Bucky’s Fan Favorite Tournament: round of 32 (East Region)

With COVID-19 crushing everyone’s March Madness vibe, we at B5Q crafted our own tournament to determine which basketball player from the past 20 years was the biggest fan favorite.

After the first round of votes have been cast, there seems to be some serious odd love pouring in for some of the current players, as presumptive favorites such as Michael Flowers, Mike Wilkinson, and Ben Brust fell.

WAIT WTF, FRANK THE TANK?!?!?!!!? March Madness has taken a very different turn...

For the second round, we will continue to split the voting into regions. We at B5Q will briefly breakdown each matchup, and it is up to you the fans to vote and ultimately decide who moves on, and who is eliminated.

In the third quadrant of the bracket, we turn our attention to the East Region. Check out each pairing below, and vote for your favorite.

The voting window closes at midnight, Wednesday, April 1, so get those votes in quick.

Check out the complete round of 32 bracket Bucky's Fan Favorite Tournament Bracket.pdf.

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(16) Maurice Linton vs. (8) Mark Vershaw

Linton was a starter on the 2000 Final Four team. He averaged 4.5 points per game that season.

Vershaw was the leading scorer on the 2000 Final Four team, and the only one to average double digits btw. Looking at his game log, however, you’ll find that he did not have a particularly good Tournament that year. He played well against Arizona in the second round and, uh, that was kind of it.

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(5) Zak Showalter vs. (4) Kirk Penney

Photo by Dan Sanger/Icon Sportswire/Corbis/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

Showalter was a joy to watch play basketball. He was supremely athletic and had zero regard for his own personal safety if the ball was loose or a defensive play needed to be made. He was on the 2017 B1G All-Defense team, he did the “Title Belt” celebration to Aaron Rodgers, at Madison Square Garden, after hitting a three to send the NCAA Tournament game against Florida into OT, he took the charge against Xavier that set up Bronson Koenig’s game winning shot in the NCAA Tournament and was a spark of the bench in the NCAA Tournament comeback against Oregon.

The former walk-on ended up playing in 129 career games and started 72 straight at one point.

A native of New Zealand, Penney is one of the most beloved Badgers in the past few decades. He was a part of the 2000 Final Four team as a freshman and then won back-to-back conference titles as a junior and senior. For his career, he averaged 11.4 ppg, 4 rpg and 1.7 apg. During his senior season he averaged a career-high 16.2 ppg, 6 rpg and 3.1 apg.

He now coaches at UVa with Tony Bennett, whose father is Dick Bennett...who was the coach of the 2000 Final Four team. Try and keep up.

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(6) Kammron Taylor vs. (3) Mike Kelley

Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images

Another link in the long chain of Minnesotans wising up and heading to Madison for college, Taylor was a point guard for the Badgers from 2003 to 2007. Over his final two seasons for the Badgers he averaged 13.5 ppg, 2.8 rpg and 2.2 apg. Much like Brian Butch, I also rode the Ogg East elevator with Taylor a bunch of times. He isn’t nearly as tall as Butch. A lights out free throw shooter, Taylor also made the B1G all-tournament team in 2007.

Kelley was one of the best defensive guards that Wisconsin has ever seen. During the 2000 Final Four run he had 19 steals in the Tournament. He also had an assist-to-turnover ratio of 23-4, and three of those turnovers came in one game! He has the top assist-to-turnover ratio in Wisconsin history (both career and single-season). He was the 1998-99 B1G Defensive Player of the Year and his 275 steals over his career are still a school record (and fourth in B1G history).

While he also wasn’t scoring for that Final Four team, he was almost definitely the one passing it to the guy who scored.

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(7) Jason Bohannon vs. (2) Jordan Taylor

Photo by Jamie Squire/Getty Images

There are so many Bohannons that played/still play college basketball in the B1G it is hard to keep track. This Bohannon, a native of Marion, Iowa, was a sharp-shooting guard, who started all 33 games both his junior and senior year for the Badgers. After earning Big Ten Sixth Man of the Year honors in 2008, Bohannon followed that up by ranking third on the team with 10.3 points per game in 2009 and finishing his career 4th in UW history with 212 made 3-points. One of the conference’s best free throw shooters, he was also the Badgers’ most lethal 3-point threat. Has played in 135 career games (68 starts) and owns 58 career double-digit scoring games.

Photo by Sandra Dukes/Icon SMI/Icon Sport Media via Getty Images

There are certain players who you remember specific plays for and Jordan Taylor is one of those players. At one point, my Facebook profile picture was of Taylor blocking Kansas State’s Jacob Pullen’s shot in the NCAA Tournament to secure a win. God, what a sweet picture that was.

Anyway, Taylor was the consummate point guard for the Badgers during his career. Did you know that he turned the ball over just 79 TOTAL times in 71 career Big Ten games? And that his 3.01 career assist-to-turnover ratio shattered the NCAA record (2.70 - Julyan Stone, UTEP, 2008-11)? And that his 3.83 assist-to-turnover ratio in 2010-11 led the nation and was the 4th-highest mark in NCAA history?

Taylor also made the all-B1G first team twice and was a national All-American in 2011. During his senior season he averaged 18.1 ppg (20.1 in just B1G games).