UW-Milwaukee basketball grows in Wisconsin’s shadow

By MICHAEL HUNT

MADISON, Wis. — Here at Wisconsin, where the basketball gym is named after a U.S. senator and the adjoining practice facility for one of the richest people in Milwaukee, a universal truth in big-time college sports is illuminated in big, red lights.

The more powerful and wealthy the alumni base, the more pressure on the coach.

That’s one of the reasons why the football guy, Bret Bielema, was feeling the heat with a 28-11 record. Like everybody else with luxury boxes to fill and bills to pay, the Badgers have to keep the boosters happy.

It’s a little different at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where there has been no football team for 35 years and far fewer walking, talking revenue streams to appease.

But the Panthers’ lower profile doesn’t exactly mean a pressure-free existence for the only cash cow in the athletic department.

It’s been five years since the men’s basketball team took that magic carpet ride to the Sweet 16 with Bruce Pearl. Since then, they are 70-65 with Rob Jeter, who got to the NCAAs his first season but has finished no higher than a tie for fourth place in the Horizon League since.

Which, of course, raises the question of expectations at a place like UW-Milwaukee. The program was basically off the map, forgotten and neglected until the Panthers became a certifiable darling of the 2004-’05 Big Dance. And then, after Jeter won UWM’s third consecutive league championship in his rookie season, the question became whether Jeter could win with his own players.

A follow-up record of 9-22 with an almost completely turned over roster didn’t provide a satisfactory answer three years ago. But the story is still being told, if under different circumstances.

The hiring of George Koonce as UW-Milwaukee’s athletic director last spring upped the ante. Koonce was brought in to elevate the school’s profile. His No. 1 job is fundraising in times more challenging than when the Panthers caught Alabama and Boston College leaning in the NCAA tournament. That means the department’s flagship program needs to pick it up, because the former Packers linebacker is going to insist.

Of course, the Panthers didn’t have to beat the Badgers on a snowy Wednesday night that helped cut the Kohl Center’s usual full house in half. And they didn’t, with Wisconsin winning 68-58.

In fact, UW-Milwaukee has beaten Wisconsin only once, the stunner 16 years ago that caused the UW coach at the time, Stu Jackson, to wad up and spike the stat sheet and then stomp out of the interview room without taking a question.

But the fact UW-Milwaukee’s Horizon brother, UW-Green Bay, clipped the Badgers a little more than two weeks ago up in Brown County raised the possibilities.

Unquestionably, they’d be a different team with Tone Boyle, who was terrific last season as a freshman. Boyle has yet to play this season because of a back injury. But give Jeter credit for bringing in two talented first-year guards.

Ja’Rob McCallum — whose uncle, Ray, the Detroit coach who once recruited Michael Finley and Rashard Griffith to Madison as a UW assistant — can play. So can Lonnie Boga. There’s the hope, because guards make all the difference in a league like the Horizon.

The belief here is that Jeter can make the Panthers relevant again. He doesn’t have to present the salesman/schmoozer qualities that Pearl used to promote the school, because that’s not his personality.

All he has to do is win. That never changes, no matter the level of competition.