Wisconsin Basketball 2022-23

[Jim French Stepstool]

11 hours ago, LouisEly said:

They've lost five of six.  They've also played five of the last six on the road.  Not sure why the Big Ten allowed that in a schedule.

Most teams are thin.  Between the portal and one-and-done for the NBA, few teams have anyone other than true freshmen coming off of the bench.  The portal is a crap shoot - nobody wants to come off of the bench unless it's a team with a legit shot at the final four.  If most teams ranked 15-25 a few weeks ago lost a starter for a stretch when they played most of their games on the road, they wouldn't be ranked any longer either.

Four of six on the road, right? MSU & Penn State were home games.

Valid points regarding the depth, though. Watched some of Oregon State-Utah tonight. I certainly wish he was here to give us another option, but after watching Ben Carlson & knowing what Gard would be asking of him I'm not totally convinced he'd make a huge difference.

[yourout]

Just not very good right now.

[yourout]

This one was lost on the recruiting trail a couple of years ago.

Way to big a talent gap.

[edfunderburk]

I hope McIntosh takes a similar approach to basketball as he did with football. Like Chryst, Gard is a ‘good man’ & a decent coach … but he can’t recruit & keep the Badgers competitive. This year’s team will be lucky to finish .500 … if we want to remain (become) competitive in the Big Ten & nationally, we need a new coach who can resurrect this bland, boring program. Today’s Badgers basketball is hard to watch. 

[edfunderburk]

On 1/14/2023 at 5:13 PM, Brewcrew82 said:

I’m a huge Gard supporter (anyone who thinks his job is or should be in jeopardy at this point is insane). But he’s gotta quit it with these one man recruiting classes like in 2019 and 2022. That’s absolutely killing our depth right now when you combine it with the transfers from Carlson, Bowman, and Mors and Davis leaving early for the draft.

Uh Oh … according to you - I’m insane 🥴

[edfunderburk]

On 1/18/2023 at 9:45 AM, stoutdude04 said:

Honest question.  Hasn't he only missed the tourny once?  

Twice if you include this year 🤓

[edfunderburk]

On 1/18/2023 at 12:29 PM, Brewcrew82 said:

Could Gard improve his recruiting and up the ceiling of this program to a whole new level? Yes he could. And there’s the opportunity to do that with some of the prospects we’re in on in the 2024-2025 classes. But to liken him to PC, who literally gave up on recruiting, just doesn’t square with reality.  

I’m not as confident in Gard’s ability to recruit more effectively. And … more of a concern … is his monotonous [boring] offense 

He probably is “safe” - but I’d be thrilled if McIntosh made a change & brought in a Fickell-like (big personality) coach to get Wisconsin back in the spotlight

[Jim French Stepstool]

I think there's way too much comparison to Fickell going on. FB & BB are two vastly different animals. 

Right now they need their top 3-4 players to simply play with more consistency. The margin for error is really thin. Last year Hepburn was surrounded on the wings by a combined 33-34 PPG. With Essegian starting, it's half that. Before he started it was considerably less than half.

The next couple recruiting classes are very important. Let's see how they play out before saying Gard can't recruit effectively. Or better yet, let's remember many of the recruits of the past decade who experienced a lot of success here. Guys that Gard recruited. Maybe he forgot how? Or maybe it's just tough to replace your top two scorers, especially when one of them averages almost 20 per game & leaves after his sophomore year, something absolutely no one saw coming until last season was well underway, making the loss next to impossible to replace. Yeah, I know, the portal. We should've outbid UK for Reeves.....😄

They have four really important veterans they need production from who start. All of them are shooting the ball the same or worse from the field compared to last year. Three of the four are worse from the FT line than last year. And more than enough of the shots are makeable. There's nothing wrong with the offense. Funny how it suddenly looks "boring" when the ball doesn't go through. Wahl & Crowl are getting plenty of good looks & not making them. 

Then again, maybe we should go more up-tempo. Never mind we've struggled to rebound the ball as it is. Let's have 2-3 fewer players hit the boards, get those guys out on the break.🙄

Bottom line, anyone who wants to blame Gard for the circumstances that created the current roster, have at it. I think a large amount of this is out of his control. I mentioned the next couple classes (24 & 25). Anyone who wants a change, pull for him to strike out there, I guess.

