The 2000 team made the Final Four. The 2003 team made the Sweet 16. The 2005 team reached the Elite Eight. The 2011 team got as far as the Sweet 16. Those were all strong statements and significant accomplishments, but you can easily see that Wisconsin basketball, even as it built a strong fortress of consistency and quality, didn’t collect a particular achievement which truly marks a program as a next-level force in college basketball: It had not reached the Sweet 16 in consecutive seasons.
When a program — any program in any sport — tries to climb the mountain to elite status and attain the identity of a top-tier force, it has to produce consecutive great seasons. Great programs, in any sport, establish their greatness by showing they can be great annually, not just occasionally. They shed the “every now and then we’re great” label, and they prove they can be great as a matter of course.
Wisconsin became a next-level basketball program in the first half of the previous decade, and one of the important forward-moving moments in that evolution was the Badgers’ ability to finally make the Sweet 16 in consecutive seasons.
Wisconsin beat Kansas State in 2011 to make the Sweet 16. The Badgers then entered the 2012 NCAA Tournament and handled Montana in round one. They had to beat the Vanderbilt Commodores in round two to make their back-to-back Sweet 16 goal a reality.
The plain facts stated that Wisconsin was the higher-seeded team, No. 4 compared to Vanderbilt’s No. 5 seed. Yet, in terms of raw talent, Vanderbilt had the edge. Future NBA player John Jenkins and international player Jeffery Taylor had more raw skill and athleticism than any other Wisconsin player. Vanderbilt had also beaten future national champion Kentucky in the SEC Tournament championship game one week earlier.
Wisconsin had to rely on its cohesiveness, its discipline, and its work ethic… and that signature collection of UW characteristics saw the Badgers through in Albuquerque.
Jenkins entered this game averaging 20 points per game. Wisconsin held him to 13. Taylor entered the game averaging 16 points per game. Wisconsin held him to nine.
So much like Wisconsin’s upset of top-seeded Arizona in the second round of the 2000 NCAA Tournament — a 66-59 win — UW held this explosive and powerful Vanderbilt offense under 60 points as well. A 60-57 win carried Wisconsin across the threshold. Finally, in consecutive seasons, Wisconsin reached the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament.
The Badgers set up their greatest moments of Final Four glory, which would come a few years later.