Game 17: Wisconsin thoughts

[bac2therac]

Win was huge and that is an understatement. A loss and the wheels could have really come off with MSU looming and a tough OSU next Sunday. This team needed to get its mojo, moxie, strut whatever you want to call it back. I will admit my love tank was empty with this team. I was extremely down and negative following the two bad losses to Stoneyhartford. I think we all need a confidence boost as fans and players and staff got a major one so congrats to them. It was not Same Old Rutgers tonight that is for sure and doing it against a traditional Big 10 power ableit a down one, is particularly satfisfying

RUMAN mentioned resiliency in his recap and its a great point. Well this team wasnt that in the two losses. Tonight after going down 5, they went on a 14-2 run to take a 7 point then never lost it despite Wisky making two surges to cut the back. Thats what makes this win all the more beneficial and satisfying....that they learned something from prior losses and buckled down....the last time coming after Wisky tied the game with about 2 minutes. There was no uh oh we are going to lose this game, instead it was the Corey Sanders show. Corey was the best player on the court today and it wasnt close, You could only say that a handful of times this year. You could tell he was on from the get go. His patented dead on to the basket jumper was money tonight and when he hit that 3 you knew this was going to go down in the win column. To me it was sort of reminiscient of the Illinois win where he just took over. When Corey is good, he is very good and Wisky was just the kind of team where he could show his stuff. Corey being a leader and taking over, hitting the two decisive shots that basically won the game. Missed that in those two losses. We know he can do it and its frustrating to watch the inconsistency but everyone will take what he gave tonight....10-19 shooting 23 points, 2-2 from 32 assist, 0 turnovers in 35 minutes

Beyond Corey, RU won the game by getting back to playing defense. They really bothered the Wisky guards and seemed to rush Happ and passes to Happ disrupting Wisky from getting into any offensive rhythm....Hap had 7 TOs and Wisky 14 and thats huge because Wisky actually shot the ball well at 49%. RU limited Happ to just 10 points on 4-10 shooting and Wisky had absolutely no outside game to go to. It was a prototypical Rutgers hardnosed put your head down defensive effort about sticking to the gameplan and good things happen.

Individually Geo and Eugene stepped up in key stretches of the game so good to see bounce back. Geo hit a big jumper that extended and Eugene nailed two late fts. Yes Geo blew that layup there that started a swing that tied the game. Like the aggressive to go and "win" the game but you have to make that shot, if not its best to pull it out and run clock but I understand why he did.it. Eugene had seemingly become an invisible man for 3 games but was more involved and more confident on the court tonight. RU isnt going to win games when players take off. The margin of error so slim that they need everyone to be working in tandem whether its the younger players or the older ones, Freeman was erratic at times with his shot selection but calmed down as the game went on and I liked his defense

Loved the distribution of minutes tonight...loved loved it.

Corey:35, yes he can handle that
Baker; 28
Thiam: 28
Freeman: 26
Eugene: 26
Mike: 21
Sa: 15
Doucoure: 13
Mensah: 8

Kudos to Pike for doing a great job with prep and game management and minutes distributed, he even squeezed 8 out of Mensah without it hurting too much. Everybody contributed to this win in some way

Wisky is really going to struggle this year. I know they had a couple injuries. This matchup was favorable to RU once you saw what they had and what they looked like. Gard going to have issues if he cannot get his recruiting moving forward. RU seemed like the team with more talent.

So let us rejoice. This was only RU's 7th conference win in regular season play. Now 1-3, yeah an expected beatdown vs Sparty is coming but an interesting two game homestand vs OSU and Iowa awaits after. Tonight the win kept the fans on board and revive the hope that was flagging after those 2 WTFs. Always tough to see when you lose to bad teams or you lose to 30, picture always get clearer when you pick up a win and that one was much needed

 

[dpwhite]

Also, notice how they learned from Stony Brook. Wisconsin tried to make it really tough to inbound in that final minute, but Rutgers made smart plays to make sure the ball got in and they made it to the line.

 

[SkilletHead2]

My first game to see this year. My observations:

1. Really good movement on both offense and defense.
2. If Corey could hit that back up jumper from two feet further out, he'd be a superstar.
3. Shooting. Both on free throws (especially on free throws) but also on shots from the floor for a number of guys, at times, you can see the concentration fades. It's like they think the shot is over about half way through. Watch for it.
4. Mensah appeared to have only one bad effort in his 8 minutes. I thought he played pretty well.
5. A lot of guys seemed to get so psyched after scoring that they immediately came down and committed a foul.

