The No. 3 seed Wisconsin Badgers will travel to Denver to take on No. 14 Montana in the Round of 64 in the East Region of the 2025 NCAA Tournament. Tip-off is scheduled for 12:30 CT on Thursday, March 20.
Below, BadgerBlitz.com breaks down the key statistics and trends that will dictate the Badgers' first matchup in their second consecutive March Madness appearance.
Writers note: Many stats in this article are courtesy of KenPom.com.
Montana has the 13th-highest effective field goal percentage (56.4) in the nation
Simply put, the Grizzlies can shoot the lights out. They're especially potent from inside the arc, knocking down 57.3 percent of their two-point attempts (17th nationally). That's not to say they can't let it fly from long range, either. Montana has four players who shoot over 35 percent from distance, including two who shoot over 40 percent (guard Malik Moore and forward Te'Jon Sawyer). A litany of capable shooters is a big reason why the Grizzlies had the second-best offense by adjusted efficiency in the Big Sky Conference.
No Grizzlies starter is taller than 6-foot-8
And there's just a single player who reaches that height in the center Sawyer. The tallest player on the roster is 6-foot-10 freshman Jensen Bradtke who averages 10.5 minutes and didn't play in Montana's Big Sky title game win over Northern Colorado. The Grizzlies are still proficient inside the arc offensively, as mentioned, but defensively they surrender the 270th-best two-point percentage in the country. They also have the 18th-worst offensive rebounding rate. If Steven Crowl and Nolan Winter can play aggressive early, the Badgers' bigs could set the tone down low.
Montana lost to its two power conference opponents by a combined 67 points
The Grizzlies fell to Oregon in the second game of the season, 79-48, and lost to Tennessee 92-57. Now, those are both NCAA Tournament teams, and Tennessee is a No. 2 seed. But couple those results with an 0-4 record in Quad 1 games and three Quad 3 losses, and Montana has the look of a team that isn't equipped for quality competition. That's not to say they're not potentially dangerous, however.
The Grizzlies are winners of 14 of their last 15 games
Montana enters the tournament scorching hot. After starting 4-2 in conference play, it rattled off 10 straight wins, winning 11 of its last 12 regular season games with the only loss coming in overtime on the road to Portland State. After that, the Grizzlies won three straight games in the Big Sky Tournament as the No. 4 seed and clinched an automatic bid to the Big Dance. 11th-year head coach Travis DeCuire makes his third appearance in the NCAA Tournament with Montana riding some serious momentum.
Money Williams leads Montana with 13.3 points-per-game
With a name that's got March written all over it, Money Williams is by far the most intriguing player on this roster. The point guard started the first 20 games of the season, but he was moved to the bench in favor of Kai Johnson on Jan. 25 and hasn't started a game since. Still, he leads the Grizzlies in points and is especially hot this month, averaging 19.0 points since the calendar flipped to March. What's more, with a 36-point performance this season but also a solid handful of quiet, single-digit scoring outings, Williams has the feel of a player who could get extremely hot in a tournament setting.
Wisconsin's 53 points in the loss to Michigan were extremely off-character
The absolute offensive dud laid by the Badgers in the Big Ten Tournament Final loss to Michigan, highlighted by star wing John Tonje going 1-of-14 from the field a day after posting 32 points against Michigan State, was extremely out-of-character for this iteration of Wisconsin, but does it highlight larger underlying issues?
At the moment, there's just not enough reasons to think Sunday afternoon was anything other than an extreme exception to the rule. The Badgers' 53 points were easily the lowest they'd scored all season, second to the 62 they posted in a loss to Michigan State on March 2. Wisconsin's three-point shooting has cooled off slightly down the stretch of the season, but an abysmal 7-of-39 from distance (17.9 percent) with open looks repeatedly not falling looks to be the result of tired legs, legs that would've been better rested had the Badgers secured a double bye in the Big Ten Tournament by beating Penn State at home on Senior Day.
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