GDT: Game of the day

[Basketbill]

We got beat, we beat ourselves, and the Refs took our best player out of the game for 9 minutes or so in the first half. Despite that and how bad we were shooting, we were able to pull within 5 in the last few minutes. Not happy about it, but we take our lumps and move on to beat the crap out of ODU. Come home and prepare for Wichita St.

[AlumniFan]

For better or worse, given our early foul probs, we needed jake out there.

I certainly would not pin this loss on Jake, but his drives to the basket were probably deflating to his teammates. That said, Jordair was 2/10 and 0/4 from the line.

Bottom line: plenty of blame to go around...oh, yeah, and Biondi....

[slufan13]

We won't beat many teams especially top 10 teams in the country from the big 10 when our 2 Senior all conference guards play that poorly.

Rob has a key turnover and I feel like the only time he jumps is when he gets pump faked but I thought he was fine tonight. Jett and McCall were not good.

McBroom is frustrating but at least he can create and hit shots. McCall is one of the best I've seen at the 15 foot pull up yet he keeps driving in and forcing up garbage. He's not big or strong enough. Jett just looks lost. It looked like he went in for a layup a couple times tonight and instead of drawing contact and getting to the hoop and he just kind of jumped straight up and got his shot contested and drew no contact.

Someone tell JB that even if he has no intention to shoot the ball it's ok to at least look at the basket. Defenses have to respect his ability to hit a shot. Easy to defend when you don't even look. He looked scared tonight. I'd rather him force up a 23 footer than drive nowhere and lose the ball. Hell I'd rather him run over people and get an offensive foul than try some of the stuff that he did tonight.

Manning looked decent actually. Glaze is improved but I honestly might like Lancona more. He got burned defensively a couple times but had a nice block and some rebounds. Not like Glaze doesn't get burned defensively too. Lancona does remind me of Cody. Glaze needs to play and pull down rebounds but I'm fine if Lancona sees more time.

Agbeko. Not much to say.

Dwayne is the key. Bad calls or not he's the Senior leader. He needs to stay out of foul trouble and stay on the court.

[GoBills]

Not the end of the world, but frustrating loss as I really don't think Wisconsin is much better than the Bills. Reasons we lost - early foul trouble for Dwayne, took him too late to get into the flow. We should have exploited our quickness advantage more and drove to the basket more when the outside shots weren't falling. The biggest reason we lost had nothing to do with our role players - it had everything to do with our guards. McBroom had some good moments, but too many bad decisions and ill advised shots. McCall had a couple nice steals and drives, but seemed to disappear in the second half and couldn't get his outside shot going and Jett was the biggest disappointment. We need a big game out of him to win a game like that. Terrible free throw shooting, not enough good drives to the basket and he missed midrange shots he has gotten much better at knocking. Overall a poor game for one of my favorite players.

[GoBills]

I certainly would not pin this loss on Jake, but his drives to the basket were probably deflating to his teammates. That said, Jordair was 2/10 and 0/4 from the line.

Bottom line: plenty of blame to go around...oh, yeah, and Biondi....

Blaming Biondi is always a good idea.

[Box and Won]

What cost us the game, in my mind, was poor shot selection and execution from our guards.

Terrible shot selection throughout the game.

[Bizziken]

I don't think anybody played well...we missed so many bunnies tonight...I thought we had passed that stage. Loe played like Loe...played decent defense, and he missed some easy ones (who didn't). He got 3 of his buckets by being set up perfectly for an easy layup.

The second foul (the offensive foul) called on Dwayne (with 10:31 left in the 1st half) was complete garbage. We got Cody Ellis'd...dude acted like he got elbowed in the face when Dwayne didn't even raise his elbows above his waist. Great acting job.

Even with Evans out we played them tough for about 6 and a half minutes, and were only down 4 at the Under 4 Minute TO.

McBroom teased us by hitting his first 2 jumpers, then went 2-9 the rest of the way. 9-32 from our 3 main guards + Barnett won't get it done and it doesn't matter who we play.

Wisconsin didn't exactly light it up at the Free Throw line...loss coulda been worse than 6 pretty easily

[bbtds]

WE WON!!!!!! WOOHOO!

[Billikenboy]

What a great opportunity squandered by guard turnovers, bad shots, and so so defense! Problem is we cannot shoot ourselves into every game and we certainly dug ourselves a nice hole to fight out of. Wisconsin is one of those teams that it is difficult to comeback on..well chalk it up as a missed opportunity and let's get ODU.

