NCAA Tournament: Hughes' heroics push Wisconsin past Florida State

After 44 minutes and 40 seconds of intense, high-pressure basketball produced by two tenacious teams, the Wisconsin Badgers finally separated themselves from the Florida State Seminoles, if only by a margin of one solitary basket. In the course of two possessions that had two distinctly different results, Bo Ryan's boys won more than a first-round NCAA Tournament game; the men of Madison earned a great deal of respect.
 
Trevon Hughes' old-fashioned 3-point play with two seconds left in overtime gave 12th-seeded Wisconsin a 61-59 win over No. 5 Florida State in an East Region first-round game in Boise, Idaho. The gutsy play completed a 20-second span in which the Badgers showed why they've been an NCAA Tournament mainstay over the past decade.
 
Yes, there were many significant plays that preceded the fantastic and frenzied finish. There was Jason Bohannon's 25-foot shot at the very end of the shot clock, which gave UW a 52-50 lead with just under one minute left in regulation time. There was the traveling call on Florida State guard Derwin Kitchen one play before the Bohannon bomb, as Kitchen forgot that a timeout cannot be called by a player jumping out of bounds. There were the threes hit by Seminole sensation Toney Douglas and the eight triples hit by Wisconsin after halftime.

All those plays, as big as they were for both ballclubs, faded away in the final 20 seconds of play. All you needed to know about the winner of this 12-5 tilt was revealed in two possessions and the short amount of time in which they unfolded.
 
With 20 seconds left and FSU leading, 59-58, Douglas--who had been able to get to the rim at times in the second half and overtime (but not at will, an important distinction)--could not power the ball to the basket. The Seminoles used a high ball screen, but the Badgers--disciplined as ever under Bo Ryan--made a strong switch and denied dribble penetration. With roughly 13 seconds left and the shot clock about to expire, Douglas had to hoist a step-back three, which hit the front rim and fell into the arms of the Badgers, who raced downcourt and called timeout with 8.3 seconds left.
 
One defensive stop down, one score left to go.

When Wisconsin encountered its final, fateful offensive possession, this tough and tested Big Ten team exhibited its blue-collar boldness. Whereas Toney Douglas couldn't get to the rim, Brooklyn native Trevon Hughes most certainly could. The Badger guard found a driving lane, made a sharp move around a Seminole defender, got to the middle of the lane roughly four feet from the goal, and--with his jersey being grabbed by a flat-footed FSU player who was late in providing help defense--flipped the ball off the window and in as the whistle blew, indicating a foul. Hughes nailed the free throw and when FSU struggled to get the ball upcourt off the inbounds pass, the NCAA Tournament had seen its third 12 seed knock off a 5. More importantly for Wisconsin, Bo Ryan defeated an opponent seeded higher than 9 for the first time in his NCAA Tournament career.
 
Their postseason credentials were doubted by many, as a 10-8 Big Ten record was derided by numerous pundits in other parts of the country. But when the time came to take on a supremely athletic set of Seminoles, the basketball Badgers defended and rebounded as though their lives were hanging in the balance. As a result, a season that witnessed a six-game losing streak is now a season that has punched a ticket to the round of 32. Wisconsin's reputation took some big hits in late January and early February, but as the month of March grows older, guess who's still in the thick of the fight?
 
A program just reaffirmed its greatness in an Idaho outpost. It wasn't quite the 2000 Final Four joyride or the 2005 journey to the Elite Eight, but make no mistake: This two-point win over Florida State represented one of Wisconsin's finest hours on the hardwood, in a decade already marked by a considerable amount of success.

> Find more Big Ten football news online at Big Ten Fans!