Max Siker / UW Athletics
Badger Bronson Koenig: Never-say-die hero, inspiration.
Bronson Koenig wasn’t talking directly to me last Sunday night on national TV. But I took the University of Wisconsin junior’s comments to CBS Sports reporter Dana Jacobson personally after the Badgers’ unexpected, unlikely and unbelievable 66-63 last-second victory over Xavier.
“Our goal is to always win a national championship, and we always believed in ourselves,” Koenig said, minutes after nailing a three-point buzzer-beater to send the No. 2-seeded Musketeers back to Ohio in the second round of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament. “The difference was, the media didn’t really believe in us. So, hopefully, you guys believe now.”
Guilty as charged, and faith restored.
The Badgers have won 13 of their last 16 games — including an ugly, low-scoring grinder against Pitt in last Friday’s first-round game — and are the only team in NCAA history to advance to the Sweet 16 five times in six seasons.
The Badgers, a No. 7 seed in the East Regional, will play No. 6 Notre Dame at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia on March 25 at 6:27 p.m. on TBS. The winner advances to the Elite Eight on Sunday against either top-ranked North Carolina or No. 5 and Big Ten rival Indiana.
There hasn’t been this much Sunday night excitement for Wisconsin sports fans since the NFL season. And it’s arguable whether the Green Bay Packers have ever pulled off a play as stunning and significant as the one in which Ethan Happ, with the score tied at 63, threw an inbound pass to Koenig, who dribbled once into the deep right corner and let the ball fly directly in front of the Badgers bench.
A little more than two months ago, UW was 9-9 and headed nowhere fast. But then-interim head coach Greg Gard made some adjustments in the wake of Bo Ryan’s sudden retirement, and less than two weeks after Wisconsin athletic director Barry Alvarez introduced Gard as Ryan’s official replacement, the Badgers find themselves in the position to make a third straight Final Four run.
Is it too soon to broach that possibility? Consider this: The Badgers rebounded from the Pitt game — in which UW played sluggishly, shot only 32% and scored just 16 points in the first 20 minutes — with a performance against Xavier that will go down as one of the all-time greatest. This team’s never-say-die spirit, on display all season long, is peaking at the perfect time.