[drkelsey55]

I don't understand why Crawford never saw the floor? He can make a basket. Was he hurt? Has his defensive play in practice kept him on rthe bench? Anyone know?

[cheeseman]

For better or worse, given our early foul probs, we needed jake out there.

We all know why JB was out there - the problem is he can not be out there. He never developed into the player RM led us to believe he would be. My point is if we have to depend on him then we are in trouble.

[Billiken Rich]

We have to put this on our players and not the coach but were we running any sort of organized offense last night? I know we had some set plays but how many drives inside followed by a circus-style missed layup were there last night? Drive in, don't dish it out because no one is in good position is pretty much Memphis's style. Maybe we need a little less freedom and a little more structure.

Mornings after a loss always suck a bit harder........

[Cowboy]

-I haven't read the GDT but here are my thoughts

-there were points in the game we played and coached well, ok and like crap

-the key is what we learn and do different going forward

-our shot selection was 'turrible' at times, key times and this encompasses both the shot and timing of it

-our defense overall wasn't 'turrible' but left room for improvement and we did commit some bad fouls

-a key stretch in the second half, not sure the five on the floor but at least one senior guard, AMc was the other, and DE were out there and we had 6 or so possessions in a row that were horrible when we could have cut the lead, where is our veteran leadership? where are our coaches? a to was called for there, imo (we ended the game with one)

-DE, I think you expect more, I sure do

-while both had moments I would submit RL and AMc were our two best players start to finish and this is relative judgment

-let's clobber ODU

[slufanskip]

Watched the game from start to finish and here are my thoughts:

We set ourselves up to win this game. The rebounding and turnover margins were both insignificant. Wisconsin shot 47 percent from the field and 33 percent from 3—both percentages we could live with. Additionally, Loe played a decent game. He hit a big three, knocked in his free throw, and was far from a liability on defense or as a rebounder.

What cost us the game, in my mind, was poor shot selection and execution from our guards. McBroom and Jett both misfired on several questionable deep mid-range shots. All four of our guards drove with no destination in mind.

Barnett was terrible. He was bad defensively, and made awful decisions with the ball. He looks like a good high school player trying to compete in an intense D-1 game. His minutes against top-tier teams should come only when we desperately need another guard out there.

I agree with you. It seemed when we got close the 1st time we went away from what the comeback was built on ... getting the ball inside. And our Sr's DE and JJ were a huge part of the problem. Despite horrendous first half and down the stretch officiating we played with the #10 team in the country. Give us a 1st half officiated properly and this is a different game despite us not playing our best (though I think some or alot of that goes to Wisc D)

And for those dogging RL ... get real.

[slu72]

Friggin Cheeseheads snuck into our locker room and slipped some Mexican ice cubes into our water coolers is my take on the game.

[Billboy1]

Many of the Badgers are NBA ready with all of the travels they took on the drives to the basket especially basket that ended the first half

[Taj79]

Watched the whole game and Wolfe is a clown. Obviously spent the whole day as a white man wearing SPF 0 and sipping fruity drinks (no ice) at the pool and sadly missed his last buffet opp of the afternoon. SCOTT McCall? Really?

Jett resorted back to bad form ---- in his mid-range shooting and from the line. I also believe his lock down defense is under attack given the new rules and whistles being called this year.

Short of making two steals and getting two breakaway layups,McCall was invisible. We just cannot have that from our lone, traditional starting two guard. He has to take and make some threes. Plus, he seems to be the only guy able to create an exterior shot off the dribble. Jett is the shot-off-the-drive guy but if we are not hitting from outside, the Frank Kaminsky's of the world sit on the low blocks, swatting all that come their way. That also clogs the down-low for our major player Evans.

Jake Barnett appears more and more the second coming of Drew Deiner. How can a Chris Collins and a Brad Redford exist and yet Barnett can't? You are a three-point shooter, take the three. Not saying force it but I'd prefer the Jake from 23 feet as opposed to the guy flopping through the lane with no plan, no clue and no landing zone.

McBroom did well is too quick on the trigger at times. There is a small resemblance to Kwamain in that he'd drive to the hole. Difference is Kwamain would make it and right the ship. No one is there just yet,

Glaze appears to be the same guy as last year right now. Yes, better shape and quicker and showing a few moves. But the competition got tougher and Glaze was MIA and totaled 11 minutes. Made the free throws though and fought hard.

