“Can you win in the mud?”
If you haven’t seen or heard that question before, it refers to the ability to win an ugly, low-scoring, slow-paced grinder, a game in which baskets are hard to come by and frustration mounts.
The Wisconsin Badgers have won a lot of games in the mud this century. They won a number of games in the mud earlier this season, particularly the wins at Ohio State and Penn State in early January. Wisconsin has risen as a college basketball program because of its ability to reliably win a 60-56 kind of game… the game it won over the Indiana Hoosiers on Saturday in Assembly Hall.
The great thing about this particular “mud victory” is not only that it delivered a Big Ten championship to Madison, but that Wisconsin remembered it could still win this way.
Keep in mind that the past month was filled with high-level offensive performances from the Badgers. They kept scoring 69 or more points in a series of wins over Nebraska and Purdue and Rutgers and Michigan and Minnesota. Wisconsin’s offense dramatically improved in February, and while the Badgers didn’t perform that well on offense against Northwestern last Wednesday, that was Northwestern, a game in which UW did not have to play very well to win.
This contest against Indiana in Bloomington would give Wisconsin a clear chance to measure where it stood. If this game became difficult, could the Badgers dig out of trouble?
Yes they could.
They didn’t solve Indiana quickly. They didn’t figure out the Hoosiers at the offensive end of the floor. They did it with defense. Wisconsin held Indiana scoreless for nearly six full minutes down the stretch. Trailing 51-44 with 6:52 remaining, the Badgers gained a 56-51 lead with one minute left before Indiana finally scored with 55 seconds to go. That 5:57 scoreless nightmare for Indiana was Wisconsin’s dream scenario. The Badgers rolled up their sleeves, reached into the mud pit, and dug out an ugly win after weeks of aesthetically beautiful basketball.
I couldn’t imagine a better turn of events for a team which enters single-elimination tournament competition knowing it can win ugly, not just pretty. That’s what a balanced team looks like.