UW–Madison alumnus Jason Gay of the Wisconsin State Journal:

Arghhhhhhhhh. So this is the hazard, right? If you are going to become attached to a team, you have to accept that with the good stuff comes the heartache, and there’s always more heartache than good stuff. Always. Especially during something like March Madness, in which 64 teams (OK, 68, technically) get thrown together and 63 of them (OK, 67, technically) end up abruptly bounced—goodbye, farewell, you’re done, kaput. They end this three-week tournament with a montage and the soaring high fructose of “One Shining Moment.” But disappointment is the standard party-bag gift.

The Wisconsin Badgers lost the NCAA men’s basketball championship on Monday night. If you follow this column you have probably noted that it has been slightly enthusiastic about the Badgers in recent weeks. OK: It has been embarrassingly enthusiastic about the Badgers. But so what? Wisconsin is where I went to school. It is where I met my closest friends, where I first read William Faulkner, where I first ate an entire pizza by myself before noon. I’m attached to Madison for life. If I had gone to the Sorbonne, and the Sorbonne had made the Final Four, I would have gone bonkers for the Sorbonne. (I have the Sorbonne in my 2016 office pool.)

By Monday morning, I was convinced it was really going to happen for the Badgers. On Saturday, Wisconsin had ended Kentucky’s 38-0 season and the whole thing just started to feel inevitable. It had to happen. A year ago, Wisconsin had reached the Final Four and lost to Kentucky on a late shot in the semis. Playing Duke in the final was almost cinematic. Duke! Fearsome, celebrated, complicated-to-love Duke. This would be bigger than the Badgers. For one night only, Wisconsin would be America’s Team.

The problem is, Duke is, you know, Duke. Disciplined, well-assembled, well-coached. They call Coach K Coach K for a reason. They make an opponent work. Nothing is for free. More than midway through Monday’s title game at Lucas Oil Stadium, Wisconsin could not have asked for a more delicious scenario—the Badgers were rolling, up nine points, and Blue Devils center Jahlil Okafor was parked on the bench in foul trouble. This was the dream. Anybody would have taken this. The crowd was roughly 75% Badger fans, many of whom had roared into Indy that morning, and the room began to feel like a party on the verge. If I had been back at my old Madison apartment on North Hancock Street, my roommates would have begun to talk about walking down to State Street. This was really going to happen.

And then Duke got smarter, stronger, faster, more relentless—freshmen guards Tyus Jones and Grayson Allen proved essentially unstoppable—and Wisconsin began to fade. The Badgers looked tired. There were a lot of miles on the starters, especially emotionally. (Duke had cruised past Michigan State in the semis; Wisconsin’s stunner of Kentucky had been treated like a moon landing.) With Duke pulling away late, the Badgers needed a little more, and a little more didn’t arrive.

When it was over, you could see all that irresistible life drain out of the Badgers, who had been a delight all tournament—loose, quick-witted, a self-deprecating sitcom cast. The postgame locker room was a mournful hush. This outfit had accomplished so much—Big Ten title, first Wisconsin No. 1 seed, back-to-back trips to Final Fours. But this was now a breakup. There were departing Badgers, historic players, who would never wear red again. “Right now it’s hard to swallow,” said fifth-year senior guard Josh Gasser, surrounded by microphones, eyes red, processing the end of it all right there, in real time.

They’d imagined a different finish. “These guys are my family—I mean that literally; I don’t mean that hypothetically,” Frank Kaminsky, the senior center, said at a postgame news conference. An awkward freshman who had risen to become the national player of the year, Kaminsky had often thrown the Badgers upon his lanky back, and Indianapolis represented the end of his brilliant run, too. “It’s just going to be hard to say goodbye.”

“What [Frank] did in his years at Wisconsin will be remembered for a long time,” said Badgers coach Bo Ryan.

This is what it means to get here, of course. In the aftermath, there was talk about what Duke did and what Wisconsin didn’t and Ryan growled a bit about the late flurry of foul calls—that’s the kind of thing that never lands right—but this was the second-guessing that happens when the road reaches this far. The history was now history. Badgers had reached the Final Four once more, and once more had come heartbreakingly close. This was always the hazard. It was also totally worth it. Now if you don’t mind I need to hug Bucky Badger, and go talk to a beer.

A comment sums up my feelings Monday night:

… Buzzfeed finishes that thought:

Jonathan Daniel / Getty Images

A regular season school record for wins. Big Ten champions. Big Ten Tournament Champions. It was already one of the greatest seasons in UW history.

2. Because Wisconsin entered the tournament as a No. 1 seed for the first time ever.

Sports Illustrated

And by the end of the tournament, Wisconsin had definitely proven that they deserved it.

