Badgers wallop Michigan, play Spartans Saturday

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By JESSE OSBORNE / Lee Newspapers
Friday, March 14, 2008 11:56 PM CDT

INDIANAPOLIS — The final numbers were stunning, even by the lofty defensive standards set by the University of Wisconsin men’s basketball team this season.

In Friday’s 51-34 victory over Michigan in a Big Ten tournament quarterfinal game at Conseco Fieldhouse, the eighth-ranked Badgers muzzled the Wolverines in a signature performance to date.

“That’s what we hang our hat on — defense,” UW junior swingman Joe Krabbenhoft said. “To keep those guys to low numbers is quite an accomplishment.“

And the numbers game was clearly tilted in the Badgers’ favor.

UW — which led the nation in scoring defense (54.3 ppg) during the regular season — held Michigan to the lowest scoring output in the Big Ten tournament’s 11-year history. The 34 points also marked the Wolverines lowest total since 1999.

“We weren’t giving them open looks,” Badgers sophomore guard Trevon Hughes said. “That’s the whole key to our defense — don’t give them open shots. ... We tried to make a statement with our defensive play.”

That statement was quickly delivered to a Wolverines team that made just one field goal over the games first 7 minutes, 38 seconds. Michigan (10-22) — which also endured a spans of 5:02, 5:57 and 4:16 between field goals in the second half — made just 10 of their 50 field goal attempts for the game for a 20-percent conversion rate, one that ranked as a season-low for a UW opponent.

“Tournament time is win or go home and it’s going to start with our defense and we know that,” UW senior center Greg Stiemsma said. “When you can hold a team to 20 percent, then you know you have a pretty good shot of getting a win.”

Good shots, meanwhile, were tough to come by for Wolverines freshman guard Manny Harris.

The 6-foot-5 Harris, a second-team All-Big Ten pick who scored a 26 points in a 64-61 loss to the Badgers at the Kohl Center on Jan. 22, was essentially rendered a non-factor due to the smothering defense of UW senior guard Michael Flowers.

With Flowers in hot pursuit, Harris — who was averaging 16.5 points per game and had scored in double figures in 28 of Michigan’s first 31 games — finished with a season-low four points on 1-for-12 shooting.

“(Flowers) was committed to coming in and not letting (Harris) score. That was his mentality,” UW junior forward Marcus Landry said. “He was really determined to shut him down today and play great defense.”

The Badgers’ offense, however, wasn’t exactly the model of efficiency.

UW, which received a team-high 12 points from Krabbenhoft and 11 points from Flowers, shot just 34 percent from the field for the game, including 26.9 percent in the second half.

But the Badgers were able to string together a series of baskets after Michigan’s Anthony Wright — the only Wolverine to record a field goal over the final 20 minutes — made a 3-pointer to trim the Badgers’ lead to 26-23 just 45 seconds into the second half.

Flowers followed with a 3-pointer of his own, and Landry provided the next six points, with emphatic slam dunks sandwiching a baseline jumper, to make it 35-23 with 14:33 to play.

“Marcus’ dunks ingnited the crowd and that was a turning point,” Flowers said. “We made sure they never got that close again.”

The Badgers (27-4) never led by less than nine points the rest of the way en route to their eighth straight victory and a date with Michigan State (25-7) in a semifinal today.

“A win is a win,” Hughes said. “It took us a while to click as a team today. ... But we just got it done, we ground it out, kept chopping the wood. That’s what we do.”