The Demetri McCamey Game

I'm not sure what I just witnessed.

Wait, yes I do. That was a beat down. And the result was No. 11 Wisconsin's first loss to a unranked Big Ten team at home under Bo Ryan.

Wisconsin was cruising in the early going, but could not stop Demetri McCamey at any point in this game. Illinois embarrassed Wisconsin with the pick-and-roll. I did not see any real adjustment at halftime, which means the Badgers let the Illini stars beat them instead of forcing some of the unproven Illinois players to make plays.

Meanwhile, Wisconsin struggled mightily to finish any plays at the rim. Ever since Jon Leuer went down and Wisconsin put on it's "perimeter-oriented team" pants, you knew this game was coming. Wisconsin scored just one (!) meaningful basket in the final 9:56 of the contest. The Badgers settled for 30 attempts from 3-point land. [box score]

McCamey scored 27 points on 11-of-17 shooting while handing out 7 assists. He set up Mike Tisdale time after time, allowing the 7'1" center to have a remarkable shooting game of his own (8-of-11, 19 points). In fact, Tisdale's early buckets were about the only thing keeping Illinois from getting blown out in the first half. Wisconsin went into the break up, 35-33, on a Trevon Hughes 3-pointer.

Both Hughes and Jordan Taylor left their best defense in the locker room tonight. But their job was made nearly impossible because they could not trust their interior help defense to stop McCamey. McCamey caught fire hitting shots over the Badger guards and then simply toyed with Keaton Nankivil when there was a switch on the pick. When he's on, McCamey can drive or stop and pop; he kept Wisconsin off guard all night.

It was probably one of the most frustrating games of Hughes' career. His body language was awful and he couldn't get anything going. Pop shot a horrendous 22% (4-of-18) from the field. He led the Badgers into panic mode late with an increasingly poor shot selection once Illinois took command. He's got to learn from this game and get back into early-season form.

Jason Bohannon led Wisconsin with 15 points. His shot looked great. But no one else was effective. I am shocked that Rob Wilson did not play more in the second half. Among significant contributors, the team's offensive efficiency was the highest (1.07 PPP) when Wilson was on the court. (ed. note: Ryan Evans and Jared Berggren posted nice efficiency numbers over a small sample size)

Some interesting touch fouls at times during the game, yet none of the typical calls you expect around the basket. Wisconsin was visibly frustrated by this. But UW got most of the favorable calls anyway, so I'm not complaining.

Instead of rising to second place in the Big Ten, Wisconsin (18-6, 8-4) drops to fifth for now. Illinois (17-8, 9-3) takes one more step closer to Michigan State.