2024-25 Team Preview: Wisconsin
What levels can Serah Williams lead this Badgers team to in year three?
How about a quick look at Caitlin Clark’s two games back from the Olympic break to open this Hoopla?
29 points, 5 rebounds, 10 assists, 8/16 FG, win
23 points, 5 rebounds, 9 assists, 9/19 FG, win
Clark has looked every part of the star she was anticipated as being, and the Indiana Fever are playing their best basketball in years largely because of it. The stats are impressive, but you can really feel the difference in how Clark, and Indiana, are playing as of late. The ball movement is incredible, the offense has multiple ways to score and the defense is steadily improving.
As an Atlanta Dream fan (shoutout a 2-0 weekend BY THE WAY), this hurts me, but Indiana looks like a dangerous team for anyone to play right now, and a long ways removed from its difficult start to the season.
Last Week’s Hoopla:
Overview
I was a little bit doom and gloom on Wisconsin’s trajectory heading into this past season, mainly because of a transfer portal that saw big exits and zero arrivals. But head coach Marisa Moseley found a way to get the Badgers to improve by multiple wins for the fourth straight season, inching their way closer to a .500 record.
In comparison to the rest of the Big Ten, this may not look like much, but the victories were a massive move forward for these Badgers. The 15 wins were the most by a Wisconsin team since 2018-19, and the 46.9 win percentage was the program’s best since 2010-11. Wisconsin really needed to see any amount of growth to get this team some momentum, and Moseley has delivered that already.
That being said, there are still some clear notes to take from the stats. Wisconsin’s defense was a relative strength and an improvement over the past few seasons, but the offense took a step back. There wasn’t much consistency from the Badgers’ shooters, specifically from behind the arc, and it made a whole lot of contests into slugfests.
What Wisconsin did do well on offense was share the ball. The Badgers had a 62.9% assist rate that ranked 36th in the country. This did, however, come along with 18.5 turnovers per game and a 22.6% turnover rate that was 42nd-highest nationally.
On defense, it was the shot blocking that stood out: Wisconsin averaged 4.5 blocks per game, 36th-best in Division I. The Badgers had at least two blocks in all but one game, and had five or more rejections in nearly half (15) of their contests.
Here's last year’s Wisconsin roster, sorted by Her Hoop Stats win shares:
Departures
It’s another big offseason for Wisconsin exits, though none of the six departures leave quite the hole that Maty Wilke did last offseason when transferring to Utah.
The largest loss here is Sania Copeland, who started 26 games and had a promising freshman season for the Badgers. Her three-point shot hadn’t quite come around yet, but she was a high-volume shooter who attempted and made the most threes for the team last season.
Brooke Schramek is the other starter who will not be returning, and despite an off year for her efficiency, she had loads of starting experience and was useful as a secondary facilitator.
Outside of those two, the other four transfers never found large roles in Wisconsin’s rotation, but each of them still have multiple years of eligibility remaining. Imbie Jones and Ana Guillen were both true freshmen last season, and those types of losses always sting even without proven production.
Returnees
Serah Williams was the cover photo for last year’s Wisconsin preview as well. There, I had this caption: Serah Williams had a great freshman campaign. With key departures, she will need to be the star for Wisconsin in year two.
Hahaha, well!
Serah Williams stats, 22-23 vs. 23-24:
PPG: 12.7 → 17.4
RPG: 5.4 → 10.7
BPG: 1.9 → 2.8
Williams surpassed all of my highest expectations with a truly brilliant year two, fully taking on the role of leading this Badgers team. Look at those win share numbers above. Only four players on this roster had a positive number in 23-24, and yet Wisconsin still got to 15 wins and made a WNIT. That was because Williams willed that team there, earning more wins than the rest of the roster combined.
Watching Williams in year two felt like a 2K player in the way it felt like she was developing evenly and steadily across her game. She increased her volume while barely losing efficiency. She nearly doubled her rebounding totals and adding almost a full block per game, all while playing only five more minutes per contest. If her three point shooting (8 of 24, 33.3% on the season) can become more than an interesting wild card, she could legitimately make a run at being a top three player in this conference.
There was another sophomore that took a big leap for Wisconsin last name, and that was Ronnie Porter. The 5-4 guard when from a deep rotational player to a 32-game starter and the Badgers’ top playmaker on the season. She also is a tremendous rebounder for her size and is extremely active on the defensive end at nearly two steals per game.