Loe is who Loe is. If we are expecting him to carry it, forget it. But 15 in a complimentary and supportive role would be fantastic. We had no one last night hitting on any cylinders. Rob Loe did not lose this game and actually I was pleased at his output.

We let them slip away. They were not that impressive. If they are tenth in the country, the country is hurting. Despite how bad we were and how the refs gave us nothing, we were still in it at the end. Convert free throws. Make another shot or three, and it's a different morning today. MUST rebound and beat ODU.

I didn't see much helpin the present from Manning, Lancona nor Agbeko. One would think Crawford has to start taking Barnett's minutes soon. Lancona had a nice block and some rebounds but all three are not much in terms of scoring options and because they are all traditional inside players, it places their man in help defense against Evans. Not too down ---- the OOC is a learning process. But there are tons of things to work on --- like first, let's figure out how to play two halves.

Large arse back in the couch for 7 tonight and Old Dominion.

[Pistol]

Some general thoughts:

-Nothing about our offense looked fluid. Guys were tentative, showed no confidence, showed poor shot selection, really seemed overmatched by Wisconsin's defense. But the missed layups really put me over the edge. Most times we did get a good, open shot, we didn't make it, anyway. It looked like the first time SLU saw the floor this season.

-When Evans takes it inside, he looks great. He's looked very tentative most of the season so far. He asserted himself for a while in the second half and it worked.

-If Loe can go 2-5 from the perimeter all season, that'd be great. 6-13 overall is not a bad percentage, either, but he missed some easy ones. And that turnover, wow. But still, it's hard to get too upset at the leading scorer.

-Good grief, did we get hosed by the officials in the first half. Phantom fouls on our end, and tons of contact allowed when Wisconsin was defending. We're lucky Wisconsin didn't shoot better from the free throw line.

-Manning seems much improved in terms of positioning and footwork on both ends, but he was clearly getting frustrated with the amount of contact (not to mention intentional push in front of a ref) that was not being called.

-Kaminsky is a more impressive player than I expected. I don't know if it was the 43-point game, but that kid plays with a ton of confidence now. That wasn't on display his first two seasons (my mantra on here: bigs take time). He's a better defensive player than I realized, and very smart with shot selection.

-Dekker looked like an NBA player at times but kind of disappeared for stretches.

-Steve Wolff has added about 20 pounds and forgot to wear sunscreen yesterday and/or the day before.

-Pretty sure I saw a group of teenage kids in the stands drinking pina coladas, mai tais, or hurricanes.

[moytoy12]

I didn't see much helpin the present from Manning, Lancona nor Agbeko. One would think Crawford has to start taking Barnett's minutes soon. Lancona had a nice block and some rebounds but all three are not much in terms of scoring options and because they are all traditional inside players, it places their man in help defense against Evans. Not too down ---- the OOC is a learning process. But there are tons of things to work on --- like first, let's figure out how to play two halves.

Large arse back in the couch for 7 tonight and Old Dominion.

Really? I don't see TL as an inside guy and actually think he could start pushing for GG's minutes. TL was open on a number of pick and pops, but we wouldn't get it to him for the shot (JB in particular). Oddly enough, TL's shot is the only one I trust right now.

JM was fine and provided some decent minutes.

RA is raw, but I think we'll see some good things from him by the time conference games roll around.

Finally, without MM this season, we'd be in a world of hurt. He hasn't shot particularly well, but he is doing so many other good things on the court.

JJ needs to get it together.

[Pistol]

A few more:

-Nothing good happens when Barnett drives. He doesn't seem to have good court vision, especially the deeper he gets in the lane. Not a good passer in traffic, not strong at taking it to the basket. He wasn't even looking for threes. They scouted him well.

-Jett must have had the Mexican water or something. 4 missed free throws. Looked like a pro on an 18-footer and missed just about everything else, looking bad in the process.

-McCall was kind of a ghost out there for most of the game.

-I was pleased with the way McBroom looked last night. He almost seemed frustrated by how little other guys were giving him on the offensive end. Not finding spots. But he was fluid, beating guys off the dribble, grabbing rebounds, getting open.

I'm still having a hard time getting over how many layups and close shots we missed. Evans, Glaze, Jett, Lancona, McCall, Manning, Loe, Barnett, McBroom- pretty sure everyone who took at least one shot last night missed a bunny at some point.

