Bucky’s Fan Favorite Tournament Elite 8: (1) Alando Tucker vs. (2) Jon Leuer

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.

With three rounds in the books, we are down to only eight former players still alive. It’s Elite 8 time!

For the Elite 8, we will be dropping one matchup each day, as the decisions become harder. We at B5Q will state the case for each player, and it is up to you the fans to vote and ultimately decide who moves on, and who is eliminated.

In the second matchup of the Elite 8, we turn our attention to the West Region. Just like the first three rounds, the voting window closes at midnight each day, so get those votes in quick.

You can check out the players still vying for the title in the complete bracket...Bucky's Fan Favorite Tournament Bracket.pdf.

Two of the best players to don the cardinal and white face-off in a critical matchup with Final Four implications in effect, as No. 1 seed Alando Tucker takes on No. 2 seed Jon Leuer.

Dan Sanger

The case for Alando Tucker:

First and foremost, Alando Tucker is Wisconsin’s all-time leading scorer with 2,217 points, in 134 career games. Tucker overtook Michael Finley as the school’s all-time leader as a senior, when he was the B1G Player of the Year and was in the running for multiple national player of the year awards.

Tucker played in four NCAA Tournaments, reaching the Sweet 16 as a freshman and the Elite Eight in his sophomore campaign. As a junior and senior, Tucker led the Wisconsin Badgers in scoring with over 19 points per game, and also led the conference in in two-point field goal makes as well as total points.

Tucker joined the UW coaching staff this past season, following Howard Moore’s tragic accident which left an opening on the staff. Prior to joining the staff, Tucker served as UW’s Director of Student-Athlete Engagement since February of 2018. He worked with incoming student-athletes and their families to enhance how they acclimate to life at UW and in the community, in addition to sharing information about and using UW resources.

For his career Tucker averaged 16.5 points, 5.7 rebounds and 1.6 assists while shooting 48 percent from the field in 134 games.

A prolific dunker with freakish athleticism, Alando Tucker is one of the top overall players to ever play in a Wisconsin uniform. Tucker also probably pulled off the old school baggy UW jersey the best, and it is just a matter of time before his name hangs in the rafters of the Kohl Center.

Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images

The case for Jon Leuer:

Leuer was an honorable mention AP All-American in 2011 while also being named first-team all-B1G by the coaches and second-team by the media. He was also honorable mention all-B1G in 2010.

The native of Orono, Minn. finished twelfth in school history with 1,376 career points and is one of just eight players in UW history with 1,300 points and 500 rebounds. He scored 621 points in his senior season (18.3 ppg), the third-highest single-season total in school annals. His 85 career blocks place him 10th on UW’s all-time ledger.

Leuer led UW in scoring and rebound during both his junior and senior seasons and was a two-time Academic All-Big Ten (2009 & 2010).

Leuer’s senior season was particularly impressive. He shot 37% from three-point land and 84.3% from the charity stripe, which was No. 104 in the whole country, while being used on 29.3% of all of Wisconsin’s possessions (No. 57 in the nation). It should also be noted that the Badgers offense in 2011 was ranked No. 2 by KenPom in the nation and they also led the country in turnover percentage and free throw percentage. Leuer (and Jordan Taylor, obvs) was a big reason for that.