Would love to see us end up over .500!

 

[AreYouNUTS]

Great recap BAC. The only time I was really worried - winding down - was after the TO when we were inbounding under their basket with maybe 35-seonds to go. Thank GOD Williams got the foul call before the ball went out-of-bounds. It's simply stunning that, since 1990 or so, we have got to be year-in and year-out the worst team in the nation at both getting the ball inbounds AND defending inbound plays. We were only up 4 at the moment but luckily Mike hit the 2nd after rushing the first free throw and then I took a breath lol!

 

[RedChucken123]

I know it’s practically heresy around here, but I must say, I agree that I am pretty content with Mensah’s contributions lately.

It’s been two games in a row where he’s forced a turnover from an opposing guard in his limited minutes. He’s been hounding the opposing guard, making them work. That helps Corey get a good breather and we all know how important Corey is and how much energy he expends.

If you’re gonna give us 8-10 minutes a game, go hard, and that he has been doing. Though he doesn’t really score, none/minimal turnovers lately and stopping opponents from scoring 2 points is just as good as getting 2.

 

[BigEastPhil]

Some notes from my end:

- Happ is a good player - not a superstar by any stretch - and I thought we played good defense against him.
- This is not your Older Brothers' Wisconsin Squad. With the exception of Happ, is there anyone on this team that scares you and/or impresses you? Not for me.
- For Greg Gard's sake, his Badgers better show improvement next year or I think Mr. Alvarez may pull the plug on him after the 18/19 season - especially given what Wisconsin BB has been as of late and given the really good job that Wojo is doing at Marquette elevating that program terrifically.
- In the first half, Happ would come out every few minutes. Was he in foul trouble?
- Pike was very intense from the onset and took a great TO when Wisky started with a 5-0 run in the 2nd half.
- Amazing how many open 3's Wisconsin missed as they are simply a bottom 3 squad in the B1G 10.
- Eugene seemed to have his mojo back.
- Great to see Corey dominate as this was certainly the team to do it against with their slow guards.
- Thought Dourcore played solid minutes getting some rebounds and diving on the floor for loose balls.
- Nice crowd that was into the game especially given the frigid temps and the snowstorm from yesterday.
- I never felt nervous about the outcome of the game.
- Also, solid officiating crew as calls were fair

 

[Greene Rice FIG]

phenomenal win. great job by all that guarded Happ. it started with freeman.

eugene is mike williams 2.0.

corey was great. his shots were perfect, right arc and nothing but net.

 

[FastMJ]

I was at the game and came away very happy except the free throw shooting is really frustrating.

 

[RU-ROCS]

Corey was terrific. Baker and Williams were solid. Eugene was the glue - incredible effort on D, drawing charges, rebounding and making a great outlet pass for the Freeman dunk late in the game. Pike gets huge props for defending Happ with smaller forwards. It really took him out of his game. Great to see Freeman bring an A game defensively. He and Eugene really gave Happ trouble. A much needed quality conference win!

 

[SkilletHead2]

One other thing! Watching Pike on the sidelines, I was reminded of Calhoun or Boeheim, being in the game intensely, but not in an objective fashion. He coaches for 60 minutes each game.

 

[Degaz-RU]

Like bac said, this was a season saving win, maybe our best game of the year (better defense and much better shooting percentage than the SHU game).

Corey looked like an NBA player tonight. After Wisky went on that 7-0 run to tie the game late, Corey then went on a personal 6-0 run out of the timeout, allowing us to wrest control back, including that dagger three from 22 feet out, over Happ no less. If only we could get efforts like this from Corey in 2 out of every 3 games (instead of 1 out of 4).

It’s confounding why Thiam can’t get more shots. He’s hitting threes at a 38% clip this year.

Good contributions from Omoruyi and Sa.

And yes, Mensah gave us 8 pretty good minutes tonight. He moved the ball on offense and played solid defense. Getting 8-10 minutes from him each game would be HUGE.

We will get blasted by MSU, but hopefully we can come back and beat both OSU and Iowa at home.

 

[NewJerseyHawk]

No moving screens....which is a turnover.

No forced passes into the post unless it was absolutely there.

Turnover by Doucoure was 100% acceptable after digging out a great offensive rebound and attempted to get ball back out to the guards.

