Post season awards:  

MVP: LaTonya Sims

Rebounding Award:  LaTonya Sims, Jessie Stomski

Free Throw Shooting Award:  Tamara Moore

Defensive Award:  Tamara Moore

Academic Excellence:  Amy Wiersma

Chemistry Award:  Kelley Paulus

Service Award:  Amy Wiersma

Sixth Player:  Kyle Black

Coaches Award:  Christine Cleary

Media Award:  Kelley Paulus

Big 10 Honors

LaTonya Sims:  1st team media, 2nd team coaches

Jessie Stomski:  Big 10 Freshman of the Year, coaches and media.  All Big-10 second team media, honorable mention coaches.

Roster

The Badgers went into the 1998 season with many, many questions and few certainties.  1500+ point scorers Katie Voigt and Ann Klapperich had graduated.  The highest ranked recruiting class in school history entered the program.  LaTonya Sims returned as the reigning Big 10 Freshman of the Year.

It took exactly one practice to see that incoming freshmen Tamara Moore and Jessie Stomski were for real.  Shortly after, Nina Smith of Waterloo Iowa, considered by many to be the nation's top recruit announced that she would join the Badgers for the 1999-2000 season.  It seemed reasonable to have high hopes for the future.

But first there was a little matter of the 98-9 season to play.

The Badgers started the season with a line-up of seniors Amy Wiersma and Tanisha Boston, juniors Dee Dee Pate and Kelley Paulus and sophomore LaTonya Sims.  Freshmen Jessie Stomski, Tamara Moore and Kyle Black were waiting their turns in the wings.

It was quickly clear that this lineup was going to have problems.  Despite being significantly bigger than their opponents, the Badgers were outrebounded in nine of their first twelve games.  As bad as that was, their rebounding was better than their defense.  They consistenly gave up dribble penetration and were unable to stop players from driving the baseline.

Offensively, three starters contributed little.  Boston, Wiersma and Pate only contributed 46 points in the first five games, although Boston and Pate each missed one game and Wiersma missed two.

Tamara Moore started the season out strongly and moved into the starting point guard spot in place of Pate in the fourth game of the season.  Stomski took Wiersma's place in game 5.  The two freshmen gave the Badger's more offense but Moore struggled with turnovers, leading to a year-long game of musical point guard.  It took Stomski a few games to settle in, but once she did, she provided the team with amazingly steady play from a freshman.

The team opened with wins over mid-majors Bowling Green and UW-Milwaukee.  They then played their first overtime game of the year when they scored an impressive win over  UC-Santa Barbara 103-90 behind Sims' 34 points.

After splitting with UW-Green Bay and Stanford, the season hit the first of its low points when the Badgers fell apart after holding a 16 point lead early in the second half against Marquette.  The Golden Eagles outscored the Badgers by 24 over the last 19 minutes of the game in Madison.

That game was the beginning of one of the more frustrating periods in Jane Albright's time in Madison.   An unimpressive home win over Minnesota and a drubbing of small school Florida A&M were sandwiched around non-competitive losses to Texas Tech and Western Kentucky.

It was becoming clear that this team would continue its predecessor's disturbing trend of leaving their composure behind when they left the city of Madison.

The team lost senior Amy Wiersma for six weeks following the Western Kentucky game. She underwent surgery on a finger and missed the first nine games of the Big 10 season.

Then came the second headlong crash into the bottom of the year.   Not only was the Badgers loss at Illinois not as close as the 90-72 score, but the team appeared to give up.

After a home win over Iowa, the Badgers set forth on their first of two three game road trips in the league.

They  came crawling home with their tail between their collective legs after three losses. A non-competitive loss to Ohio State was followed by close losses at Michigan State and Indiana. The last two losses were especially hurtful as both teams finished below Wisconsin in the standings. The Badgers had an opportunity to win each game but were unable to finish.

What was even more alarming was the fact that the team had only two players it could rely on for scoring. LaTonya Sims and Jessie Stomski were consistent double figure scorers but no other player was scoring consistently.