3. Because this is how Wisconsin center Frank Kaminsky celebrated that No. 1 seed.

BuzzFeed

Note the eye contact. It really brings a whole new level to the ball-rubbing.

4. Because only one win into the tournament, sophomore forward Nigel Hayes noticed the press stenographer. And then he tested her spelling.

Charlie Neibergall / AP

“Well, the wonderful young lady over there, I think her job title is a stenographer, yes, OK. And she does an amazing job of typing words, sometimes if words are not in her dictionary, maybe if I say soliloquy right now, she may have to work a little bit harder to type that word, or quandary, zephyr, xylophone, things like that, that make her job really interesting.”

5. Because right before the Sweet 16, Nigel Hayes accidentally called a woman in the press room “beautiful” into the microphone.

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I guess he didn’t realize how powerful microphones are.

6. And it led to this epic facepalm.

YouTube

Sam Dekker and Frank Kaminsky cannot contain themselves. Who can blame them?

7. Because after Sam Dekker went off for 23 points against UNC in the Sweet 16, the impossible became possible.

Mark J. Terrill / AP

“Make ‘em believe.”

8. Because two days later, Frank Kaminsky exploded for 28 points against Arizona, and led Wisconsin back to the Final Four. For the second year in a row!

Mark J. Terrill / AP

When you’re that tall, you only need to go a quarter of the way up the ladder.

9. Because even Aaron Rodgers couldn’t resist joining in on the fun!

Mark J. Terrill / AP

Heroes of Wisconsin, unite!

10. Because back in Madison, State Street went hard!

State Street is ALIVE. #FINALFOUR

— UWMadison (@UW-Madison)

You think they might be a little excited?

11. Because no one was prepared for what happened next.

USA Today Sports

The biggest stage. The undefeated Kentucky Wildcats. Lucas Oil Stadium. The Final Four. NBD, right?

12. Because THEY DID WHAT???

David J. Phillip / AP

13. SERIOUSLY! WHAT?!

Darron Cummings / AP

14. *runs around screaming and high-fiving and hugging*

Andy Lyons / Getty Images

If you want to be a Badger, just come along with me…to the NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP GAME!

15. Because after beating the unbeatable, the Badgers had some friends waiting for them back at their hotel.

So, this must be what it’s like to be a rockstar? #Badgers #OnWisconsin

— BadgerMBB (@Wisconsin Basketball)

It’s a Wisconsin thing.

16. Because before the biggest game of their careers in front of the bright lights of the sports media, the Badgers stayed true to themselves.

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17. And of course, Nigel Hayes arrived in style.

Its @tmj4 photog Jim Angeli’s video of @NIGEL_HAYES riding to presser. We’ll show you hilarity at 10:20 #Badgers

— lanceallan (@Lance Allan)

Classic Nigel.

18. Because Wisconsin’s own Frank Kaminsky was this year’s NCAA Player of the Year.

Kiichiro Sato / AP

Could coach Bo Ryan smile any harder?

19. Because no matter the final score, the Badgers made Wisconsin proud in the National Championship.

David J. Phillip / AP

You wanted a game? You got one!

20. Because no other team gave their fans this many amazing memories.

David J. Phillip / AP

21. And no other fanbase was more proud of their team.

Andy Manis / AP

Let’s go, Badgers! *clap clap* *clap clap clap*

22. Because while players come and go, Wisconsin still has Bo Ryan.

Michael Conroy / AP

23. And Bo’s many, many amazing faces.

Michael Conroy / AP

David J. Phillip / AP

Mark J. Terrill / AP

On Wisconsin!

Andy Manis / AP

U-rah-rah.

First, our national anthem, including Wisconsin’s Vitto Brown:

Saturday’s NCAA national semifinal …

… was to the Badgers what this was to the nation …

… because while beating undefeated Kentucky was huge, it’s not the last game. Tonight is, against Duke.

As you can see, the Badgers have been letting the attention get to them:

The Sporting News recounts Sunday’s press conference:

During media availability on Sunday afternoon at Lucas Oil Stadium, Nigel Hayes, Sam Dekker, Josh Gasser, Frank Kaminsky and Bronson Koenig sat on the stage constantly scanning the crowd of reporters below. Every minute or so, two of the players would lean back in their chairs, cover their mouths with a hand or part of their jerseys and giggle like schoolgirls.

The entire 40-minute media session was punctuated with giggles from the players, Bo Ryan and the media, but perhaps no one moment was funnier than when sophomore forward Hayes responded to one of the only questions he was asked with this honesty:

“I don’t really know how to answer questions. I just thought I was brought here to say some words and you might laugh,” he said with a megawatt grin. (His words to stump the stenographer on Sunday were “logorrhea” and “succedaneum,” in case you’re wondering.)

