With Kobe King Gone, Badgers Roll On. Will He Find Happiness at Nebraska?
There are two sides to the Kobe King coin.
On one side, he heads out of Wisconsin. On the other, he high-tails it to Nebraska.
Could this be a win-win for two Big Ten basketball programs as well as a sensitive and talented young man?
Let’s take a look.
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HE DOESN’T WANT TO BE A BADGER
A few weeks ago, when I told you that a favorable schedule would help Wisconsin remain near the top of a very rugged Big Ten, I set aside a big concern.
Kobe King had just left the program. He was the Badgers’ second-leading scorer, at 10 points a game. And his 12.6-point scoring average in his nine Big Ten games still leads the team. He was a key player because he was a gifted scorer.
This was not a guy leaving because he didn’t like his role. This was a go-to guy indicting Greg Gard and his staff. (King is transferring to Nebraska. More on that below.) It was a very unusual rift. At the time, I wondered if it was a sign of more turmoil, if other players were unhappy. I wondered if the wheels might come off at a program that has only missed the NCAA tournament once since 1998. And has been a model of decorum virtually that whole time.
Here was a 6-4 sophomore with a bright future walking away. Would this impact Jonathan and Jordan Davis, the talented pair of twins from LaCrosse Central, King’s alma mater, who are joining the program in the fall? Were other current players also unhappy? Or was King just a kid who wasn’t connecting?
Then strength coach Erik Helland resigned after using a racial epithet in front of players. King wasn’t there and the word was used in an anecdote about Helland's NBA days, not in reference to anyone in the program.
But red flags seemed to be raised. And they didn’t have a W on them.
Fortunately, there has not been more to come. Apparently, the departures of King and Helland were unrelated. Rather than further signs of turmoil, the Badgers seem to have become an incredibly tight-knit group. Which is good for them.
Weakness in a league poised to send 10 teams to the NCAA tournament is not a good thing.
In short, the Badgers have moved along very nicely without King. Less was more.
In his final game, he went 0-for-5 in an ugly 70-51 loss at Purdue. Wisconsin then went to Iowa and got beat 68-62.
Before the next game, the news broke that King was leaving the program because he felt like ``a servant,’’ a really troubling and surprising observation about coach Greg Gard, who has been the opposite of controversial during his very good run as head coach. Succeeding Bo Ryan may not have been an easy thing. But Gard has made it look that way.
In their next game, their first with the King cloud hanging over them, Wisconsin, a rare 5½ point underdog at home, seemed to be in troubled waters. Instead, it rose up and surprised Michigan State 64-63, with four starters in double figures.
The Badgers have continued that team-oriented success. Since King left a 5-4 team, they have gone 7-2, including their last six in a row. Six different players have led the team in scoring since King left.
The Big Ten race remains very snug. Wisconsin (12-6) is in a three-way tie for second with Illinois and Michigan State. If Maryland (13-5) loses on Tuesday at Rutgers, which is 17-1 at home and ought to be desperate for a quality win, there could be a four-way tie atop the league, with four more teams only two games back.
A six-loss champion (or co-champions) would be a Big Ten record. No one has won the league with more than five losses. Yes, this is only the second season of the 20-game schedule. But still. . . that’s a lot of quality parity.
And now, after wondering how Wisconsin would do without Kobe King, I wonder how the Badgers would have done if Kobe King had stayed.
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HOIBERG BUILDING AT NEBRASKA
There’s so much focus on whether native son Scott Frost is going to revive Nebraska football. Wouldn’t it be strange if native son Fred Hoiberg brought success to Nebraska basketball before Frost got it done in football?
I’m not saying that’s going to happen. But the fact is, it’s easier to rebuild in basketball, where you only need a few good players, than football, which requires more good players, more reps, more weight-room time, more everything.
While Frost is beloved as a national-championship winning quarterback, Hoiberg’s Nebraska pedigree is a tad more under the radar. But it’s very real.
His grandfather, Jerry Bush, coached the Huskers from 1954 to 1963. His other grandfather was a longtime professor at Nebraska. His parents are Nebraska alums. Hoiberg was born in Lincoln before growing up in nearby Ames, Iowa, and becoming an Iowa State legend as a player and coach. Oh, and by the way, people in Lincoln are expecting great things. They gave him a seven-year, $25 million deal that made him the third highest-paid coach in the Big Ten, and put him 11th nationally.
It probably sounds crazy to say this now, when Nebraska is 2-16 and coming off a home loss to Northwestern, the Big Ten’s other 2-16 cellar dweller. But I expect Nebraska will get better next year. Leading scorer Haanif Cheatham is one of only two departing seniors on the young roster that Hoiberg slapped together after he was hired last spring.
The youngsters will get better under Hoiberg, who had a good coaching run at Iowa State before struggling in 3½ seasons with the NBA’s talent-challenged Chicago Bulls.
And he has brought in three promising players who could be immediate-impact guys. They seem high risk. But it will be interesting to see how this plays out.
Lat Mayen, is a 6-9 Australian who started his college career at TCU and moved on to Chipola College in Florida, where he’s averaging 11.8 points and 8.4 rebounds.
Teddy Allen is a 6-5 wing who lived at Boys Town for two years as a youngster. He played a season at West Virginia and made a brief stop at Wichita State before landing at Western Nebraska Community College, where he leads the nation in junior-college scoring (30.7 ppg).
And then there’s Kobe King. He still needs an NCAA waiver to be eligible to play next season. But he might fit right in.
That’s quite a group Hoiberg is bringing to Lincoln. They won't be wide-eyed kids. If Hoiberg has their ear, they sure seem battle-tested—on and off the court.
Once again, we are left to wonder about Kobe King. I still don’t understand why things became so unbearable at Wisconsin that he would leave at that moment.
But it has been addition by subtraction for the Badgers.
I hope Kobe King finds what he’s looking for with Fred Hoiberg in Lincoln. Wisconsin has moved on nicely. Maybe he will, too.