Takeaways from No.13 Wisconsin's 61-59 Win at Minnesota

Greg Gard’s blue suit was soaking wet as he sat down to talk to reporters Tuesday night, the victim of a surprise water attack by his University of Wisconsin players in the locker room to celebrate his 100th Big Ten win.

It was fitting that it happened how it did, in a 40-minute grinder of a game.

“You’re not going to breeze through any game in this league,” he said. “Specifically, when you’re on the road. Teams are too good.”

Wisconsin made it tougher than it needed to be at Williams Arena, but the 13th-ranked Badgers made the critical plays late to extend their dominance over Minnesota with a 61-59 victory.

Wisconsin (15-4, 7-1 Big Ten) defeated Minnesota for the seventh straight time, has won 16 of the last 18 meetings in the series, and won on seven of its last eight trips to Minneapolis. Gard improved to 12-2 all-time against Minnesota, including 6-1 in Williams Arena.

Here are my takeaways.

A game in which Wisconsin looked to be on cruise control suddenly appeared headed to the loss column in the final minutes. The Badgers had given away all their 15-point lead from the first half and finished the game just 1-for-8 from the field over the final minutes.

But for Wisconsin’s eldest statesman and its athletic wing, there was still room to make game-altering plays.

On a night where UW didn’t score 70 points for the first time since November 22, Tyler Wahl and A.J. Storr combined for 31 points, 15 rebounds, six assists, and three blocks. More importantly, the pair were responsible for nearly all of Wisconsin’s game-altering plays that kept the Badgers alone in first place in the conference.

Start with Wahl, the Lakeville, MN, native who was playing his final game at Williams Arena. Wahl was an efficient 6-for-7 from the field and made only his second three-point attempt of the season. Wahl’s defense against Dawson Garcia was evident in holding the forward to 10 points on 10 shots (7.7 points below his average). On Minnesota’s second-to-last possession, Wahl got a hand on Elijah Mitchell’s jump shot and then got inside position on Garcia to draw a loose-ball foul.

With 5.2 seconds left in a one-point game, Wahl hit both free throws to up his season average to 70.0 percent (63-for-90).

“We’ve seen each other since my sophomore year of high school twice a year every year,” Wahl said of Garcia, who played at Prior Lake HS. “It’s definitely a game where you feel a little extra coming into it. I felt I was locked in to start the game and carried it through 38, 40 minutes.”

He ended his night by getting a finger on Braeden Carrington’s game-tying shot just before time expired.

Other than his gaffe for drawing a technical for trying to dunk the ball while hanging on the rim, Storr picked a great time for his first collegiate double-double that included a career-high 12 rebounds. While going only 2-for-9 in the second half, Storr delivered a big transition dunk off a Max Klesmit steal, dribbling the ball out in front of him and putting a move on a defender to tie the score at 57 with 1:51 left.

Coming out of a timeout, Wisconsin ran a play for Storr to get downhill with his size and his explosiveness. Storr’s drive to the rim drew contact and allowed the sophomore – an 84.1 percent free-throw shooter – to make both attempts with 26.4 seconds left to take a 59-58 lead.

“It was no nerves,” Storr said. “I shot some clutch free throws last year, too. It’s just rhythm shots really. Being in the gym, shooting free throws is simple.”

Chucky Hepburn made a bold declaration Friday night, saying that he and his teammates would fix the defensive lapses that have been reappearing over the early parts of the Big Ten season by the next time.

There was a lot of good. In addition to Wahl and reserve Carter Gilmore aptly defending Garcia, Wisconsin made guard Joshua Ola-Joseph (2 points, 1-for-2) a nonfactor and held Minnesota to 37.9 percent shooting (UW’s lowest in Big Ten play), 24 first-half points (fewest since Dec.5), .922 points per possession, and became UW’s fifth opponent to score under 60 points.

However, UW let Minnesota get too comfortable on the perimeter to flip the script of the game in the first 10 minutes of the second half. After going 3-for-14 from the perimeter, the Gophers hit their first six in the second half.

“I thought we were pretty good defensively in the first half, made threes pretty hard,” Gard said. “Second half, we didn’t have the same bite to us to start the half and gave them some confidence.”

Minnesota entered eighth in the country in assists per game and moved the ball effectively with 15 on 22 buckets. The Badgers also forced only 10 turnovers, as UW got soft defending the ball in the second half.

UW was up three in the closing seconds and had a foul to give, but the Badgers nearly bungled the decision to foul by first fouling too early on the sixth team foul and then Storr did not block out the foul shooter, allowing Mike Mitchell to get his missed free throw and attempt to tie the game.

However, the Badgers kept the Gophers out of the lane (40 of their 58 shots were away from the rim) and tightened the screws when they needed to by only giving up two points on the final five possessions.

“I think we started out the game sticking to our game plan pretty well,” Wahl said. “Not necessarily sloppy, but we didn’t have the urgency that we needed to on the three-point shooters, especially early in the second half. We talked about it in a few of the timeouts, got it straightened out, and at that point, it was a dog fight. Coming down the last eight minutes, we had to play our game and get some stops.”

Looking for a stat that made the biggest difference? Glance at what happened at the free throw line between the two teams.

Wisconsin entered the night ranked first in the league in free throw shooting and went 8-for-10 at the line, including 4-for-4 in the final 30 seconds. Minnesota was 12th in the league from the line and went 5-for-13, including 2-for-7 in the second half. Garcia is UW’s best foul shooter at 82.1 percent, but the Badgers defended him cleanly and didn’t commit a shooting foul against him.

On the season, UW is shooting 77.7 percent (304-391) from the line, which is on pace for the second-highest mark in program history.

“It saves us in games like this where every point matters,” Wahl said. “We got a lot of guys who can put it confidently at the line.”

That wasn’t Wahl a season ago. He shot 63.4 percent from the line last season, shooting better than 66.7 percent only four times against conference opponents. With his 3-for-4 performance against the Gophers, Wahl is up to 70 percent from the line and has been above 66.7 percent in six Big Ten games.

“To put us in that position to close it out or get another possession ahead was big,” Gard said. “Now I don’t have to be consumed as much about who’s in the game and who’s not because we’ve shot the line pretty consistently well.”

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