OK, before we begin ... Marquette fans should be urged to relax.
That said; Bo Ryan is the best college basketball coach in the state.
(See, we warned the blue-and-gold faithful ... but let's face the facts)
Ryan has led the University of Wisconsin to unprecedented heights during his four-plus years at the helm of the Badger program, including back-to-back Big Ten Championships in his first two seasons, and a Big Ten Tournament crown in his third.
Under Ryan, the Badgers have advanced to the Sweet 16 and Elite Eight in consecutive years. And despite losing five seniors -- including four starters -- from last year's squad, Bucky enters his showdown with Michigan State this afternoon with an 11-2 mark, losing only to Pittsburgh and Wake Forest.
Yes, it should be pointed out that Marquette opened its first year of Big East competition with a home demolition of second-ranked Connecticut last week. OK, that's fine. But as UConn coach Jim Calhoun warned, don't get carried away. There are still 12 more games left on the league slate, with some pretty daunting road dates. But more on Marquette another time.
The beauty of Ryan isn't just that he's having success at a school that, save for a handful of NCAA Tournament games highlighted by a Final Four appearance in 2000, had been just another team until Ryan arrived.
Using an approach nearly identical to the one which he used to lead UW-Platteville to four NCAA Division III Championships in the 1990s, and one that helped lay the cornerstone for the resurgence of the UWM program, Ryan has turned Wisconsin into one of the nation's better teams, and the Kohl Center into one of the nation's most difficult venues to play.
The Badgers' home-court advantage has been so dominant since Ryan took over that Wisconsin has lost just one Big Ten home game (last season, against No. 1 Illinois), and three games overall (Wake Forest, Marquette, and Illinois). For those counting at home, that's 32-1 in the league, and 66-3 overall. And with a 47-18 overall mark in the Big Ten the last four seasons, only Illinois has more wins with 51.
The Kohl Center is sold out -- legitimately SOLD OUT -- every night. Like Marquette, the University of Wisconsin is on winter break. And while MU's students showed up en masse for the UConn and Cincinnati contests this week (kudos to MU for chartering buses in Appleton and suburban Chicago), the rest of the stands were surprisingly barren.
Not so at Wisconsin.
Counting his time at Platteville and Milwaukee, Ryan is the winningest active coach in the Division I ranks. While Wisconsin will never be confused with the run-and-gun flash of Atlantic Coast Conference rivals Duke and North Carolina, or even Big East teams like UConn, Cincinnati, and even Marquette, it doesn't matter.
The swing offense doesn't need a star to work. And at the same time, the swing offense can develop and highlight players' individual abilities (see: Harris, Devin and Tucker, Alando). Yeah, Harris is making some money playing in the NBA right now, but since when is that the job of a college coach?
Just like it's not Ryan's job to graduate a player, it's not his job to get guys in the NBA, either. That's up to the player.
Ryan's job is to win basketball games. And nobody in Wisconsin has done a better job of it lately.