There was a stretch of 6 Wisconsin points where they missed a 3 and Baker barely bumped the shooter...he missed but made all 3 FTs...and a wild.sequence with a 3 point play where we almost had forced another turnover and they converted that for another 3 points.

Mensah can play against what I believe are teams that arent going to push the tempo so his 8 solid minutes bought Baker and Williams time....

Williams had to guard Iverson at 6'8", & His footwork and willingness to body up was huge...he prevented a clear mismatch against RU....that was a very difficult physical 21 minutes he had and Mensah helped save RU by not having Baker and Williams get overworked.

The Bac summary is perfect.....RU will need a 70-73-75 points against an Ohio State and Iowa so Baker and Williams will need to be ready and Eugene and Freeman will both need to be sharp...can we find space for Thiam to drain 3-5 3's vs OSU and Iowa...can't see getting into the 70s unless Thiam steals some points with some 3s.

Checking the standings looks much easier this AM because at least showing RU has 1 win...and with the unbalanced schedule of 4 of the first 5 against ranked or Top 4 B1G teams, this was the one game as a must have to avoid an 0-5 B1G start...

More importantly, we are gaining ground with the RAC and think we will see solid crowds the rest of the way because of Seton Hall and now Wisconsin going into the win column.

 

[TDIrish27]

As stated earlier mandatory win and let's hope it energizes the team going forward.

Sanders was terrific----he was due to be-----let's hope it continues

 

[jonS]

Keep the faith. Very nice win that was desperately needed. But this is a very mediocre Wisky team badly in need of an upgrade in talent. Considering how good they've been all these years , you'd think they'd have been able to recruit better players surrounding Happ. Big difference in game was Corey whose athleticism was on display. On the negative side, the margin of victory would have been 10-15 points if Rutgers had even mediocre outside shooting and could make some free throws.

 

[wheezer]

two other observations....

it is a bit comical when Freeman gets the ball at the three point line and the defenders just leave him alone....the one play last night, he was all alone, looking at the basket, and you could hear the crowd saying "no"....but he could not help himself, took the shot and made it..

more often than not, not a good idea... the crowd immediately appreciated the shot.

Wisconsin had at least two inbound plays where a big posts up, or what ever you call it, and two of our guards ran into a brick wall..... looked like it could hurt, both times going down hard.

the refs never seem to call a foul on that for some reason, it winds up just being big contact.

 

[mrslate]

Like bac said, this was a season saving win, maybe our best game of the year (better defense and much better shooting percentage than the SHU game).

Corey looked like an NBA player tonight. After Wisky went on that 7-0 run to tie the game late, Corey then went on a personal 6-0 run out of the timeout, allowing us to wrest control back, including that dagger three from 22 feet out, over Happ no less. If only we could get efforts like this from Corey in 2 out of every 3 games (instead of 1 out of 4).

It’s confounding why Thiam can’t get more shots. He’s hitting threes at a 38% clip this year.

Good contributions from Omoruyi and Sa.

And yes, Mensah gave us 8 pretty good minutes tonight. He moved the ball on offense and played solid defense. Getting 8-10 minutes from him each game would be HUGE.

We will get blasted by MSU, but hopefully we can come back and beat both OSU and Iowa at home.

They really need to get more out of Thiam, especially if he is going to play 28 minutes. It is easy to forget he is out there at times. Early in the game, he faked and had an easy drive to the basket for the score. I wish he would do more of that. That is how Douby elevated his game to another level.

 

[RUChoppin]

Wisconsin had at least two inbound plays where a big posts up, or what ever you call it, and two of our guards ran into a brick wall..... looked like it could hurt, both times going down hard.

the refs never seem to call a foul on that for some reason, it winds up just being big contact.

Because it's not a foul if you just stand there and a guard runs into you. Eugene blew someone up that way a few weeks ago, too. It's the responsibility of the rest of the team to call out those screens so that the guards don't run into them so hard.

 

[RUChoppin]

I know it’s practically heresy around here, but I must say, I agree that I am pretty content with Mensah’s contributions lately.

I've been one of the hardest people on Mensah, but he has given some stable minutes lately. Maybe things are finally starting to slow down for him?

 

[RUJMM78]

Keep the faith. Very nice win that was desperately needed. But this is a very mediocre Wisky team badly in need of an upgrade in talent. Considering how good they've been all these years , you'd think they'd have been able to recruit better players surrounding Happ. Big difference in game was Corey whose athleticism was on display. On the negative side, the margin of victory would have been 10-15 points if Rutgers had even mediocre outside shooting and could make some free throws.