[LouisEly]

One of UW's challenges with basketball recruiting is that they are an Under Armour school, not a Nike school.  The kids that go to the Nike camps/AAU teams get steered towards Nike schools.  Under Armour is more of a football brand than basketball, and Nike is the top brand for basketball - the Nike camps/AAU teams usually get the best basketball players.  That has contributed to some of the in-state kids going elsewhere (Podziemski initially going to Illinois, a Nike school, as he went to the Nike-sponsored Phenom camps; that, and he thought he was a 1-2 year player and UW had Davison and Bowman, so he had no interest in UW).

Purdue, Illinois, Michigan, Michigan State are all Nike schools and, not so coincidentally, the top basketball schools in the conference.

[superfly]

Us UW fans have been awful spoiled the past 15-20 years...I find it annoying when we have an off season and right away it’s time to fire Gard. No, we haven’t won a title, but the consistency year in and year out is a rare animal when you’re not UNC, Duke, Kansas, or Kentucky. Imagine being Indiana with all the prestige and history, and nothing but mediocrity.

[yourout]

17 hours ago, Jim French Stepstool said:

I think there's way too much comparison to Fickell going on. FB & BB are two vastly different animals. 

Right now they need their top 3-4 players to simply play with more consistency. The margin for error is really thin. Last year Hepburn was surrounded on the wings by a combined 33-34 PPG. With Essegian starting, it's half that. Before he started it was considerably less than half.

The next couple recruiting classes are very important. Let's see how they play out before saying Gard can't recruit effectively. Or better yet, let's remember many of the recruits of the past decade who experienced a lot of success here. Guys that Gard recruited. Maybe he forgot how? Or maybe it's just tough to replace your top two scorers, especially when one of them averages almost 20 per game & leaves after his sophomore year, something absolutely no one saw coming until last season was well underway, making the loss next to impossible to replace. Yeah, I know, the portal. We should've outbid UK for Reeves.....😄

They have four really important veterans they need production from who start. All of them are shooting the ball the same or worse from the field compared to last year. Three of the four are worse from the FT line than last year. And more than enough of the shots are makeable. There's nothing wrong with the offense. Funny how it suddenly looks "boring" when the ball doesn't go through. Wahl & Crowl are getting plenty of good looks & not making them. 

Then again, maybe we should go more up-tempo. Never mind we've struggled to rebound the ball as it is. Let's have 2-3 fewer players hit the boards, get those guys out on the break.🙄

Bottom line, anyone who wants to blame Gard for the circumstances that created the current roster, have at it. I think a large amount of this is out of his control. I mentioned the next couple classes (24 & 25). Anyone who wants a change, pull for him to strike out there, I guess.

I agree with most of what you post.

The only caveat is I'm not sure how much the NIL and the portal have changed the college basketball landscape.

I wonder how Bo would have faired in this era.

[Jim French Stepstool]

7 hours ago, yourout said:

I agree with most of what you post.

The only caveat is I'm not sure how much the NIL and the portal have changed the college basketball landscape.

I wonder how Bo would have faired in this era.

I guess we'll find out how much as this whole thing unfolds. I think a "rich will get richer" aspect is certainly possible. One thing---I'd hate to be a fan of a low-to-mid major school right now. In that world you want the players to have success, but not too much or they'll look to the "next level"----a power five school. UW is one of the "haves" & the Varsity Collective they've put together sounds like a really effective model so it shouldn't bother me, but it does. I'd hate for college hoops to degenerate into one level of a top 70-80 schools with the rest left behind; I think that would rip out the very soul that has made college hoops what it is.

As for Bo, that's a heckuva good question. My best guess is he'd have tried to surround himself with assistants who were good at the "new stuff" so he could focus on what he did well.....day-to-day coaching & closing the deal on HS kids. I think he would've disliked it about as much as Chryst, but was so much more of a personality & so much better with fan events & the media & such that it wouldn't have cost him his job. A lot of coaches hate this stuff, but keep it under their hats. I know Izzo thinks we've all lost our minds.

[True Blue Brew Crew]

Duke, UNC, Kentucky, and Villanova are all unranked. This is not at all like college football where the same 6 teams have a shot at winning a championship each year. NIL and the portal have not ruined things for teams on the periphery. The Badgers biggest hinderance imo is their archaic style of play. We all see now how much an up tempo offense is attracting talent on the football side. Greg Gard seems like a good guy but ranking 347th out of 363 in pace of play isn't going to attract a wide net of talent.

[stoutdude04]

On 1/28/2023 at 4:26 PM, edfunderburk said:

Twice if you include this year 🤓

They sure seem like an average team after the beginning of the year.  

I was thinking the Wahl injury was unfortunate, but now I think perhaps the team is just average.

