M. Hoops struggles in Wisconsin

MADISON, Wis. -- Wisconsin coach Bo Ryan knew how good the Penn men's basketball team could be when firing on all cylinders, and he didn't want that Quakers team to show up at the Kohl Center Saturday night.

After watching game footage from Penn's 67-52 win at Princeton last season, the Chester, Pa., native stressed to his No. 21 Badgers that they had to stop the Quakers' timing.

"When they're running their stuff, it's as pretty as you could possibly want to see, and we didn't want to see it," Ryan said. "We saw some more film on them after we had played them earlier in the year last year. At Princeton, they had them down by 30. Just their timing, and how they played off it, if you let them get into that, they can play against anybody. Thursday night and tonight, that timing just wasn't there."

Wisconsin was able to throw Penn out of sync in front of an announced sellout crowd of 17,142, as the Badgers rolled to a 77-44 opening-game victory. This was the team's 29th straight win at the Kohl Center.

For the first 10 minutes of the game, the Quakers (1-2) held their own against their Big Ten counterparts.

Sophomore guard Ibby Jaaber hit a three seven minutes into the game to tie the score at eight, and with eight minutes remaining in the first half, Penn was still within one possession of Wisconsin, trailing 14-11.

At the first media timeout, the crowd -- including the large "Grateful Red" student section -- was quiet, worried about their team's chances.

The Quakers were able to stay close due in large part to their ability to break their opponents' full court press, a defense the Badgers presented for the majority of the game. Penn was able to push the ball up the court and create shots.

"I think we got a lot of pretty good looks off our transition because they were pressing us," Penn coach Fran Dunphy said. "If we've got odds -- 3-on-2, 2-on-1 -- we'd like to push the ball up and try to score it. I thought we did take some pretty good chances of just spotting up, making threes. At that point, we didn't knock them down, which would have helped us a great deal."

Indeed, for the second straight game, the Quakers struggled shooting the ball.

After shooting just 32.3 percent from the field Thursday night at Providence, the team shot an almost as dismal 31.9 percent Saturday night.

The Red and Blue also struggled from the free-throw line, shooting just 52 percent (9-for-17).

Wisconsin would pull away toward the end of the first half, outscoring Penn 22-9 in the final eight minutes.

The second half started with Penn missing its first seven field-goal attempts, including a wide open breakaway layup by Jaaber.

The Elizabeth, N.J., native struggled all night long, shooting just 1-for-10 on the night from the field and 0-for-2 from the free-throw line.

Dunphy was quick to praise his struggling sophomore's defense against the Badgers.

"He gets his hands on a lot of basketballs," he said.

As Wisconsin started heating up in the second half, in which the Badgers shot 57.1 percent from the field and 80 percent from downtown, so did All-Big Ten senior forward Mike Wilkinson.

After the Quakers held him to just two points in the first half, Wilkinson finished the game with 19 points and 11 rebounds.

In a three-minute stretch in the middle of the second half, Wilkinson scored 12 points, including two three-pointers.

"The one three, that was ridiculous," Dunphy said. "We were right in his face. There was no way the ball could go into the basket, and it did."

Wilkinson credited the tough Penn interior defense as the reason for his sluggish start.

"Penn's a good team. They do a lot of good things," he said. "They make it tough to make cuts. That's a reason we love playing teams like that. They really make you work for everything you get."

Dunphy was also pleased with his team's defense.

"I thought we guarded better than we did the other night, obviously," he said. "And, of course, we probably can't guard any worse than we did the other night."

This marks the second straight year that Penn has fallen to Wisconsin, as the Badgers defeated the Quakers, 64-53, last season at the Palestra.

Despite the Quakers losing three starters to graduation, Ryan sees this year's Penn squad as very similar to last season's.

"The circumstances are different," Ryan said. "They've had a tough run, when you play in the Preseason NIT and travel the way they have.

"But I still see [Penn] trying to do the same things ... From the time I was a kid watching them play, it just seems timing and the way they play together [and] off each other [is] going to come a little bit better" as the season progresses.

NOTES: With the win, Wisconsin improves to 6-0 all-time against Penn.

After wearing last season's jerseys Thursday night at Providence, the Quakers unveiled their new away uniforms Saturday night. They are navy with a red and white stripe down the side.

The was the first time since last year's 49-47 win over Manhattan that Penn was held under 50 points on the road.

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