Last Remaining Undefeated Team Falls: Wisconsin Upends Ohio State's Hopes For Perfect Season

(Reuters photo: Wisconsin's Jordan Taylor [Left] and Jon Leuer [Right] celebrate their win over No. 1 Ohio State).



No. 1 ranked Ohio State was undefeated when they entered the Kohl Center in Madison, WI, for their Saturday afternoon game against No. 13 Wisconsin. But the Buckeyes exited the Kohl Center with their hopes of an undefeated season dashed after they were upset by Wisconsin 71-67. Wisconsin junior point guard Jordan Taylor scored 21 of his 27 points and dished out 4 assists in the final 13 minutes of the game, as he and the Badgers overcome a 15 point Ohio State lead en route to victory.

Ohio State will drop from No. 1 when the new AP Top 25 is released on Monday. Current No. 2 Kansas will, undoubtedly, overtake the No. 1 position. But Ohio State will be just fine. No one really expected them to finish the season with an undefeated record. As Drive and Dish opined when the previously undefeated and No. 1 ranked Duke Blue Devils lost their first game of the season in January, nobody goes undefeated in college basketball today. Bob Knight's 1976 Indiana Hoosiers delivered the last undefeated season in men's college basketball. In the ensuing 35 years, nobody else has finished the season with an unblemished record. And it's extremely unlikely that anybody will do so anytime soon, if ever.

The loss will have no bearing on Ohio State's prospects for earning a trip to the 2011 Final Four and a shot at the 2011 National Championship. They still must be considered legitimate contenders for both honors. However, it bears mention that teams which rely heavily on freshmen rarely win Championships--especially teams that start a freshman at point guard. And despite the leadership of talented upperclassmen David Lighty, William Buford and Jon Diebler, coach Thad Matta's Buckeyes are led freshman superstar center Jared Sullinger and start freshman Aaron Craft at point guard.

Drive and Dish considers the 2011 Ohio State Buckeyes to be the most talented, best balanced team in college basketball. But they face an uphill battle in their quest to reach the Final Four, if for no other reason than their heavy reliance on freshmen at the key positions of center and point guard. Jared Sullinger might be the best player in the college game, but he's still a freshman (despite the fact that he doesn't play like one). At some point in the NCAA Tournament, his inexperience--as well as the inexperience of freshman point guard Craft--is likely to catch up with the Buckeyes.

So who do we expect to win the 2011 National Championship? It's still too early to answer that question, or to even identify a short-list of likely teams. It's been one of those rare seasons in college basketball in which no team has distinguished itself as a favorite. Defending National Champion Duke still probably has to be considered the team to beat, despite the fact that the Blue Devils have lost several key players from their 2010 Championship team. But there's lots of room for an upstart to take the college basketball world by storm. Can Ohio State be that team? Possibly, but Buckeye fans shouldn't hold their collective breath waiting for that to happen. No freshman has taken his team to an NCAA men's basketball title since Carmello Anthony directed Syracuse to the 2003 Championship. And Anthony was a noteworthy exception to an otherwise near-ironclad rule: prior to 2003, Louisville's Purvis Ellison had been the last freshman to lead his team to a National Championship (1986). Michael Jordan famously hit the game-winning shot as a freshman for North Carolina in the 1982 National Championship game, but the young Jordan was far from the leader of his team--upperclassmen James Worthy, Sam Perkins and Matt Daugherty led the '82 Tar Heels.

Ohio State is very talented and should be considered extremely dangerous with regard to their potential for making a run deep into the NCAA Tournament. But the odds are still against them cutting down the nets in April.

Pictures From Midnight Madness

By Trashtalk Superstar

Sports Illustrated has pictures from several schools' Midnight Madness exhibitions. As much as Midnight Madness has become a big deal on campuses across America, there's still nobody who does it better than Kentucky.

Edit:

Someone should have prevented Wisconsin coach Bo Ryan from embarrassing himself by doing the superman dance on camera. Once the white people start doing a dance, it's officially over.


Updated (10/19/07):

Bo Ryan is a great basketball coach. Wisconsin never gets the big time recruits and their style of play isn't exactly ballet on the hardwood, but Bo Ryan's teams consistently win. Drive and Dish's editorial staff has nothing but respect for Bo Ryan's coaching abilities. But Bo looks like a damn fool in that video.

Bo Ryan is a coach's coach. He spent much of his long career in total obscurity. First he was a high school coach. Then he went on to coach small college basketball at Wisconsin/Platteville, where his teams won several NCAA Division III national championships. He's paid his dues like few in his profession have. With his career accomplishments, and with the level of success he's brought to Wisconsin basketball, Bo Ryan commands respect.

That's why Bo Ryan should never have done that Soulja Boy superman dance. First, the song is terrible and represents everything that's wrong with the current state of commercial hip hop (and on a broader level, with the current state of the music industry in general). That song and its corresponding dance are the hot thing right now, but weren't hot six months ago and won't be hot six months from now. Hell, it probably won't even be hot two months from now because - as we noted above - once the white folks catch on to something, its days are numbered.

Bo Ryan is a man of stature who holds a position of authority. He's experienced. He's distinguished. He's the don of Wisconsin basketball. He should act the part. But he sure as hell shouldn't try to act young and cool. He's neither. And by attempting to latch on to the latest hot dance moves, Bo Ryan looks insecure, needy and desperate for approval.

Bo Ryan's best play is to project his authority. That's what big time college coaches do. After all, as far as all things UW basketball go, Bo Ryan is the man. Players and students should have to earn his approval. Not the other way around.