Illinois stuns No. 11 Wisconsin at home
February 9, 2010
MADISON, Wis. (AP)—Demetri McCamey scored 27 points and Mike Tisdale added 19on 8-of-11 shooting to lead Illinois to a 63-56 upset over No. 11 Wisconsin onTuesday night, snapping the Badgers’ 51-0 home record against unranked Big Tenopponents under coach Bo Ryan.
The Illini (17-8, 9-3) became the first team to beat Ryan three times at theKohl Center after wins in 2005 and ’06 and ended Wisconsin’s 18-game homewinning streak. More important, Illinois won its fifth straight game after a78-73 win over then-No. 5 Michigan State on Saturday that featured fans rushingthe court.
This one may have been better, because the Illini are now in prime positionto challenge the Spartans for the regular-season conference crown. The scheduleisn’t easy for Illinois, which plays four more ranked teams in its final sixgames, including two games with No. 13 Ohio State and a rematch with the Badgersin the regular-season finale.
It was a shock for Wisconsin (18-6, 8-4), which got 15 points from JasonBohannon, including 13 in the second half, and 12 from Trevon Hughes.
The Badgers built a 22-11 lead while only Tisdale could find the basket,hitting every field goal for the Illini until just over 6 minutes to play in thefirst half.
That’s when McCamey took over.
McCamey, the Big Ten player of the week for his performances against Iowaand the Spartans, scored 15 of Illinois’ final 20 points of the half and theIllini hit 10 consecutive shots straddling halftime to erase the double-digitdeficit.
With 5:16 left, Wisconsin’s Jordan Taylor fell to the ground, but managed apass to Bohannon for a 3 that tied it at 53-all. But D.J. Richardson and McCameyanswered with jumpers to push the lead to 57-53, and Wisconsin went cold, goingscoreless for 5 minutes.
The Badgers missed nine consecutive shots down the stretch, including alayup by Taylor with just over 2 minutes to play and 3s by Keaton Nankivil,Taylor and Bohannon.
McCamey hit one free throw with 58 seconds left and Richardson hit two more16 seconds later to seal it.
With a winter storm making life miserable in southeastern Wisconsin, therewere several open seats throughout the Kohl Center and the top of the studentsection was sparse.
Wisconsin went up 22-11 on a four-point play by Hughes and early only the7-foot-1 Tisdale hit six of his first seven shots.
His teammates, meanwhile, missed 10 straight shots until McCamey’s layupwith just over 6 minutes left until halftime.
But the Illini hit eight straight shots to end the half, 10 in a row and 17out of 21.
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