Wisconsin Preparing For Indiana's Inside Duo of Reneau, Ware Entering Rematch

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – Indiana and Wisconsin met in Madison on Jan. 19, and the Badgers put up their second-highest scoring game of the season in a 91-79 win.

Indiana coach Mike Woodson said Wisconsin coach Greg Gard told him after the game that Bob Knight would have been disappointed in both of their team's defensive efforts. Max Klesmit torched the Hoosiers for 26 points on 5-for-7 3-point shooting to lead a Wisconsin offense that shot 56.9% from the field, its second-highest rate of the season.

While Indiana offered little defensive resistance, 79 points represent its highest point total in Big Ten play this season. Malik Reneau led the way with 28 points, and the Hoosiers shot 53.8% from the field, also their best in Big Ten play.

Looking ahead to Tuesday's 7 p.m. ET rematch at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall, defense is the clear focus for both sides.

"Defensively, we got come with it on Tuesday in order to beat them, because they're a good offensive team. They play inside out," Woodson said. "We got to find some kind of defensive presence. That's what we've been working on a little bit, and see if that can keep us in the game until we can start making our threes and free throws."

A notable factor in Tuesday's rematch is the health of Indiana center Kel'el Ware, who didn't play in the first matchup on Jan. 19 due to an ankle injury. He missed the following game at Illinois, too, but he has played every game since. At 7-foot, Ware is second on the team at 15.1 points per game, and he leads the team with 9.4 rebounds and 1.7 blocks per game.

Ware is the anchor of Indiana's defense, consistently deterring shots at the rim. Like the previous matchup against Wisconsin, and when he had foul trouble Saturday at Penn State, it's obvious Indiana's defense takes a step back when he's on the bench.

Wisconsin forward Tyler Wahl said they didn't know Ware was going to be out until just before tipoff of the first game, so they had to adjust their game plan. Without Ware's interior defense, Wisconsin shot 69.2% on 2-point attempts that night.

Wahl has played against Ware once before, when the Badgers won 61-58 at Oregon in the 2023 NIT last season. Wahl scored just five points on 1-for-9 shooting, but he added seven rebounds and six assists in 27 minutes. Ware played 15 minutes off the bench, scoring two points on 1-for-6 shooting with six rebounds and two blocks.

"He's a presence at the rim," Wahl said of Ware. "He can get off the ground quick. He can block shots. He's a lob presence on the pick and roll, so we've got to make sure that we're not giving him clear runs to the rim. Then when we're inside, just doing the usual when we're going against a big, bouncy guy like that where we've got to pump fake, got to pass it out if he crashes and just make the right play."

Ware is not the only inside presence Wisconsin has to worry about. Wahl said Wisconsin is going to put a heavy emphasis on keeping the ball out of the hands of Ware and Malik Reneau and make sure they play good team defense if they get the ball. Reneau leads the Hoosiers at 16.1 points per game and scored the second-most points of his sophomore season in the first game against Wisconsin.

During its current four-game losing streak, Indiana has struggled mightily from the 3-point line and with free throws. The Hoosiers have shot just 16-for-70, or 22.9%, on 3-point attempts, and 49-for-85, or 57.6%, at the line.

Though Indiana's offense has fallen off since its trip to Madison, Wisconsin point guard Chucky Hepburn is eager to have a better defensive performance this time around.

"I wasn't too happy with the performance defensively. We gave up 79 points, that's kind of uncharacteristic of us, so we've got to do better than that," Hepburn said. "So we know [Malik] Reneau and [Kel'el] Ware play really well together. They're really good players, they're really high-level players, so we've got to be able to stop those two."

Wisconsin was on a roll when it first played Indiana, going 7-1 in January. The Badgers peaked at No. 6 in the AP top-25 poll, but they've gone just 2-5 in February and fallen out of the rankings.

Wisconsin, has had a week-long break since its 74-70 home win over Maryland on Feb. 20. Hepburn and Wahl agreed the break was good for the team to rest and recover before traveling to Indiana.

The Badgers are favored by 4.5 points, and the over/under is set at 143.5 points, according to the SI Sportsbook. While Assembly Hall has historically been known to provide one of the best home court advantages in college basketball, Indiana is just 10-5 at home this season with three consecutive home losses.

For Hepburn, Wisconsin has to do a better job of fighting through adversity Tuesday at Indiana.

"When things go downhill, we just don't know how to respond to that," Hepburn said. "So that's something we're going to have to be able to do, especially going down to Indiana because it gets loud in that place and we're going to have to fight through adversity for sure."

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