Mike Robinson, the Big Ten’s Player of the Week, is the poster child forplayers who want to refashion their images. The Purdue senior hasemerged as a performer who not only scores, but also rebounds, plays defenseand operates within that old-fashioned concept of team.
“He came here as a highly respected national player who was a McDonald’s All-American, which a lot of times hurts kids,” Purdue coach Gene Keady explains.
“Sometimes you’re picked for that because of your scoring average, not because you’re a total player. That was a little bit of his situation. He was looked at as a great player. But when you come to Purdue, you have to play defense, go to class, be a team member, be part of the basketball family. He had a great family situation at home. But he didn’t understand what being part of a basketball family was about.
“He’s a great player now, and being player of the week is a great compliment to him. But at this time last year he was close to being gone and out of here.
“That Ohio State game last year when they killed us [by 29], we got back here and the next day, maybe that night, it was time for an attitude adjustment for everyone. That’s when he got the picture. Hey, they’re not going to tolerate me anymore with my haphazard habits.”
Was he almost a lost cause?
“I never give up on young people,” Keady says. “They give up on themselves. But, probably, if they haven’t gotten it by the time they’re juniors, they’re in trouble.”
So he was late getting it?
“I think that’s an understatement,” says Keady.
More than meets the eye: Wisconsin is 14-12 overall and 6-8 in conference, but all season the various strength indexes have had the Badgers ranked somewhere in the 30s. Thatmeans they have every right to hope for an NCAA tournament bid.
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“I think they’re playing for it,” asserts Northwestern coach Kevin O’Neill, whose Wildcats host Wisconsin on Wednesday. “I think if they get two more wins, they’re in.”
“I know we have to do at least that,” says Badger coach Dick Bennett. “I don’t know if that would put us there. But it would give us a fighting chance.
“We did play a very good non-conference schedule [that included Syracuse, Texas and Temple], and even in the Big Ten, we played all the top people twice except Illinois. So maybe so.”
Know thine enemy: The Badgers wrap up their regular season Sunday at home against Indiana, which will be coming off emotional games against Michigan State and Purdue.
The Hoosiers already are assured a spot in the field of 64 so theywill go into that game with nothing tangible on the line.
Does that help or hurt the Badgers?
“I think the kids feel so much pressure these days anyway. The day is long past when this is just an educational experience,” says Bennett. “So we’ll certainly feel pressure. Too much? I don’t know.”
Rough initiation: The times have not been easy for Minnesota coach Dan Monson, who’s wrapping up his first season at the school and in the Big Ten. His best player, center Joel Przybilla, defected when told he had to attend class and his second best player, forward John Blair Bickerstaff, was sidelined by injury. His team played without any hope of a postseason tourney, a result of the scandal that besmirched the program under Clem Haskins, and eventually it sunk to the bottom of the conference standings, ahead of only Northwestern.
What drives itas it prepares to close out this troubled season against Michigan State and Ohio State?
“We’re hanging on clichs,” says Monson. “Pride. Character. Those are the things I’ve emphasized. They’ve endured it all.
“We’re coming up to the end of a year when they’ve endured just about anything a basketball team can endure. Now we have to finish it off with the same character and pride we’ve shown the last 11 months. They’ve done a wonderful job enduring.
“You look at our situation and you think it couldn’t get worse. But it does get worse with us having to play Michigan State and Ohio State.”