Wisconsin men’s basketball: Tyler Wahl and D’Mitrik Trice interview

The No. 10 Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball team (11-3 overall, 5-2 Big Ten) are coming off an important bounce-back win over Rutgers last Friday and will look to keep the momentum going against the Northwestern Wildcats (6-6 overall, 3-5 Big Ten) on Wednesday evening.

Senior PG D’Mitrik Trice and sophomore SF Tyler Wahl sat down with the media on Monday via Zoom to discuss the game against the Scarlet Knights as well as look ahead to the game with the ‘Cats.

D’Mitrik Trice

• On consistency of defense recently, “Going through the film today, coach Gard said it wasn’t as bad as he thought it was...but yeah, there are a lot of lapses that we can’t afford.”
• On improved two point shooting, “I’ve been working on improving scoring around the rim. Just staying on the attack has been the biggest thing.”
• On Northwestern’s team, “They’re a long team, really athletic one through five. We’re just going to have to exploit the mismatches when they present themselves.”
• On Tyler Wahl starting against Rutgers, “It worked perfectly, I’d say. I really challenged Aleem (Ford) and T-Wahl before the game...to go out there with a defensive mindset.” He mentioned how well they both did against Ron Harper Jr. and Geo Baker.
• On not forcing his offense against Rutgers, “Obviously as a point guard it’s important to get other guys rolling as well. I think it was important for me not to force it. I knew that eventually it would come for me to start making plays.”
• Trice noted that he thinks opposing players are getting too comfortable in the lane over the past three games and it is something that they are focusing on heading into the Northwestern game.

Tyler Wahl

• On some of the defensive struggles the team has had, “When teams go on their little runs against us it’s mostly points in the paint.”
• On starting against Rutgers, “We knew a couple of days before because of matchups. I didn’t really change a whole lot.”