The consensus was that the 2015-16 Wisconsin Badgers basketball team would go as juniors Nigel Hayes and Bronson Koenig went. It’s been true to some extent, but there’s a third piece to the puzzle that is becoming equally important for the Badgers — redshirt freshman Ethan Happ.
After a slow debut, complete with head coach Bo Ryan calling him out following the loss to Western Illinois, Happ has not been afraid to showcase his talents in a major way.
In his second game, Happ scored eight points, but played just 18 minutes as the Badgers drubbed Siena. He continued to only grow and gain more confidence on Tuesday night as well. Along with Koening, Happ led the team in scoring by pouring in 17 points, but more importantly got it done in an efficient manner — shooting 63.6 percent from the field.
Head coach Bo Ryan sees two sides of the coin with Happ, and given the fact that he’s just three games in to his career, that is totally understandable and obvious.
Still, Ryan and Co. are starting to see that they can count on Happ to be more than just a low-post scorer.
“It’s sporadic and it was sporadic when he (Happ) was on the scout team,” said Ryan after Tuesday’s game. “He’ll have days where you scratch your head and other days where you use two hands to scratch your head, meaning he was doing some good stuff. When you scratch your head with one hand, that’s not good, two hands, that’s good. He was having fun out there.”
However, the most important part of Tuesday’s game was that Happ and the rest of the starting five seemed to play with a lot more chemistry than they did in the first two games of the season.
“Everybody contributed,” said Ryan. “Nigel (Hayes) was finding open guys, Bronson (Koenig) had four assists, Nigel had seven, so that’s 11 with one turnover. That’s pretty good, but that’s the two guys who had experience. They were finding these guys in pretty good spots, especially Nigel.”
Hayes hasn’t exactly been on fire from the field, shooting just 40.6 percent from the field so far this season. Yet, Hayes does lead the team with 15 assists and no turnovers so far this season.
Having him be able to find open players like Happ and Vitto Brown has been vital to the Badgers breaking out over the past few games. It’s no coincidence that Happ leads the team in field goal shooting as well, with Hayes and Koenig’s passes finding him in good positions down low. He’s shooting 60 percent from the field through three games (12 of 20) so far this season.
In addition to all of that, Happ is tied with Vitto Brown for the team lead in rebounds with 17 and may be the best all-around rebounder on the team. His eight offensive boards lead the team, while he also committed just two turnovers while averaging over 20 minutes played per game so far this season.
Wisconsin may well go as Hayes and Koenig go, but don’t be surprised to see Happ become a true force for this team as the season goes along — and that’s only good news for a team in need of multiple options to emerge.
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