Wisconsin's Title Run Far From A One-Man Show

MADISON, Wis. – During the University of Wisconsin’s surprising second-half surge, winning eight straight conference games to claim a share of the Big Ten conference crown, head coach Greg Gard heaped plenty of praise on point guard D’Mitrik Trice developing into a complete point guard.

While he did light up the scoreboard with 28 points in UW’s road win at Michigan, Trice has done most of his damage by facilitating. In addition to averaging 10.4 points on the winning streak, Trice dished out 47 assists to only 14 turnovers, earning the trust of his teammates that he’ll find them.

“This is the perfect time for us to be going uphill,” Trice said. “Everybody is going up in a successful rate and projection. My confidence in the guys to knock down shots, make the right reads and find the right guys to hit is at an all-time high.”

Contrast things now to where they were a year ago, when Trice was leading an offense that was skidding downhill and fast.

Averaging 71.4 points per game with three players averaging double figures after 24 games, not to mention ranking eighth in the NCAA in defensive points allowed (61.0), the Badgers were sniffing at a conference crown with eight games to go. UW’s defense lived up to the billing, but its offense did not.

The Badgers slogged through the final weeks of the season in an offensive fog, playing three consecutive games in the 50s and averaging 63.6 points over their final nine games to finish two games out of first. The postseason was worse, as UW bowed out of the conference tournament scoring 55 points against Michigan State and had its season end with an ugly 72-54 loss to No.12 seed Oregon in the NCAA Tournament first round.

After UW shot under 41 percent only once the first 22 games of the season, the Badgers were under that number eight times in the final 12 games.

A year later, Wisconsin became the first Big Ten regular season champion in league history to not feature a first- or second-team all-conference selection, a distinction that dates to 1948 (73 seasons) and includes 95 different teams that have won a regular season title.

“The biggest thing is we’ve gelled well off the court, as well as on the court,” Trice said. “We do a lot of things together. We’re more of a team this year. A lot of things have brought us together.”

While the Badgers had dedicated the entire season to assistant coach Howard Moore, Wisconsin didn’t start its surge until Kobe King left the team after nine Big Ten games and announced he was leaving the program (he has since committed to Nebraska).

UW suffered a 68-62 loss at Iowa, the first game without King, but have gone 9-1 since then heading into Friday’s Big Ten Tournament quarterfinal.

And while Trice’s play has seen an uptick, he hasn’t been alone.

- Junior Aleem Ford averaged 5.2 points and 2.1 rebounds per game through the first nine league games, shooting 41.5 percent overall and 28.0 percent from three-point range. He bumped those averages up to 9.7 points and 5.5 rebounds over the last 10 games, shooting 46.9 percent from the field, 39.6 percent from 3-point range and had six games with at least six rebounds.

- Junior Brad Davison averaged 7.6 points in the first nine league games and shot just 27.8 percent of his three-point attempts (10 of 36). In his last nine games, Davison is averaging 14.9 points and shot 47.4 percent from the perimeter.

- Senior Brevin Pritzl averaged 6.6 points and 2.1 rebounds in the first nine league games but delivered 9.1 points and 4.5 rebounds in the last 11. After playing over 30 minutes just once with King on the roster, Pritzl surpassed the mark nine times without him.

- Since being held scoreless against Purdue, junior Micah Potter has averaged 13.8 points and grabbed 38 rebounds.

During the eight-game win streak, six different Badgers and are averaging double figures. Of those, five have hit double-digit triples. Six different players have led UW in scoring on the streak: Pritzl had 19 against Ohio State; Davison dropped 30 at Nebraska; Ford led four players in double figures against Purdue; Micah Potter’s 18 points led the four players who scored at least 15 against Rutgers; Trice put 28 at Michigan; Davison had 20 against the home-state Gophers and junior forward Nate Reuvers had 11 against Northwestern and 17 at Indiana.

“We’re very connected, especially offensively,” Davison said. “The ball is moving very fluid. We have a lot of different weapons that makes it a very challenging assignment for teams to defend. One person can have an off game, but we have four, five, six other guys that can pick up that slack.”