Indiana basketball gets ‘All-American-type night’ from Kel’el Ware in win over Wisconsin

BLOOMINGTON — Wisconsin coach Greg Gard didn’t have to look far down on the box score to explain his team’s 74-70 loss to Indiana basketball on Tuesday night.

“Kel’el Ware had an All-American-type night, he was terrific,” Gard said.

The starting center had 27 points (just one point shy of his career high) with 11 rebounds and five blocks. He had a near-perfect shooting performance going 11 of 12 from the field and 4 of 4 from the free-throw line. It was Ware’s 12th double-double of the season.

“It was unbelievable,” Indiana coach Mike Woodson said. “He had a man's game. He really did.”

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Indiana basketball starting center Kel'el Ware set the tone against Wisconsin

Ware exploded out of the gate with 20 points in the first half. He scored seven straight points late in the half to give Indiana a 32-17 lead, the largest of the game for either team. The sophomore knocked his first eight shots.

“When you give a good player’s confidence, you are in for a long night,” Gard said, with a shake of his head.

Gard said Ware “did whatever he wanted” in the first half. He was particularly effective on pick and rolls with Trey Galloway, who assisted on six of Ware’s 11 made field goals.

The only thing that slowed Ware down was the success Malik Reneau had in the second half. Woodson admitted after the game that Ware should’ve had more touches coming out of halftime.

He still had a critical 3-point play with 3:13 to go off a lob from Galloway.

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“Those two guys together are a handful, the key for them is they haven’t been able to consistently make threes and they’ve struggled from the free-throw line, but Ware and Reneau are really good,” Gard said. “I don't know if this is the best Kel’el has played, but it’s got to be ranked near the top. Those two draw a lot of attention, we didn’t do a good enough job against those guys specifically.”

Ware didn’t play when Indiana lost 91-79 in Madison on Jan. 19. He told reporters after the game he benefited from traveling with the team on the trip and getting a chance to see how they played IU in person.

The soft-spoken Oregon transfer was just happy to help the Hoosiers end a four-game losing streak that had produced a lot of negativity around the program in recent weeks.

“This win means a lot. It's not even just about me,” Ware said. “That whole team has just been, as y'all seen, on a little downhill. I feel like tonight we finally got over the hump everybody has been talking about.”

Michael Niziolek is the Indiana beat reporter for The Bloomington Herald-Times. You can follow him on X @michaelniziolek and read all his coverage by clicking here.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Indiana basketball center Kel'el Ware too much to handle for Wisconsin