Wisconsin Badgers Take Down Dayton Flyers in Battle 4 Atlantis Quarterfinals

The Wisconsin Badgers (4-0) find a way to take down the Dayton Flyers (3-2), 43-42, from inside Imperial Arena at Atlantis Resort in Nassau, Bahamas in the Battle 4 Atlantis quarterfinals.

Dayton will likely be a NCAA Tournament team and Wisconsin’s “Big 3” (Wahl, Hepburn, Crowl) went a combined 5-for-29 from the field. So this is a massive win for the Badgers. This game will look nice on the NCAA Tournament resume.

A lot of people that don’t know what they’re talking about will look at the box score and think it was a boring game because all they want to see is offense and no defense. This was a hell of a game and both defenses played outstanding.

Gritty beats pretty every damn time. Max Klesmit had a big time rejection in crunch time with 2 seconds left.

Connor Essegian led UW with 13 points off the bench. Steven Crowl finished with nine points, seven rebounds and four assists.

Buy stock in Connor Essegian now.

Tyler Wahl finished with just three points on 1-of-8 from the field, but down the stretch he made some tough nosed plays that you don’t see in the box score that helped the Badgers.

Wisconsin leading 43-42 with 31.4 seconds left, and Dayton with possession, needed to turn to their calling card as a program for the last 20-plus years, defense. The Badgers played phenomenal defense with the game on the line. After two Dayton timeouts and a Max Klesmit rejection, UW forced a shot clock violation.

Greg Gard postgame said: “We knew it was going to be a battle. Proud of our guys for just continuing to find a way.”

Wisconsin is now 2-0 all-time against Dayton. The previous meeting was all the way back in 1961.

Up Next:

The Badgers will play the No. 3 Kansas Jayhawks (5-0) tomorrow, November 24th in the Battle 4 Atlantis semifinals. Tipoff is scheduled for 10:00 a.m. (Central Time) and will be nationally televised on ESPN.

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