Everything that goes up must eventually come down. There is somewhat of a certain beauty when the big teams go down. It’s not just the disappointment of seeing a brilliant team lose its perfect season, or the fight of the underdog to play against the odds and pull off an impressive win. Yes, there is some sort beauty behind the fall of the perfect; perhaps it is something like the upside of failure.
And the Wisconsin Badgers now all about it. The crowd couldn’t resist much longer and stormed in the court as the home team was working its way up to defeat a No.1 ranked team for the first time since 1962. The Badgers put on one heck of a comeback on the second half to close on a 15-point margin to defeat the Ohio State Buckeyes by 71-67.
Playing the underdog is somewhat of an act of sheer faith. Yes, sometimes the spread is so significantly unbalanced that going for the little team is exciting and worth taking your chances. And yet there is a whole other approach when it comes to wagering on sports such as the College Hoops: playing against the team that is breaking all the records.
The Ohio State Buckeyes had had one phenomenal season this year, brining in not only the schools second best ever season starting winning streak. At 24-0 the Buckeyes had only one better record from the season kickoff and it came in 1960-61 when Ohio State went on for a 27-0 start. But then it all went south.
The man of the hour was no other then Jordan Taylor who in 13 minutes was capable of leading the Badgers into an impressive come from behind win over the best team in the Nation. Taylor scored 21 of his 27 points in the second half, working Wisconsin to keep the NCAA Division I basketball championship from having a perfect team since Indiana had its flawless season back in the 1975-76 season.
Taylor was the spark that started the 15-0 fire from the Badgers completing 8 straight points, including back to back three’s that really gave Wisconsin that special boost to build up enough momentum to hold back the Buckeyes desperate attempt for a comeback.
For those of you fond of stats and records, the Wisconsin Badgers have joined Florida as the only team to defeat the same No.1 team in the Nation on both NCAA football and NCAA basketball during the same academic year. As a matter of fact this is the first time that a NCAA team has defeated the No. 1 team in both football and basketball during the same season.
The Badgers have been a good team this season. Even though the squads numbers aren’t as impressive as most fans would like, at 19-5 overall and 9-3 in Big Ten conference play, the Badgers have been quite outstanding when playing at home. One must take into consideration that this is the Badgers 17th straight win at home. Wisconsin was sharp from the three point line, hitting 12 of 24 3 to really guide the team into the upset. But by the halftime break it sure didn’t look like the Badgers would be close after such a big deficit.
Taylor worked the Badgers momentum hitting a floater and two deep 3-pointers, then Wisconsin went on another 10-0 run at the end of the game to hold on to their advantage
No comments:
Post a Comment