Wisconsin returned home with an overall record of 7-8 and a Big 10 mark of 2-4. The season was barely over and the team was essentially out of the running for an NCAA bid already.

Rebounding, which had been a major concern early in the season, was gradually getting better as was the team's defense. But there was little flow on offense and the team did not appear to be playing up to it's potential.

The Indiana game proved to be the last game in the career of senior Tanisha Boston. She was diagnosed with a stress fracture in her foot and it never healed enough for her to return.

Without their seniors, Wisconsin, led by by Sims, Stomski and Kelley Paulus, defeated a decent Michigan team before falling to top-ten Rutgers.

Going into the season, one of the major question marks facing the teams was point guard play. It was not a question that was answered. Dee Dee Pate started the season at point and was replaced by freshman Tamara Moore early. Moore struggled with turnovers and struggled more with frustration and Pate returned to the starting lineup, without significant improvement.

The final game in the homestand was Northwestern. After struggling to a 27-23 halftime lead, Albright made another change at point. Freshman Kyle Black, who had minimal experience at the position, started the second half and led the team to one of it's better halves of ball, as they scored 53 points in the half to blow out the Wildcats. Black showed that she had the understanding of the game necessary to make correct decisions with the ball. Unfortunately, her ball handling skills were not good enough to play the position against most of the more athletic teams in the league.

The team was starting to feel a little more confident after the Northwestern game. This confidence was going to be tested by another three game road trip, including stops at the league's top two teams.

Wisconsin played reasonably well at Purdue and the 20 point margin was more indicitive of the excellence of the future national champions than of Wisconsin's poor play.

From Purdue, the Badgers traveled to a place that has become their own house of horrors, misnamed Happy Valley, to play Penn State. Wisconsin actually led at the half, but the officials insisted on playing the second stanza. The Badgers weren't too thrilled with that and they totally collapsed. Committing an unbelievable 37 turnovers, Wisconsin suffered an embarassing 91-61 loss and reeled into the bottom for the third time in the season.

The Badgers record was 9-11. They were facing their first losing season under Jane. The natives were restless. Very restless. Jane Albright kept insisting things would be fine. Not a lot of folks jumped up to agree with her. A local columnist headlined his work: "Is Coach A Too Optimistic?"

Wisconsin staggered from Happy Valley to Ann Arbor to face the Wolverines. They played the first half like they usually do on the road, not very well. Somehow, at halftime, the lightbulb went on. Wisconsin came out in the second half and looked like the team albright had been telling people she had. Their 70-46 thumping of Michigan was the first time in recent memory they had soundly defeated a decent team on the road.

The game was huge for Wisconsin.  At the time, the coaches and players proclaimed it the turning point of the season.  The fans hoped they were right.  They were.

Returning home with a 10-11 record, the Badgers were faced with the prospect of finding four more wins before they could claim a berth in the post-season WNIT tournament. Fortunately, they had four home games and a road trip to cellar-dwelling Minnesota before the Big 10 tournament.

First in was the evil empire from Penn State.  Exactly one week after kicking Badger butt in Happy Valley, the Lady Lions arrived in Madison to attempt to duplicate that effort.  Wisconsin was determined to show that they were a better team than the one that collapsed a week before.  They did.  After staying with the Lady Lions the entire game, LaTonya Sims hit a three at the buzzer to force an overtime.  The Badgers went up by 6 quickly but just as quickly faded as Penn State scored all the rest of the points to sneak away with the victory.

That overtime game was to be only a starting point.

Next up was Michigan State.  After 40 minutes the teams were again tied.  This time Bucky dominated the overtime and won the game.

The two overtime games sent the Badgers into the end of the season with an 11-12 overall record and a 6-7 Big Ten mark.

The final home weekend of the regular season had the Badgers hosting Ohio State and Illinois.