Porter gives Wisconsin some excellent consistency at guard, but needs to find that same consistency with her shot in year three. She improved her efficiency from 29.7% to 38.1% last season, a huge boost, but a trend that needs to continue into the 40s to help Wisconsin find more non-Williams answers for scoring.
Natalie Leuzinger and Halle Douglass are both entering their fifth years after spending all four of their previous seasons with Wisconsin. Leuzinger has become an established starter and one of the Badgers’ best shooters, a role that may only expand heading into this season. Douglass is similar, and was in fact Wisconsin’s best three-point shooter in 23-24, but she was among the worst in the nation at finishing inside the arc.
Two sophomores catch my eye as the next pairing of players that could see a big boost in their numbers a la Williams and Porter, and they would be D’Yanis Jimenez and Tessa Grady. Jimenez had freshman jitters with free throws and efficiency, but also showed a knack for getting active defense and for a well-rounded skillset with 5.0 rebounds and 3.2 assists per 40 minutes. It felt like there was a lot to unpack with her game still and I hope to see that this season.
Speaking of a lot to unpack, Grady may have played under 10 minutes per contest as a freshman, but her lack of fear with launching the deep ball should make her a key rotational player at worst for a Wisconsin team desperate for shooting weapons. Grady finished the year 10th in the COUNTRY with 11.9 three-point attempts per 40 minutes, knocking down a very respectable 34.3% on the year. That is a clear area of weakness on this roster, and it could be especially useful to have a 6-2 forward like Grady out there with Williams to spread defenses out.
Incoming Players
Five freshmen and two transfers makes for a crowded set of new faces into this Wisconsin roster, but Carter McCray is a standout add that could take Wisconsin to new levels.
Despite Williams’ pure dominance on the glass, the Badgers were mediocre at best at out rebounding their opponents. Enter McCray, one of the best rebounders in all of college basketball last season as a true freshman. While spacing could be a fair concern, Williams and McCray could make for one of the most lethal interior duos in the country if the pair can co-exist, and it should give the Badgers more of an identity on offense in the process.
That “spacing” and “three-point shooting” stuff I keep bringing up could be helped a lot by Myers. Her 36.1% efficiency last season was the worst of her collegiate career but would have been the best on Wisconsin’s roster. If she can find the ~39% efficiency she had for the first three seasons, the Badgers offense really starts to open up in new ways.
It’s hard to know what to expect from this large freshman class, but I think it’s a safe bet to expect a player like Jovana Spasovski to make an early impact. It is theoretically a quicker adjustment to move from European play to the college game, and Spasovski has solid experience in Serbia and good size at the wing for a team lacking in it.
Outlook
Projected Starters
Ronnie Porter - G
Natalie Leuzinger - G
Tess Myers - G
Serah Williams - F
Carter McCray - C
Projected Big Ten Finish: 13th
Wisconsin has continued the build upwards each of the past four years, and that is really, really important for the long-term success of this program. It is also important for the now, because they have found the star that can lead them to some real success in Williams.
If Williams has another leap in her, maybe the Badgers really can get over the .500 hurdle, even in such a difficult conference. It would take more than her, though, and I think Porter and Leuzinger have proven solid enough at guard to help make that happen.
If the McCray addition is a home run, which it very well could be, then I highly recommend tuning in to watch this team. That front court becomes beyond lethal if it can mesh together, and it becomes a team Big Ten foes will be concerned about if Wisconsin’s rebounding rises to where it should be.
The big concern is with perimeter shooting, and the Tess(a)’s should go some ways in helping that. But I think if a player with previously lackluster three-point numbers like Porter or Jimenez can get their shot at least to a place where it threatens opponents, you start to wonder how Wisconsin can be fully contained.
I just used a whole lot of “ifs,” and that’s because that’s how I feel about Wisconsin heading into the season. Last year I did not have the optimism to do it, but Moseley and co. have proven to me that the Badgers are, at the very least, a team worth putting belief in, and I can’t say enough to how much of an improvement that is to the recent history of the program.
Williams should be here two more seasons, and that has to be considered the window for Wisconsin to make its largest swing in decades. Stars like that do not come around often, and the core looks to be improving around her to make this the Badgers’ most talented unit I have covered.
Photo Credit: Wisconsin Athletics
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