Ranking Wisconsin's Wins in 2019-20: Part Two

MADISON, Wis. – The University of Wisconsin men’s basketball team won 21 games during the 2019-20 season, but it’s a reasonable expectation that the Badgers would have won more, maybe even nine more.

Winners of eight straight games and one of the Big Ten’s tri-champions in the regular season, the Badgers – ranked 18th in the country – were about to head to Indianapolis as the No.1 seed in the conference tournament when college basketball’s remaining four weeks of the season were canceled due to the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus.

So instead of adding to their haul, the Badgers will have to settle for a season in which they overcame tremendous adversity to deliver the 19th regular season Big Ten championship in school history.

Putting a cap on the season, and to try and quench our thirst for March basketball, BadgerBlitz will rank UW’s 21 wins from last to first in a three-part series. For our list, we considered when the victory came, who the win was against, where the victory happened and the overall importance of the victory.

After ranking wins 21 to 15 yesterday, today we list 14 to 8.

Wisconsin broke two important lulls with this victory: The Badgers won their first true road game in over a month and Brad Davison found his offense. Having scored a combined 16 points in his previous four games, going 5-for-23 from the floor, Davison tied his career high with 30 points and tied a school record with eight 3-pointers.

Two of Davison's 3-pointers came as Wisconsin took control of the game with a 21-2 early second-half run. Trailing 43-41, the Badgers made five 3-pointers in a 4½-minute stretch that saw them go up 57-45. UW hit 15 3-pointers, including five from D’Mitrik Trice on six attempts, while Aleem Ford notched a career-high 10 rebounds. Nebraska shot just 32.3 percent in the second half.

The Huskers finished last in the conference with a 7-25 record, 2-18 in the Big Ten.

Beating up on two mid-major opponents in its first two home games, Wisconsin registered a dominant victory against a likely NCAA Tournament team, breaking a two-game losing streak in the series. Playing the game roughly three weeks earlier than when the two in-state school usually meet, the Badgers showed to be the more complete team on both ends of the floor.

Wisconsin had all five starters in double figures, including 15 points and a career-high 13 rebounds from Brevin Pritzl, outscored the Golden Eagles, 24-10, in the paint and did a number on them defensively. Marquette committed 15 turnovers and the Badgers held volume shooter Markus Howard to 18 points on 6-for-21 shooting, causing MU to shoot 37.3 percent shooting.

Wisconsin's 16-point win marked its largest over the Golden Eagles since Dec. 23, 1998 and delivered an early season confidence boost after letting the St. Mary’s win slip away.

Marquette finished 18-12 and 8-10 in the Big East, losing its last three games.

The biggest thing about this victory was what the result meant, moving the Badgers into first place in the conference and putting them one way away from a conference title. Nate Reuvers scored a team-high 11 points, Davison added 9 points and 8 rebounds and Pritzl – UW’s lone scholarship senior – added 9 points and six rebounds on his Senior Day.

UW led by as many as 17 points, but an uneven 39 percent shooting night made things closer than they needed to be. In a theme toward the end of the season, Wisconsin’s defense stepped up a notch and held Northwestern to 31.5 percent from the floor (25.9 percent in the second half) and 3-for-15 from 3-point range. The 31.5 percent was the lowest against a UW opponent in Big Ten play.

“Over our winning streak we’ve shot the ball really well, (but) sometimes it’s good to win in other ways,” Davison said. “We love to always hit our shots, but when it comes down to it, you play both ends of the floor, you can win games on both ends of the floor.”

Continuing to impact the game more and more over the final six weeks of the season, Micah Potter finished with nine points, five rebounds and helped the Badgers outscore Northwestern by 16 points when he was on the floor.

The Wildcats finished 8-23 and 3-17 in the league.

The start of Wisconsin’s torrid stretch to a conference title, Wisconsin got a season-high 19 points from Brevin Pritzl, who bounced back from his 0-for-7 night at Minnesota and added five rebounds, two assists, two steals and no turnovers.

“Coach Gard has always been on me to do the little things first,” said Pritzl, who hit his first five 3-pointers with members of the 2000 Final Four team in attendance on their anniversary celebration. “Whether that’s chasing a guy off the line, make sure shooters don’t get the shots off, defending, rebounding, just hustle plays, that’s always was I’ve tried to do as much as I can. This year, Ethan (Happ) being gone, there’s a void of points every once in a while, so I try to pick it up as much as I can.”

Wisconsin started 6-for-17 from the field but closed the first half on a 26-5 run, including scoring the final 16 points over the final 4 minutes, 8 seconds. UW led 38-20 at the break, its biggest halftime lead since Dec.7.

UW’s low post defense forced nine turnovers in 29 possessions and held Ohio State to eight field goals in the first half. Even though the Buckeyes scored 37 points in the second half, the Badgers still made things challenging and held them to 36.7 percent shooting, 6-for-19 on 3-point shots and only seven second-chance points on 10 offensive rebounds.

With Pritzl’s 19 points off the bench and Trevor Anderson’s eight, UW’s reserves outscored Ohio State’s bench players, 30-20, and committed only one turnover in over 60 minutes on the court.

Ohio State ended the year with the same record as Wisconsin (21-10) but three games behind them in the conference at 11-9.