This was a crazy game down the stretch with scoring spurts by both teams.Wisconsin was making layups after excellent interior passing while Rutgers responded with jump shots and just enough foul shots to secure the win.Winning at home must continue against mid level B1G opponents by having more players contribute offensively so that the score board shows at least 65 points .There will remain no margin for error because of the lack of consistency game to game.Achieving 5-6 more wins will remain a great challenge unless the team can steal at least one win on the road.

 

[RU-ROCS]

Like bac said, this was a season saving win, maybe our best game of the year (better defense and much better shooting percentage than the SHU game).

Corey looked like an NBA player tonight. After Wisky went on that 7-0 run to tie the game late, Corey then went on a personal 6-0 run out of the timeout, allowing us to wrest control back, including that dagger three from 22 feet out, over Happ no less. If only we could get efforts like this from Corey in 2 out of every 3 games (instead of 1 out of 4).

It’s confounding why Thiam can’t get more shots. He’s hitting threes at a 38% clip this year.

Good contributions from Omoruyi and Sa.

And yes, Mensah gave us 8 pretty good minutes tonight. He moved the ball on offense and played solid defense. Getting 8-10 minutes from him each game would be HUGE.

We will get blasted by MSU, but hopefully we can come back and beat both OSU and Iowa at home.

Agree about Thiam. He also showed a quicker release on his 3 point shot last night, which is encouraging. He continues to improve. I think he will be a plus contributor on O in the future if he can add a little bulk to his frame. The kid plays hard on D. As for Souf, he played very good D last night, but he is an absolute zero on offense - like playing 4 on 5. Also, Wisconsin did not have the athleticism at guard to challenge his weak handle, so noone picked his pocket last night, as so many other teams have done. That will not be the case against most Big 10 opponents.

Kudos also go to Freeman for his second half effort. He played solid D all night, but after taking some dumb, selfish shots in the first half, he let the game come to him and finished nicely around the rim for his second half points. If he did not make that adjustment, I’m not sure we win.

 

[BIGRUBIGDBIGredmachine]

Win was huge and that is an understatement. A loss and the wheels could have really come off with MSU looming and a tough OSU next Sunday. This team needed to get its mojo, moxie, strut whatever you want to call it back. I will admit my love tank was empty with this team. I was extremely down and negative following the two bad losses to Stoneyhartford. I think we all need a confidence boost as fans and players and staff got a major one so congrats to them. It was not Same Old Rutgers tonight that is for sure and doing it against a traditional Big 10 power ableit a down one, is particularly satfisfying

RUMAN mentioned resiliency in his recap and its a great point. Well this team wasnt that in the two losses. Tonight after going down 5, they went on a 14-2 run to take a 7 point then never lost it despite Wisky making two surges to cut the back. Thats what makes this win all the more beneficial and satisfying....that they learned something from prior losses and buckled down....the last time coming after Wisky tied the game with about 2 minutes. There was no uh oh we are going to lose this game, instead it was the Corey Sanders show. Corey was the best player on the court today and it wasnt close, You could only say that a handful of times this year. You could tell he was on from the get go. His patented dead on to the basket jumper was money tonight and when he hit that 3 you knew this was going to go down in the win column. To me it was sort of reminiscient of the Illinois win where he just took over. When Corey is good, he is very good and Wisky was just the kind of team where he could show his stuff. Corey being a leader and taking over, hitting the two decisive shots that basically won the game. Missed that in those two losses. We know he can do it and its frustrating to watch the inconsistency but everyone will take what he gave tonight....10-19 shooting 23 points, 2-2 from 32 assist, 0 turnovers in 35 minutes

Beyond Corey, RU won the game by getting back to playing defense. They really bothered the Wisky guards and seemed to rush Happ and passes to Happ disrupting Wisky from getting into any offensive rhythm....Hap had 7 TOs and Wisky 14 and thats huge because Wisky actually shot the ball well at 49%. RU limited Happ to just 10 points on 4-10 shooting and Wisky had absolutely no outside game to go to. It was a prototypical Rutgers hardnosed put your head down defensive effort about sticking to the gameplan and good things happen.