[MrTPlush]

4 hours ago, True Blue Brew Crew said:

Duke, UNC, Kentucky, and Villanova are all unranked. This is not at all like college football where the same 6 teams have a shot at winning a championship each year. NIL and the portal have not ruined things for teams on the periphery. The Badgers biggest hinderance imo is their archaic style of play. We all see now how much an up tempo offense is attracting talent on the football side. Greg Gard seems like a good guy but ranking 347th out of 363 in pace of play isn't going to attract a wide net of talent.

Their insufferable to watch style of play is good on one hand because it is pretty annoying to many teams and keeps the Badgers consistently a pretty respectable squad. However, yeah, it is terrible for recruiting. It also isn't going to let you go streaking for 3+ wins in the tourney. The one-time Gard had a good ball scorer he arguably ran the worst offense I have ever seen. He just fed Davis and the rest of the team went with it and stood around. 

As I have said before, basketball coaching is a bit different than football. The Badgers are not prestigious enough to go pluck the hot name in the offseason. You don't go a find a Fickle that is going to transform the style of play and bring in a dump truck of recruits. I don't think they would really find a better coach, but they could find a coach that is similar with a different style of play. I just don't see the upside for the Badgers though. They would likely sacrifice consistency for MAYBE creating a higher ceiling basketball team.  I was always on the boat that thought they could find PC and move on from the Wisconsin way to be better...I don't really feel that way with Gard...and I don't really think Gard is that great.

 

[Samurai Bucky]

10 pages of items and counting... 😉

I'm sure I'm oversimplifying this, but I see some glaring issues.

1. Nobody attacks the lane.  By attacking, I don't mean turning your back to the basket and dribble down.  Johnny Davis attacked the basket last year and that is one of the main reasons why they were Big Ten Champs.  You put pressure on the defense.  Heck, at least when the other team has a player that is lights out, switch up and force him to work!  You can't do that when it is a 4x1 with the 1 dribbling down to the block for 10 seconds.
2. The offense if very stagnant (see previous point).  Dribble... dribble... dribble and maybe pass.  If you get it to one of your bigs, watch them try to back down for 10 seconds and, maybe, throw up a shot.  Sure, you might kick it out to somebody to jack up a three which doesn't go in as often as we would like.  I don't have a doctorate in basketball, but I don't think they are running any form of the swing.
3. The Badgers are being out hustled.  I was by the band for the Minnesota game at home.  That may be the beginning of the hustle issue.  Minnesota came back because of desire.  I don't see that with the Badgers recently.  How many offensive rebounds do they allow to the other team during a game?  Way too many.
4. The depth on the team is not very good.
5. *** WAY TOO OBVIOUS *** MAKE YOUR FREE THROWS!
6. Sorry... Tyler Wahl is not as good as people think he is.  Away from the basket, he gets owned when he is on defense.  You could make a "not top 10" video of how he gets schooled.  On offense?  Terrible.  He might average negative assists per game.

So many comments on whether or not Gard is a good coach.  I think he is a good coach.  It may take him a little longer to make a decision than I would like, but he seems to be fine.  I also know that recruiting is very iffy right now.  I do know the talent isn't there and Gard isn't making changes with the talent he does have to be successful.  So, from that standpoint, he isn't making the necessary changes.

Very disappointing.

[Jim French Stepstool]

10 hours ago, True Blue Brew Crew said:

Duke, UNC, Kentucky, and Villanova are all unranked. This is not at all like college football where the same 6 teams have a shot at winning a championship each year. NIL and the portal have not ruined things for teams on the periphery. The Badgers biggest hinderance imo is their archaic style of play. We all see now how much an up tempo offense is attracting talent on the football side. Greg Gard seems like a good guy but ranking 347th out of 363 in pace of play isn't going to attract a wide net of talent.

I don't know what you mean by "on the periphery", but if you're referring to low & mid-majors I think the changes could hurt them in a variety of ways.

The criticism about the style of play only seems to emerge when they aren't winning. It isn't immune to slumps, injuries or a lack of talent & depth, just like other styles. I'm pretty sure Louisvilles' pace of play is acceptible to those who love And-1 mixtapes & Sportscenter highlights. They're 2-19. And there's nothing wrong with an uptempo style, if it fits. It's just that I have this odd attraction to winning, and a strange inclination towards putting more weight on a 7-8 year stretch (or 22 years; Bo Ryan had a "boring" style in the eyes of many, too) over one season, or one month.

