Game notes: No. 15 Ohio State 74, No. 10 Wisconsin 62

On Saturday afternoon at the Kohl Center, the No. 10 Wisconsin Badgers (12-4 overall, 6-3 Big Ten) lost to the No. 15 Ohio State Buckeyes (12-4 overall, 6-4 Big Ten), 74-62. It was yet another loss this season where the Badgers were the loser on the scoreboard as well as in the “energy brought” department.

• As has been the case in all four losses this year, the Badgers were not leading after the first 10 minutes of the game and that trend continued all the way to the final buzzer. In fact, Wisconsin never led for even one second against Ohio State on Saturday.
• Wisconsin shot 25% (7-of-28) from three point range (Aleem Ford was 4-for-8) and while that is undeniably poor, few of the threes they attempted were bad looks. They were just not shooting well and it would have been worse offense, imo, to NOT take those threes even though they didn’t fall.
• UW had four players in double figures:

Aleem Ford had 13 points
D’Mitrik Trice had 12 points
Nate Reuvers had 11 points
Micah Potter had 11 points

• The Badgers couldn’t slow down E.J. Liddell though, who poured in 20 points and grabbed seven rebounds. He was able to get to whatever spot he wanted against Reuvers and Potter and once he got there he didn’t miss often.
• Trice had eight assists, one fewer than the entire OSU team, but his only two turnovers were costly and came late in the game when the Badgers were trying to mount a last-ditch comeback effort.
• Reuvers looked much improved from his previous efforts, but still probably wasn’t where he’d like himself to be. I don’t have a shot chart, but my memory and BartTorvik.com tell me that Reuvers was only 1-of-2 at the rim. That ain’t great still, but shooting 4-of-4 on mid-range shots is definitely a step in the right direction.
• Really rough game for Tyler Wahl, who was starting for the third consecutive time. He just couldn’t stay out of foul trouble and never got into the flow of the game. He still had a block and a steal, but he was a non-factor on offense.
• Brad Davison had a miserable shooting game and it’s hard not to think that this foul call had something to do with it.

Bo Boroski sucks shit, we, and everyone else in the conference, knows that, but showing up Davison here was not only inappropriate but also completely unnecessary. That was Davison’s first shirt attempt of the game and it may have gotten in his head as he finished the game 1-for-7 (1-for-6 from three). Weirdly, Davison didn’t have a single rebound this game.

• Ford led the team with seven rebounds and Jonathan Davis added five. Both guys had two offensive rebounds as well. Potter, Wahl and Trice each had four boards.
• As opposed to some other recent games, the Badgers weren’t badly outscored in the paint against Ohio State. The Buckeyes had 24 paint points while the Badgers had 22. The Badgers won the second chance points (6-2) and fast break points (12-10).
• It seemed like the Buckeyes made their living in the mid-range and upon further review...they really, really did.

• UW only shot 9-of-15 (60%) from the free throw line while the Buckeyes were 15-of-18 (83.3%).
• OSU had 1.10 points per possession while the Badgers were at 0.93.
• UW had better advanced stat rates on offensive rebounds, defensive rebounds, assists, turnovers, blocks and steals than the Buckeyes. The more I dove into the stats on this game the more it just seems like it was an anomaly of a shooting game and that’s why Ohio State won. If the Badgers had shot their season averages from three and the charity stripe they would’ve added between 11 and 14 points to their total depending on how you want to round the numbers.

That’s the thing about a team that relies heavily on the three, though...if the shots aren’t falling you’re going to have some clunkers like this. Putting the ball through the hoops is king and the Badgers did not do that at anywhere near a high enough rate.

• UW is back in action on Wednesday and looking for revenge against the Maryland Terrapins in College Park, Md. In their last four games (I’m not counting their win against Wingate here) they’ve been blown out vs. Iowa and at Maryland while beating Illinois (by three) and Minnesota (by 14), both on the road. Really weird team that I have zero read on.