[jbizzle09]

My observations after the fact:

- I think the quick outside shots we saw late in the 1st half and into the second half were an offshoot of what we saw early in the first half. The Bills were not getting any calls when they drove in the lane and Kaminsky racked up 4 blocked shots early. Evans was in foul trouble right off the bat. Consequently, the guards started taking any open looks they were getting, even if it was early in the shot clock. Sadly, they didn't hit many of them, especially McBroom and Jett.

- Anyone ripping on Loe for this game obviously just hates Loe and can't be reasoned with at this point. Yes, he made a bad turnover late in the game. However, for the most part, he had a very solid game. He played solid D on Kaminsky all night, holding him to 12 points. HE also ended up leading the Bills in scoring with 15 points on 6-13 shooting and 2-5 from three. I have a feeling that Loe will have a very good senior year. However, there will still be those who sh*t on him every chance they get.

- Going into this game, it was going to be ugly no matter what, and that is what we saw. Both teams were going to play tough defense and we were going to see a low score, even though both teams had seemingly picked up the offensive pace in their early games. That is the game we got.

- Steve Wolf was obviously drunk during the telecast. He couldn't stop talking about getting something to eat at one of the great resort restaurants after the game.

- I sense that McBroom is going to have a lot of fans on this board, and a lot of detractors. He appears to me to be a shoot-first gunner-type of guard. If he primarily runs the point next season, he almost certainly is going to lead the team in scoring and shot attempts. It depends on your viewpoint if you think this is a good thing.

- ESPN shows the attendance was 934. I doubt there was more than 300 actually at the game.

- There was one fan seated at the sideline that had to weigh at least 500 pounds. He might have been heavier than that.

[NextYearBill]

- There was one fan seated at the sideline that had to weigh at least 500 pounds. He might have been heavier than that.

I had to rewind to show my girlfriend. Argument then ensued as she says "how do you notice those things" to which I reply "how do you NOT notice that"...... then I look like the ahole

[b.hayes]

My observations after the fact:

- I think the quick outside shots we saw late in the 1st half and into the second half were an offshoot of what we saw early in the first half. The Bills were not getting any calls when they drove in the lane and Kaminsky racked up 4 blocked shots early. Evans was in foul trouble right off the bat. Consequently, the guards started taking any open looks they were getting, even if it was early in the shot clock. Sadly, they didn't hit many of them, especially McBroom and Jett.

- Anyone ripping on Loe for this game obviously just hates Loe and can't be reasoned with at this point. Yes, he made a bad turnover late in the game. However, for the most part, he had a very solid game. He played solid D on Kaminsky all night, holding him to 12 points. HE also ended up leading the Bills in scoring with 15 points on 6-13 shooting and 2-5 from three. I have a feeling that Loe will have a very good senior year. However, there will still be those who sh*t on him every chance they get.

- Going into this game, it was going to be ugly no matter what, and that is what we saw. Both teams were going to play tough defense and we were going to see a low score, even though both teams had seemingly picked up the offensive pace in their early games. That is the game we got.

- Steve Wolf was obviously drunk during the telecast. He couldn't stop talking about getting something to eat at one of the great resort restaurants after the game.

- I sense that McBroom is going to have a lot of fans on this board, and a lot of detractors. He appears to me to be a shoot-first gunner-type of guard. If he primarily runs the point next season, he almost certainly is going to lead the team in scoring and shot attempts. It depends on your viewpoint if you think this is a good thing.

- ESPN shows the attendance was 934. I doubt there was more than 300 actually at the game.

- There was one fan seated at the sideline that had to weigh at least 500 pounds. He might have been heavier than that.

And no one cares that in the first half MM left his feet TWICE in the span of 3 or 4 possessions with absolutely no plan whatsoever and turned the ball over. At least RL was trying to make a logical play.

[moytoy12]

It seems like RL's first shot is a barometer of how we do in big games. Last year it seemed like he drilled his first 3 ball against butler (twice) and VCU. Last year and this year he's missed his first one against Oregon and last night against wisc

[Westy03]

Jett and McCall might have had their worst games since their freshmen season and we were within 5 with a 1:30 left so I guess that's a positive. Our offense has been pretty bad all year. The offense needs to start and end with Evans in the post even if he is being doubled and tripled team, we did this last year and the offense really took off.