Originally posted by C8TS:
Wisconsin's DE against top 10 offenses this year:
1.29...Duke (#3)
1.22...Arizona (#7)
1.20...Indiana (#8)
1.20...North Carolina (#10)
Overall, they have a 1.16 defensive efficiency. That is not good.
We should be able to score ... If we can play any type of defense, we should not only win, but cover the -5 spread.
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Indiana scored 32 points in the final 10 minutes of that game. That was after UW took a 32 point lead with 10:40 to go. UW held them to a much lower scoring clip when the game was actually a contest. I don't think UW is the first team in the country to take its foot off of the defensive pedal with the game completely out of reach. Of course, all of the buckets count, but I don't think Indiana scoring lots of points in the last few minutes of an already-decided game would give you a reflection of the type of defensive effort you're going to see from Wisconsin in this game.
Duke was unconscious, and UW didn't play particularly good defense that night. North Carolina, too, probably had its best game of the year, turning the ball over only 4 times (weird for UNC, but not weird against Wisconsin, who doesn't force many turnovers) and shooting an unusually good percentage from 3 (sub-30 percent 3-point shooter Justin Jackson made all 3 of his, and poor shooter Joel Berry knocked in 2 of his 3). I don't think the UW defense was particularly poor in that game. UNC just made an unusual number of contested jumpshots.
Arizona took advantage of UW some, and compiled those gaudy PPP numbers mostly at the line in the 2nd half (28-30 from the FT line). Not very typical for a Wisconsin team to allow that many free throws, but Arizona did a pretty good job forcing the issue.
With that said, the season-long numbers indicate that this is not one of Bo Ryan's best clubs defensively. Of course, it hasn't had to be because they've touted probably the best offense in the history of college basketball. I think the Duke game is probably the best example of UW's inadequacies, but one has to wonder whether Kentucky can make a gazillion shots like Duke did. With a PPP number like Duke had, you'd expect there to have been a lot of dunks and layups. That wasn't the case, weirdly.
Where this game will turn on that end of the court will be in whether Kentucky decides to play to its strength, which is feeding the post with Towns, or whether it decides to do what it sometimes does (in my view, inexplicably) playing away from Towns, and letting the Harrisons take lots of low-efficiency shots. UW has a way of baiting teams into long 2-pointers that look open, but aren't particularly good shots. UK has a propensity for taking these shots, even when it should be dumping the ball into its elite post players.