Against OSU, freshman Jessie Stomski simply went wild in the post.  She set a Badger freshman single game scoring mark with 34 points.  However a Marrita Porter three point shot at the buzzer sent Wisconsin into its record-setting third consecutive overtime game.  Stomski led the team in ot as Wisconsin held on for the win and evened their season mark at 12-12.

Records are nice.   Everyone wants to set them.  Most of the time.  Wisconsin had a chance to set an NCAA record if they went into overtime for the fourth consecutive time.  If a vote had been taken,  pretty much everyone associated with this program, from coaches to fans would have passed on the record.  But, Tauja Catchings hit a jumper in the closing seconds to send the game into another extra session.  Behind Sims and Stomski, the Badgers outscored the Illini to take the game.

The win moved the Badgers over the .500 mark for the first time since they were 7-6.  It also continued the trend of improved play.  Illinois came into the game as the best rebounding team in the league.  Wisconsin, which had started the season as a bad rebounding team, outrebounded them.  The defense continued to improve.  Sims, who had started the season slowly, continued her impressive march to greatness.

An easy win at Minnesota gave the Badgers a 14-12 record to end the season and assured them of a bid to the post-season WNIT tournament.

The season had been the proverbial roller coaster ride.  But the team was clearly finishing on an upswing.  They were playing their best ball of the season.   They had improved in the areas that most needed improving.  The Badgers had become a good rebounding team and a decent defensive one.  They still struggled to run an offense without turning the ball over and their shooting percentages were all over the map.

Individually, LaTonya Sims became a dominating player sometime during the season.  Jessie Stomski set the freshman season scoring mark in the Minnesota game.  She was remarkably consistent for a freshman, as she scored in double figures in every league game and led the league in field goal percentage.

Tamara Moore stepped into the starting lineup at small forward when Boston went down, and she thrived in the position.  Her defensive intensity led her to be the stopper the team had lacked on that end and her scoring became more consistent.

With these three keying the upswing, the team went into the post-season loaded with confidence.  And fell flat on their faces.  Playing perhaps their worst game of the year, the Badgers lost in the first round to Ohio State in the Big 10 tournament.

Once more the team snuck back to the healing city of Madison to await their bid to the WNIT.

The Badgers had won five of their last seven games heading into the post-season and the tournament gave them a chance to finish their season on a high note.

They took advantage of the opportunity.

They opened with easy wins over Indiana State and Sienna.  Big 10 rival Michigan State visited and, true to their developing league tradition, the game went to overtime.  Keyed by Moore's defense on Maxann Reese, the Badgers pulled another ot win to move to the semi-finals.

They were led in the tournament by Sims and Moore.  Sims had become basically unstoppable offensivele and Moore was showing the all-around excellence that had made her a prep all-American the year before.

Memphis came to Madison for the semis, bringing with them the nation's leading scorer, Tamkia Whitmore.  The Badgers responded with their best game of the year as they turned Whitmore into a non-factor and easily beat Memphis.

Wisconsin met Arkansas in the tournament finals.  The Badgers travelled for the first time going to Fayetteville for the game.  Wisconsin started out the game as they had so many road games before, falling behind early, turning the ball over and generally playing nothing like the team they are in Madison.

But they proved that they had indeed become a tougher team by fighting back and giving the Lady Backs all they could handle before falling by 4.

Wisconsin ended its season with an 18-14 record and a load of confidence.  They won 9 of their last 12 games.  They improved in virtually every area that needed improvement.  LaTonya Sims, Tamara Moore and Jessie Stomski established themselves as a threesome that will have to be reckoned with for the next two seasons.

By season's end, Wisconsin had become a good rebounding and a solid defensive team.  Both of these resulted from improved execution and harder play.  The defensive improvement also stemmed from an increase in the use of zone defenses.

If the ultimate goal of a team is to achieve its potential,  Wisconsin either met their goal or came very close by season's end.  It may or may not be fair to wonder if they could have reached that goal earlier.  It isn't unfair to wonder why they still can struggle so much away from Madison.

But the ending of the season left most feeling good and looking forward eagerly to the 1999-2000 season.

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