Individually Geo and Eugene stepped up in key stretches of the game so good to see bounce back. Geo hit a big jumper that extended and Eugene nailed two late fts. Yes Geo blew that layup there that started a swing that tied the game. Like the aggressive to go and "win" the game but you have to make that shot, if not its best to pull it out and run clock but I understand why he did.it. Eugene had seemingly become an invisible man for 3 games but was more involved and more confident on the court tonight. RU isnt going to win games when players take off. The margin of error so slim that they need everyone to be working in tandem whether its the younger players or the older ones, Freeman was erratic at times with his shot selection but calmed down as the game went on and I liked his defense

Loved the distribution of minutes tonight...loved loved it.

Corey:35, yes he can handle that
Baker; 28
Thiam: 28
Freeman: 26
Eugene: 26
Mike: 21
Sa: 15
Doucoure: 13
Mensah: 8

Kudos to Pike for doing a great job with prep and game management and minutes distributed, he even squeezed 8 out of Mensah without it hurting too much. Everybody contributed to this win in some way

Wisky is really going to struggle this year. I know they had a couple injuries. This matchup was favorable to RU once you saw what they had and what they looked like. Gard going to have issues if he cannot get his recruiting moving forward. RU seemed like the team with more talent.

So let us rejoice. This was only RU's 7th conference win in regular season play. Now 1-3, yeah an expected beatdown vs Sparty is coming but an interesting two game homestand vs OSU and Iowa awaits after. Tonight the win kept the fans on board and revive the hope that was flagging after those 2 WTFs. Always tough to see when you lose to bad teams or you lose to 30, picture always get clearer when you pick up a win and that one was much needed

Nice work again Bac.

Quick question: Where was Doorson?

 

[FELONIOUSMONK]

I want to beat them on the road with all their pieces on the court.Then I will know that we may really be turning a corner.Nice win tonight.

 

[Degaz-RU]

Nice work again Bac.

Quick question: Where was Doorson?

Pike’s C rotation has been depending on matchups. And last night, with how nimble Haas is, the better matchups we’re Doucoure, Sa and Omoruyi. The other night against Purdue’s behemoth Centers, Doorson played.

 

[Greene Rice FIG]

njh,

thaim in 6 games vs top 100 has gotten 3 attempts from 3pt land only once in a game (4 vs MINNY). No way he makes 3 3 pointers when he only takes 2.

 

[higgins3]

3 things were very apparent to me.

1-Sanders plays at a high level against high level opponents. He was clutch, and had a great game last night.
2- A lot of big games were due to Omoyuri having a great game. Last night he had a lot of moments that don't show up on the stat sheet. I look forward to seeing his progress over his time on the banks. He just has to stay confident, and I think when he becomes a junior, senior he will step into that role quickly.
3- Great game prep by Pikiell. If you are one that needs restored faith in Pikiell, look at last nights game. Kept Happ to 6 pts under average, and tripled his amount of turnovers.

 

[RU MAN]

Some notes from my end:

- Happ is a good player - not a superstar by any stretch - and I thought we played good defense against him.
- This is not your Older Brothers' Wisconsin Squad. With the exception of Happ, is there anyone on this team that scares you and/or impresses you? Not for me.
- For Greg Gard's sake, his Badgers better show improvement next year or I think Mr. Alvarez may pull the plug on him after the 18/19 season - especially given what Wisconsin BB has been as of late and given the really good job that Wojo is doing at Marquette elevating that program terrifically.
- In the first half, Happ would come out every few minutes. Was he in foul trouble?
- Pike was very intense from the onset and took a great TO when Wisky started with a 5-0 run in the 2nd half.
- Amazing how many open 3's Wisconsin missed as they are simply a bottom 3 squad in the B1G 10.
- Eugene seemed to have his mojo back.
- Great to see Corey dominate as this was certainly the team to do it against with their slow guards.
- Thought Dourcore played solid minutes getting some rebounds and diving on the floor for loose balls.
- Nice crowd that was into the game especially given the frigid temps and the snowstorm from yesterday.
- I never felt nervous about the outcome of the game.
- Also, solid officiating crew as calls were fair

Really good points Phil, but I think you're overlooking Brad Davison on their team. He's a true freshman, and you can tell he's going to be a good one for them. He averages 12 points a game.

 

[TDIrish27]

Wiscy is high level ?

My concern is RU shot the ball well is at home and is tied at with 2 minutes to play vs a bad team.

But a win is a win-----don't worry about beating Sparty----just compete and get better for it.

 

[RU-Choppin-Ohio]

Do we have another "New Normal" or do we need to wait for the next loss in a game we should win?