. Coaches should set the example.
 
I did notice at the end of the game that he just blew past Greg Gard during the handshakes, barely shaking his hand and basically not saying anything. Kind of a quick blow-by. You can tell he's frustrated, but he'd be better off not showing that to the team. Coaches should set the example.

I saw that too. What a tool. I don't care if you're frustrated or not. That was poor sportsmanship. I wonder if he and Gard have a history?

The Badgers played pretty well but still need to improve if they want to contend for the B1G.
 
I saw that too. What a tool. I don't care if you're frustrated or not. That was poor sportsmanship. I wonder if he and Gard have a history?

The Badgers played pretty well but still need to improve if they want to contend for the B1G.
Tan Tommy has always been an ass. The league is not real good to be candid. It's Wisconsin, Purdue and Indiana. Past except for maybe MSU is average
 
I don't know that Crean and Gard have history. I checked on youtube and there are a number of videos of Crean doing the same thing to Bo Ryan, Matt Painter, Thad Motta, others?

I think he's just a poor sport.
 
In layman's vernacular, the Hoosiers got their arses handed to them on their own court, by Wisconsin. To Crean, what looked like an extremely promising season now has to look like just another ho-hum year, where they could win enough games to be first round cannon fodder for the NCAA tournament - assuming they're lucky.

Even bottom feeders in the Big 10 will now sense they're beatable, and gear up mentally, to make a run at them. It can happen so quickly in college. What looked like a great year, suddenly something that needs to be flushed down, quickly.

If there was depth on Crean's roster, he would have used it. Their bench players showed absolutely nothing that would indicate they could help lift them. They're going to be running on fumes the second half of the season.

The Badgers need to keep working a few of their bench players, and get them on script with where they were last year, to insure we have fresh bodies as we go as well. You don't go too far in the Big 10 with five or six guys and a bunch of spectators on your bench.

If I was to give Gard one word of advice, it would be "practice." Free throws. Teams are going to start fouling the Badgers near the end because we can't make them.
 
If I was to give Gard one word of advice, it would be "practice." Free throws. Teams are going to start fouling the Badgers near the end because we can't make them.

Free throws are 90% mental and the other half is physical.

I agree on the Free throw shooting. The Badgers are tied for 203rd in the Nation in FT% at .686 They need to be able to shoot at 75% or they will lose more close games than they win. The two most important guys to improve are Hayes and Happ. They have a combined total of 136 FT attempted and have only made 82 of them.
Hayes - 65%
Happ - 51%
 
As to Indiana. Let's take a trip back memory lane when North Carolina lost their first 2 conference games. They went on to win the National Championship

Happ is just not a good shooter period. I think he has taken 2-3 shots all year out of the paint.
 
It's possible Happ can get better, but with his highly flawed shooting form, I doubt he ever gets much above 60-65% on free throws unless they re-work his shot. I'm surprised he's still using that shot-putt style after a red-shirt year and his freshman season. He'll continue to sit at the end of games where the opposition is trying to get back into the game by fouling. If he touches the ball you foul him immediately.
 
As to Indiana. Let's take a trip back memory lane when North Carolina lost their first 2 conference games. They went on to win the National Championship

Happ is just not a good shooter period. I think he has taken 2-3 shots all year out of the paint.


Yes, NC did lose two in a row in conference. But not at the beginning of their conference play. In fact, they lost 3 out of 5 along the way. They lost the Championship game to Villanova. If you're talking about a different year, fine, but it doesn't really say anything about the Hoosiers.

In no way does the Indiana roster compare to the Tarheels of last year. Not even close.

Even more important, the Indiana offense consists of a bunch of guys who will go for the shot before they'll take that extra pass to create a better shot. There isn't the kind of team unity to make them cohesive, and because they lack the bodies to play body up on the boards, they're going to fall a little short.

Happ is not a good shooter is kind of a misnomer. He's shooting 67% where he's supposed to be shooting the ball. In the paint. It would be a bonus if he could shoot further out but I remember a guy named Wilt Chamberlain who couldn't hit anything more than 8 ft. from the basket, and guess what he did?

Coaches don't ask him to shoot from the perimeter, and for good reason. He's a monster on the boards, and is in the top 4 or 5 in offensive rebounds and in defensive rebounds. That's awesome. He gets a lot of points with put-backs off misses, and that's something that forces defenses to drop down on him, and try to shield him out, giving up the perimeter for a lot of jumpers for the rest of the team.

Happ needs to work on free throws. I said that. He needs a little special time on the line, and someone there who knows how to make him use muscle memory to make the shot, not try to think it through the net. The best way might be to have him recite something like the Gettysburg Address while shooting. Seriously! It works. His mind is on the words, and his body will learn to react automatically for the free throw. It's how I broke myself when I was in HS.

I was shooting between 40 and 50% free throws and the coach told me that if I didn't pick it up, I'd be on the bench in close games. I spent hours in the gym shooting, and reciting the Gettysburg Address to myself. I went from that miserable level to over 70% during that year, and as a Senior, ended up over 80%, using the same technique for practice.

But, it took one heck of a lot of work to get there. Hundreds upon hundreds of shots, and establishing my rhythm.
 
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