Hoosiers Blow 22-Point Lead, Lose for 19th Straight Time at Wisconsin
MADISON, Wis. — It's been 23 long years since Indiana has won a basketball game at Wisconsin. And despite holding a 22-point lead at one point, the clock is still ticking on that long losing streak at the Kohl Center after the Hoosiers lost to No. 22-ranked Wisconsin 64-59 on Wednesday night.
The losing streak, which started with coach Bob Knight and has rolled through Mike Davis and Kelvin Sampson and Tom Crean and Archie Miller, now sits on Mike Woodson's record as well. The Hoosiers haven't won here since Jan. 25, 1998.
Indiana's players were well aware of the long losing streak coming into the game, and had every intention of doing something about. For a team that has had a tendency to start slow, the Hoosiers, now 7-2 with both losses on the road were at their best here on Wednesday.
A 19-2 run midway through the first half gave the Hoosiers a big lead, and the margin reached 22 and one point at 42-20 with 1:17 to go. Wisconsin scratched back to cut the margin to 17 at halftime, and once Indiana's offense started to struggle in the second half, the lead fell apart quickly. The 42 points were the most Wisconsin had given up in a first half all season
Indiana was just 7-for-31 shooting in the second half (22.6 percent) and missed all five three-point attempts. They have 5-of-7 threes to start the first half.
"It wasn't like we were flat, we just couldn't make shots,'' Woodson said of their second-half struggles. "It felt like we were in quicksand the second half. But missed free throws coming down the home stretch really hurt us, and we couldn't get critical stops when we needed it at the end. This was definitely a winnable game, but you got to give Wisconsin a lot of credit. They kept playing hard right till the end.''
Indiana had a 12-point lead at 56-44 with 8:59 to go, but then everything quickly fell apart from there. The Hoosiers scored only three points the rest of the way.
Free throws were a huge issue. Rob Phinisee missed the free after his basket gave Indiana that 12-point lead. Trayce Jackson-Davis, who was held to a season-low nine points on the night, made 1-of-2 (6:21), Xavier Johnson missed two (4:19) and Johnson missed the front end of a one-and-one with 18 seconds left and the Hoosiers down by three.
Conversely, Wisconsin made 11-of-13 free throws in the second half, and their final nine in a row. That was clearly the difference in the game.
Race Thompson led the Hoosiers with 11 points and nine rebounds. Johnson had 10 points, seven rebounds and seven assists, but he was just 4-for-16 shooting from the field and 2-for-6 from the line.
"He's got to learn and figure out when he has it and when he doesn't,'' Woodson said of his starting point guard, a transfer from Pitt who also has three years of college basketball under his belt. "That's what good point guards do. He struggled tonight. We've got to keep working with him. We need good point guard play.''
Wisconsin coach Greg Gard said that defensive lapses led to the five early three-pointers from Indiana, but they did a better job of staying home on shooters in the second half. Johnson stayed in attack mode without open shooters, and it didn't pan out.
“I was getting downhill, that’s my game,'' Johnson said. "That's what I do. Just got to finish.''
Woodson said there's no panic after a loss like this, just frustration. It's too early in the season to make too much of it other than what it was — one loss in the first week of Big Ten play
"It's too early for that. We competed, and I told them we can win on the road,'' Woodson said. "For the most part, we controlled the game, but then we let it slip away. At the end of the day, we put ourselves in a position to win. I've just got to get them over the hump.
"Everybody's learning on the fly. Especially on the road, you've got to do everything right for 40 minutes. Look, we've been together 12 games since the Bahamas, and we're 10-2. We've got a long way to go and there is no quit in that locker room.''
The 19-game losing streak at Wisconsin is now tied for the longest in Indiana school history against one opponent. Indiana also lost 19 straight to Purdue from 1901. through 1922. The 22-point deficit that Wisconsin erased also set a Badgers' school record.
Indiana is back in action on Sunday with a nonconference home game against Merrimack at Noon ET. The Hoosiers play Merrimack, Notre Dame, Northern Kentucky and UNC Asheville the rest of the month before diving back into Big Ten play at Penn State on Jan. 2.
