When traveling to the Bryce Jordan Center, expect the strange to happen. It did in the form of a sudden burst of crazy three point shooting to make an easy Wisconsin win a much more difficult 66-60 victory.
The Wisconsin Badgers (11-9, 3-4 B1G) led by as many as 17 points in the second half (38-21 with 14:08 to play), but Penn State’s leading scorer on the year, Brandon Taylor, got hot with a few three pointers and the rest of the Nittany Lions followed in his footsteps.
Taylor finished with 13 points, all of them in the final seven minutes, but it was much too little, much too late for a true Penn State comeback.
It all led to the Badgers moving their win streak over PSU to eight games, and its win streak at the Bryce Jordan Center to 11 of the last 12 contests.
What was a double digit lead for most of the second half turned in to a single digit lead with just over four minutes to go.
Ethan Happ, who led the Badgers with a career high 20 points, salted the game away with seven made free throws in the final 80 seconds of the game.
He added 11 rebounds for his Big Ten-leading seventh double double of the season.
Much like the Michigan State game, the duo of Happ and junior forward Nigel Hayes was huge in the win. Hayes added 15 points and four assists to the winning effort.
Things started off rather familiar for the Badgers, allowing Penn State to score the first points and not getting in to the game early on their own offensive end of the floor. However, Wisconsin turned things on quicker than usual, and turned a 3-0 deficit in to a 9-3 lead early in the half.
From that point on, Wisconsin turned it up on the defensive end of the court and it led to them leading comfortably for most of the first half.
Wisconsin’s defense was good enough to hold Penn State to just 16 total field goal attempts in the first 20 minutes, holding the Nittany Lions to just 31.2 percent shooting (5-16) in the half. The Badgers countered with 44 percent shooting (11-25) in the first half.
Much of the work to build and maintain the lead in the first half went to an unlikely source — freshmen. Vitto Brown struggled early on, and Gard went to the bench for Alex Illikainen. The frosh responded by teaming up with fellow freshman Ethan Happ to lead UW’s offensive effort.
At one point the duo had more than triple the field goal makes as the junior trio of Hayes, Koenig and Brown.
Happ and Illikainen are a combined 7 of 9 from the field; Hayes, Koenig and Brown are a combined 2 of 12.
— Jim Polzin (@JimPolzinWSJ) January 22, 2016
Penn State did make a run as the first half began to close down. With the Badgers up 19-11, Penn State used defense and timely scoring after a 5-plus minute field goal drought to climb back in the game.
A 6-0 Nittany Lions’ run made it just a three-point game, 20-17, with 4:28 to play in the first half.
Wisconsin responded well to that adversity and shut down Penn State’s run just as quickly as it started, ending the half on a 7-0 run to end the half.
It was Illikainen putting the cherry on top of the half as well, allowing himself to get out of a trapped situation and calmly knock down a three-pointer as the half expired.
He would finish the half with all nine of his points, but it was fellow freshman Ethan Happ who would lead everyone in scoring at 10 points (4-5 on field goals).
PSU was able to stay in the game thanks to a 7 of 11 performance from the free throw line or UW’s halftime lead of 27-18 could’ve been much larger.
Unlike previous games, Wisconsin didn’t duplicate first half struggles early on. Instead, it was Koenig knocking down a triple from the corner to start the half.
It was the start of a 5-0 run, which included an emphatic jam for the target of Penn State’s student section’s ire — Vitto Brown — and the Badgers were up 32-18 quickly
It took nearly 27 minutes, but Penn State’s leading scoring — Brandon Taylor — finally got off the goose egg on the scoreboard. Hayes did a great job of shutting him down for much of the game, but Taylor kick-started an attempted rally with four points in three possessions with just over 13 minutes left to play.
It led to a 16-point Badgers lead being trimmed to just 10 with a layup by Deividas Zemgulis with 11:35 to play.
However, it was the inside play of the Badgers that buoyed the effort, with Brown getting fouled on an offensive rebound and Charlie Thomas getting a lay-in down low for Wisconsin’s own 4-0 run to kick the lead back beyond the magical 10-point mark.
Wisconsin’s double digit lead would stay for most of the half, but a 13-3 run for the Nittany Lions would see them try to get back in to the game with just under five minutes to play. It led to Penn State cutting UW’s lead to 52-45 with just 4:19 to play.
Mixed in that run were three triples by the Nittany Lions, who had it all of one for the game with just over six minutes to play. Penn State would finish the night 6 of 15 from beyond the arc, but hit 5 of 12 in the second half alone (1 of 3 in 1st half).
Without a late hot hand from beyond the arc, this game looks a lot different in the box score and on the scoreboard.
However, once again it was the Badgers’ ability to get to the line and hit when it needed to that mattered most.
All of Penn State’s big three-point shooting mattered little as the Badgers extended their lead time and again in the final few minutes of this game.
Wisconsin returns home to the Kohl Center for a pivotal game against Big Ten leading Indiana. The Badgers and Hoosiers will lock horns on Jan. 26 at 6p.m. CT with ESPN televising the game.
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