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Wisconsin Badgers Women’s Basketball Gets Run Out of the Gym by No. 2 Iowa

The Wisconsin Badgers women’s basketball team suffered a blowout loss to the No. 2 ranked Iowa Hawkeyes on Tuesday.

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6 months ago

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Wisconsin Badgers women's basketball head coach Marisa Mosely
Wisconsin women’s head basketball coach Marisa Mosely is shown during the second half of their game Sunday, December 10, 2023 at the Kohl Center in Madison, Wisconsin. Iowa beat Wisconsin 87-65.

In what was technically two teams playing the same sport, the Wisconsin Badgers women’s basketball team got run out of the gym by the Iowa Hawkeyes on Tuesday night. There weren’t a ton of positives for UW but, nevertheless, we persist. Here is the full recap:

Wisconsin Badgers Women’s Basketball Suffers Blowout Loss to No. 2 Iowa

Final Score

Wisconsin Badgers (8-9 overall, 1-6 Big Ten): 50

No. 2 Iowa Hawkeyes (18-1 overall, 7-0 Big Ten): 96

Four Factors

eFG%: 35.2

Turnover%: 37.8

Off. Rebound%: 31.6

FTA/FGA: 24.1

Key Stats

FG%: 31.5 (17-of-54)
Opp. FG%: 47.5 (29-of-61)
3P%: 20.0 (4-of-20)
Opp. 3P%: 40.5 (15-of-37)
FT%: 92.3 (12-of-13)
Opp. FT%: 88.5 (23-of-26)
Points Per Possession: 0.676
Opponent Points Per Possession: 1.315
Rebounds: 35 (12 offensive)
Opponent Rebounds: 37 (11 offensive)
Turnovers: 28
Forced Turnovers: 14


Team Leaders

  • Ronnie Porter: nine points (2-of-6 FG, 2-of-3 3P), three rebounds, -15
  • Serah Williams: 19 points (8-of-15 FG), 14 rebounds (four offensive), two assists, three blocks, -22
  • Sania Copeland: eight points (3-of-8 FG, 2-of-7 3P), three rebounds, five steals, -33
  • Brooke Schramek: six points (2-of-6 FG, 0-of-2 3P), two rebounds (two offensive), three assists, one steal, -26

Iowa Team Leaders

  • Caitlin Clark: 32 points (8-of-18 FG, 6-of-14 3P, 10-of-10 FT), seven rebounds, five assists, one block, four steals, +36
  • Kate Martin: 16 points (5-of-8 FG, 4-of-7 3P), five rebounds (one offensive), four assists, three steals, +31

Three-ish Thoughts on the Wisconsin Badgers Women’s Basketball Loss to Iowa

1. Serah Williams had a mixed bag of a game on Tuesday night. With Iowa big Hannah Stuelke missing the game, I thought Williams controlled the boards well and I also thought she had Iowa’s backup bigs in hell for much of the game. She was drawing fouls, blocking shots, and overall being a menace in the post.


However, there were also some negatives. Williams sometimes struggles to dribble in the post when making a move toward the basket and her hands might not be as good as I thought. Watch the highlight linked above: she makes a nice recovery, but bobbles the ball on a decent feed from Brooke Schramek. She just turns the ball over way too much for a post player. Recently a lot of those issues were exacerbated by poor entry passes, but I thought they looked much better against Iowa.

Another area where she looked awesome and also terrible was in passing out of double teams. Opposing defenses know that she is option one on offense for the Badgers and they treat her as such. Iowa actually switched to a zone during the game which allowed them to have multiple players collapse on Williams and dare Wisconsin’s shooters to burn them (they did not). Williams makes the correct read on passing out of the double most of the time but even when she does she sometimes still just throws a bad pass.


In this highlight she senses the double team coming and before Molly Davis can get there, Williams whips it over her head to a wide open Ronnie Porter for three. That’s high-level stuff there! She just needs to be more consistent.

She was still the best player for Wisconsin on both ends of the floor but there are still things for her to work on before she becomes the player we all think she can be. 

2. Sometimes it really is as simple as this: Iowa has a higher level of athlete than Wisconsin does. When the Hawkeyes offense got rolling there was literally nothing the Badgers could do to stop them. Iowa got open shot after open shot and Wisconsin’s defenders struggled to stay with their assignment.

The Badgers played really well in the first quarter but once Kate Martin hit a three to give Iowa their second lead of the game with 3:10 left in the period…you knew the game was basically over. UW didn’t make a field goal in the second quarter until six minutes had elapsed and had only made four free throws at all.

They were down 13 but it might as well have been 1,300. The Hawekeys continued to play at about half speed to start the second half but ended the final five minutes of the third quarter on a 19-2 run and then only allowed Wisconsin to score six points in the entire fourth quarter. Even Iowa’s backups stuffed Wisconsin in a trash can! Just two teams playing different sports.

3. Shoutout to freshman Imbie Jones who scored the first two points of her career on a layup late in the fourth quarter!

4. Anti-shoutout to Caitlin Clark who gets the most generous whistle since Michael Jordan played! I can’t imagine trying to play defense against her. You look at her the wrong way ::WHISTLE BLOWS:: and she’s at the free throw line. Smdh, they’re trying to legislate defense out of the game! WHAT HAPPENED TO THE GAME I LOVE?!?!

Final Thought

I thought the Badgers actually looked really good in the first quarter of this game. They came out of the gates with energy and probably surprised Iowa a bit. They hit the boards hard, were playing tough defense, and only found themselves down four against the No. 2 team in the nation after 10 minutes. But, if you’ve watched either of these teams play over the past couple of seasons, you knew that wasn’t going to last.


Hell, the cracks were already showing as UW had seven first quarter turnovers and only shot 35.3% from the field. To pull off a monumental upset you need to have your best shooting night of the season and win on the margins…neither of which Wisconsin did in the first quarter. With a top of the standings showdown on Sunday against No. 18 Ohio State, the Hawkeyes were possibly looking past the Badgers and came out a little lethargic. Once UW got their attention, Iowa kicked it into gear and ran Wisconsin basketball off the court.


As with every game between these two teams, I’m not entirely sure how much we can take away from this one. Iowa has beaten Wisconsin 29 straight times after Tuesday’s victory and their average margin of victory over the last 12 is well over 20 points per game. These are just two teams on entirely different floors (perhaps buildings?) of the sport and it doesn’t really matter if Wisconsin loses by 25 or 45.

I liked that the Badgers didn’t quit during this game. The bench was involved throughout the entire contest and everyone on the floor was playing until the final whistle, but when the talent disparity between two teams is as wide as it is between UW and Iowa…well, you get games like the one on Tuesday night.

Wisconsin has a full week off before returning to play against Minnesota at the Kohl Center. Under first year coach Dawn Plitzuweit (a Wisconsin native), the Gophers have vastly exceeded expectations and have one of the most potent offenses in the country. These Border Battle rivals were neck and neck with each other last year, but Minnesota has streaked past the Badgers this year and they’ll be looking to pad their record ahead of a postseason bid. Hopefully Wisconsin basketball uses the week off to perfect their gameplan to play spoiler because nothing is better than ruining a promising Minnesota season in any sport.

Next Game: Tuesday, Jan. 23; vs. Minnesota Golden Gophers; 8:00 p.m. CT; BTN; Kohl Center

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Drew Hamm is a seasoned sports journalist with an extensive background in covering the Wisconsin Badgers. He has previously held positions as the site manager at Bucky's 5th Quarter and founder of Badgers Ball Knower. Currently, he contributes as a staff writer for BadgerNotes.com.

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