I still remember when one of Dick Bennetts' teams lost in the 1st round to Texas. Tom Penders was holding court after the game in his presser, talking about style of play & how the "modern" game is played. Again, nothing wrong with ANY style of play vs another. It's just that UW was in the Final Four a few years later. Penders had a losing record his next season, left UT, and in his last ten years of coaching never won another tourney game. The two times he made it in, he gave up 108 points to Indiana & 89 to Maryland. But his teams averaged over 80 in those two games, so I'm sure it was really exciting.

 

[Jim French Stepstool]

6 hours ago, Samurai Bucky said:

10 pages of items and counting... 😉

I'm sure I'm oversimplifying this, but I see some glaring issues.

1. Nobody attacks the lane.  By attacking, I don't mean turning your back to the basket and dribble down.  Johnny Davis attacked the basket last year and that is one of the main reasons why they were Big Ten Champs.  You put pressure on the defense.  Heck, at least when the other team has a player that is lights out, switch up and force him to work!  You can't do that when it is a 4x1 with the 1 dribbling down to the block for 10 seconds.
2. The offense if very stagnant (see previous point).  Dribble... dribble... dribble and maybe pass.  If you get it to one of your bigs, watch them try to back down for 10 seconds and, maybe, throw up a shot.  Sure, you might kick it out to somebody to jack up a three which doesn't go in as often as we would like.  I don't have a doctorate in basketball, but I don't think they are running any form of the swing.
3. The Badgers are being out hustled.  I was by the band for the Minnesota game at home.  That may be the beginning of the hustle issue.  Minnesota came back because of desire.  I don't see that with the Badgers recently.  How many offensive rebounds do they allow to the other team during a game?  Way too many.
4. The depth on the team is not very good.
5. *** WAY TOO OBVIOUS *** MAKE YOUR FREE THROWS!
6. Sorry... Tyler Wahl is not as good as people think he is.  Away from the basket, he gets owned when he is on defense.  You could make a "not top 10" video of how he gets schooled.  On offense?  Terrible.  He might average negative assists per game.

So many comments on whether or not Gard is a good coach.  I think he is a good coach.  It may take him a little longer to make a decision than I would like, but he seems to be fine.  I also know that recruiting is very iffy right now.  I do know the talent isn't there and Gard isn't making changes with the talent he does have to be successful.  So, from that standpoint, he isn't making the necessary changes.

Very disappointing.

Sometimes, oversimplification is best😉.

Points 1 & 2......There IS a lot of backing down done, both by Wahl & Crowl. It looks tedious, and the off-the-ball movement often isn't good enough. But 90% of the problem there is that at the end of the backdown, the shot isn't going in often enough. Crowl was money in the low post for several games, when he was making the shots no one was complaining (or shouldn't be). And Wahl, he's just missing shots he's made in the past. If they go in, I really don't care how many dribbles it takes. When you clear out, it's tough to make a backdoor cut because you're clogging up the clearout. But yes, there should be more movement, off-ball screens, etc. The problem with attacking the rim, is no one is very good at it. Hepburn used to confound me with his pullups & fallaways, but when I see him try to get to the rim I can understand why he resorts to it. Needs to get people on his hip to finish at the rim.

They don't seem to be running the swing, which is interesting because a couple of the guards might be OK in the post. But you can't invert with Wahl or Gilmore. Crowl, maybe if he starts knocking down threes again.

3.......They ARE being outrebounded. Too many 2nd & third shots, which has hurt them much more than some of the other stuff people bring up. I agree the 50-50 balls seem to be mostly going the other way, which might be a byproduct of #4, the depth factor.

6......I've seen enough of Wahl to know he's a quality defender that can guard multiple spots on the floor. Since the Northwestern game, for whatever reason he hasn't shown that. And his floor game offensively--the decision-making, passing, propensity for turnovers--has been pretty bad. Just not the level he's performed at before. Maybe just a bad stretch after having to sit, or maybe feeling pressure from being something other than a "supporting cast" guy ???? He does need to be better. The good news is he has been.

I don't know what changes Gard could make with what he has on hand right now. Like, Meyer schooled Essegian on Saturday. From where I was sitting I would've liked a change in the defensive assignment, but it was brought up in postgame and when Gard went through his options I could see that he was pretty much stuck, unless you wanted to sit Essegian when Hepburn was the only guy consistently making shots. 

I like the class coming in next season. I like the kids he's recruiting right now who are 24s & 25s, hopefully he can get his share of them.

