They are Big, Strong and Crafty

The Badgers are apparently. Those are the words the Penn State coach used to describe our team. So in case you've tuned out on these Basketball Badgers, remember our size, might and industry. I actually loved that line.

I loved it almost as much as I loved the color commentator from Sunday's broadcast. In his pregame remarks he called Bohannon one of the hottest players in the BigTen who is really having a solid year. I watched the game with two others we were all like Okaaaay. We weren't in the mood to argue, but really? Anyway we laughed off that he was really pumping up Bohannon. But the thing is, he did this the ENTIRE game. He lauded our methodical and efficient offense. He said that we were "almost unpressable". He gushed over Wisconsin White Monkey and his arms. He said Landry had a polished inside-outside game. Midway through the 3rd quarter my living room had given up simply noticing the flattery, and had joined in and began to try to top the remarks. He topped it off at the end when the announcer said, Kbot is an 88% FT shooter. 30 seconds later the color guy says ...and Kbot is a 90% shooter. It took him 30 seconds to upgrade Kbot! I need more of this guy. 

Speaking of JBo, how bout that Illinois game. He was hot. He was so hot that when he got on a breakaway, he tried to sky jam it! My team of Badger watchers can not believe that despite our team being the most tentative offensive team we have seen in years, somehow when we get ahead we act like crazy maniacs and drive the ball recklessly to the basket. We lost to Minnesota and cascaded our season partly because we didn't just continue to run the swing at the endgame. We've lost several close games because we didn't maintain our poise. Don't get me wrong, in general I always want our players to dunk the ball. I hate when we don't dunk it. But on a 6 game losing streak I was terrified when JBo went up and missed that dunk. I was thinking "Oh no! He jinxed himself and the team trying that! Why didn't he lay it in! We need the lead! Did he lower and straighten his off-arm and lean into the basket to thunder jam it?! That should have been awesome, but what was he thinking!' Thankfully we won and I will look on JBo's attempt to lean-to straight-arm sky jam favorably.

This Badger team is so offensively tentative it hurts. It is glaringly apparent how much we miss multiple post threats in our offense. We have become accustomed to swinging the ball around and getting the ball in the post to somebody who was effective. We've had Wilkinson and Tucker and Butch and Steimsma and others. Now we just have Landry, and he is not automatic. So we pass it around and pass it around, looking for an advantage down low that isn't there. That's why I think we need to adapt by mandating that JBo shoot it every time he gets it. Just fire it up. He should have atleast six 3PT attempts per game. Just fire away. 

Let's get some more wins.