MADISON, Wis. – The Illinois State Redbirds battled and overcame an early deficit before giving the 24th-ranked Wisconsin Badgers everything they could handle, as Antonio Reeves scored a game-high 23 points and Sy Chatman 22 in an 89-85 loss on Wednesday night.
Reeves made 8-of-18 shots from the field and 2-of-7 from long range while adding four rebounds. Chatman was 7-of-10 from the field and 8-of-11 from the charity stripe while grabbing a team-high seven rebounds. Both Josiah Strong and Kendall Lewis scored 15 points for Illinois State in the narrow loss. Reeves and Liam McChesney each dished out three assists.
Illinois State, now 8-6 after its final non-conference game of the season, returns to action on Sunday, January 2, when the team travels to northwest Indiana to take on the Valparaiso Beacons in a 1 p.m. tip-off on the road.
After seeing the game tied early at 2-2, Wisconsin ran off 11 consecutive points to lead 13-2. The deficit reached as high as 20 at 29-9 with 10:36 to play in the first half. The Redbirds immediately responded with an 11-0 run to cut the gap back to single digits and got back within five at 36-31 on a Chatman dunk with 3:43 to play in the half. The Badgers closed the half on a 10-4 run to lead by 10 heading into the locker room at halftime at 46-36.
A second-half-opening 19-9 run pushed the hosts back ahead by 20; however, ISU rattled off runs of 7-0 and 12-0 to climb back within one at 81-80 with 2:01 to play in the game following a Reeves fast break dunk. Reeves and Chatman fouled out on back-to-back possessions late in the game, and Wisconsin iced the game by making all eight of its free throws over the final 1:13 of the contest, and the Badgers held on for the four-point win.
With his 23 points, Reeves catapulted up two spots in the school's career scoring list. Now with 826 career points, he passed DeVaughn Akoon-Purcell (808 points, 2014-16) and Al Meyer (816 points, 1953-56) into 65th place in program history.
The Redbirds made half of its 60 shots in the game, the team's third consecutive game shooting 50 percent or better, and was 9-of-22 from long range (41 percent). Wisconsin made 28-of-66 shots in the game, 8-of-20 from long range and 25-of-32 from the charity stripe.
Wisconsin was led by Steven Crowl who scored a career-high 21 points, while Johnny Davis scored 20 and Tyler Wahl a career-high-tying 18 points. Davis added 11 rebounds in the winning effort.
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