 

[MrTPlush]

On the recruiting front they are getting talent at face value in most years recently...but it flat out is not developing much for really strong reliable guys. Not sure if that is the literal development at fault or just recruiting the wrong guys. The 2022 class sucked, but you wouldn't expect that to be making an impact or even being legit bench guys yet anyway. 2021 featured Hepburn as a 4-star and 3 other high end 3-star guys. The 2020 class was really good too.

Crowl/Wahl/Hepburn are fine guys....but no one has taken that step to lead the team like Johnny Davis did. 

[LouisEly]

5 hours ago, MrTPlush said:

Their insufferable to watch style of play is good on one hand because it is pretty annoying to many teams and keeps the Badgers consistently a pretty respectable squad. However, yeah, it is terrible for recruiting. It also isn't going to let you go streaking for 3+ wins in the tourney.

The year that Virginia won the national championship they were literally last in the nation - 353rd - in pace of play.

The team they beat in the final was 268th.

[Jim French Stepstool]

11 hours ago, MrTPlush said:

Their insufferable to watch style of play is good on one hand because it is pretty annoying to many teams and keeps the Badgers consistently a pretty respectable squad. However, yeah, it is terrible for recruiting. It also isn't going to let you go streaking for 3+ wins in the tourney. The one-time Gard had a good ball scorer he arguably ran the worst offense I have ever seen. He just fed Davis and the rest of the team went with it and stood around. 

 

 

IMO the style a team plays has nothing to do with whether they make a run in the tourney. It's more about hitting a consistent stride at the right time & getting favorable matchups along the way. Favorable to your personnel, not necessarily "easy".

The offense they ran last year often did have too much standing around, which can happen when you have a large discrepancy btwn your #1 option & the rest. It was somewhat similar to Alando Tuckers' last couple seasons.

[MrTPlush]

14 hours ago, LouisEly said:

The year that Virginia won the national championship they were literally last in the nation - 353rd - in pace of play.

The team they beat in the final was 268th.

Why not check the champion of any other year? The last three decades or so...65% of the eventual champions are Top 15 in scoring, 6% are not Top 100 scoring teams. I get that isn't pace of play...but I doubt any of those teams had a pace of play lower than 150 at worst, because there is no way you can be scoring that much playing Badger slow. It isn't just their slow pace of play...they just suck on offense too. Virginia had a good offense and voluntarily had a slow pace of play. The Badgers...well, it feels forced because they can't score a lot and have to limit possessions. That is why Virginia outscored their pace of play by nearly 150 spots and the Badgers brutal 300+ pace of play matches their 300+ scoring offense. 

The two years they made the Final Four they had a Top 100 scoring offense. Bo Ryan had quite a few other Sweet 16 and an Elite 8 appearance because A) his offenses weren't bottom of the barrel and B) his defenses were very often elite (Top 10). The defense is still good under Gard, but most years they are floating in the 30-40 range. Still annoying for opposing teams, but not as brutal as Bo Ryan's teams. Last year was one of Gard's better teams offensively...but easily the worst defensive team the Badgers have had in a long time #75 in points allowed. 

There is slow pace of play and then there is extremely slow pace of play. The Badgers do the later. Just because one team in history managed to do it (while getting the lucky draw of another slow paced team in the final) doesn't mean it is suddenly a recipe for actual tourney success. 

 

 

[Jim French Stepstool]

3 hours ago, MrTPlush said:

 

There is slow pace of play and then there is extremely slow pace of play. The Badgers do the later. Just because one team in history managed to do it (while getting the lucky draw of another slow paced team in the final) doesn't mean it is suddenly a recipe for actual tourney success. 

 

 

 

I don't know if playing Texas Tech was lucky. Actually you can make the argument that UVA might've had an easier time of it if they drew a faster-paced team in the final.

You're right, it isn't a guaranteed recipe for success. Neither is any other style of play.

[LouisEly]

10 hours ago, MrTPlush said:

Why not check the champion of any other year? The last three decades or so...65% of the eventual champions are Top 15 in scoring, 6% are not Top 100 scoring teams. I get that isn't pace of play...but I doubt any of those teams had a pace of play lower than 150 at worst

Wisconsin's Final Four teams were 332nd in pace of play (2013-2014) and 346th (2014-2015) in pace of play.  In 2014 they lost to Kentucky who was 193rd in pace of play, and in 2015 they lost to Duke who was 141st in pace of play.  You could have checked the link I provided...

Teams win championships because they are efficient - they score at a high % of their possessions.

[True Blue Brew Crew]

Pace of play wasn't brought up as a factor in winning or losing, it was mentioned as a factor in attracting better talent.