Most coaches wouldn’t tolerate any funny business, but Ryan — who the players endearingly refer to as “Pops” — embraces his team’s looseness and camaraderie. He lets them goof around while he fields questions from the press and even joins in on occasion. For good reason too — Ryan couldn’t manufacture the team’s playful approach if he tried. And many coaches have.

Back to the question at hand: what’s so funny?

Turns out, each time the Badgers address the media, they’re playing a game. The game doesn’t have a name but the premise is simple. Each player scans the crowd searching for people who look like either famous people or someone who the players all know. When a player identifies a doppelgänger, he alerts his teammates and so begins a ripple of chortles across the stage.

PHOTOS: Duke’s Final Four uniforms throughout the years

“Vitto (Brown) started this lookalike game we do where we crowd-search to find someone who looks like someone we know or someone on our team, because Bronson (Koenig) and myself, we get asked over 101 questions per interview so we really just need to pass the time,” Hayes said with a touch of sarcasm.

Dekker said the team found “Steve Aoki” and “Ray Lewis” twins in the horde on Sunday, and added that “every bald guy is automatically Jeff Potrykus.” Potrykus is the Badgers’ beat writer for the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, and Dekker said he’s aware of his legend status in the game.

It’s hard to determine who exactly is the ringleader of the bunch. Koenig takes credit for being the self-described “funniest guy on the team” — an assessment Hayes agreed with, saying that he and Brown are “1A and 1B” when it comes to team jokester. Some may think it’s Hayes’ title for his well-documented trolling of the tournament stenographers, but Koenig says “(the team), we all think he’s corny.”

And then there’s Frank Kaminsky.

Kaminsky is the star of the show on the court, and off of it, too, due to his unabashed self-awareness. What you see is what you get with “Frank the Tank.”

“He’s one to not be afraid to show his true emotions, true colors,” Dekker explained. “I think that’s what makes him such a good player. He’s learned to be himself and not care what people think about him. You see him dancing. You see him yelling. You see him giving attitude to the media because he acts like he hates it, like it’s the worst thing ever. But that’s truly how he is behind closed doors.

“If he masks his personality, it’s going to change him as a player and as a person so I’m happy that he’s cool with being himself and not caring what the national perception of him is. I’m really proud of him for that.”

If nothing else, the national perception of Kaminsky is that he’s captivating both in terms of skillset and wit. He cemented that status on Sunday afternoon when responding to a question about whether he considered himself “the man.”

The Sporting News Player of the Year paused for a moment, looked over his right shoulder at Gasser, tilted his head and asked “am I?” There was a dramatic pause before he began his answer. Kaminsky was working the crowd for his shining moment.

“I don’t know. I wasn’t prepared for a question of this magnitude,” he grinned. Another pause. “So do you want like an intellectual answer, or…?”

Honesty. Humility. Humor. That’s what we’ll remember about these Badgers, no matter how this wild journey to the title ends. Let the mic drop.

One media type called the Badgers possibly the most media-friendly college team of all time. Another suggested that Hayes did so well at news conferences that he might be hired as a college football coach.

The Badgers will or will not win tonight (and that’s why you pay the big bucks for the brilliant insight found in this blog), but they won’t fall flat on their faces. Evan Flood explains why:

After (1) Wisconsin (36-3) did the unthinkable and beat (1) Kentucky (38-1), ending the Wildcats’ perfect season, senior guard Josh Gasser quickly reminded the rest of his teammates that the win was just another step towards their ultimate goal — and nothing more.

While the victory over Kentucky might have been the biggest in program history, the Badgers had no time to actually enjoy the moment.

“We have another game, it’s not over,” Gasser said. “We have nothing to celebrate. It’s a huge accomplishment to make it to the National Championship, but that wasn’t our goal. We celebrated for a good five or six seconds, but we’ve got to move on.

“It might have been the biggest win in school history and it will last for two days.”

Here’s a list of the last 12 National Champions in College Basketball; UConn (3), Louisville, Kentucky, Duke, North Carolina (2), Kansas, Florida (2), Syracuse.

Needless to say, Wisconsin doesn’t exactly fit in with the elite group of programs they’re trying to join in Monday’s National Championship Game versus (1) Duke (34-4). In fact, 18 of the last 19 national titles have gone to true blue blood programs, with only Maryland in 2002 able to force their way into the discussion of college basketball’s elite.

(1) Wisconsin (36-3) will always be remembered as the team that beat Goliath and previously unbeaten (1) Kentucky (38-1). That will never be taken away from them.

But that’s not what they’re here for.

Seeking the program’s first national title since 1941, the Badgers find themselves one game away from forever etched in history as one of the great teams in college basketball.

“All season we’ve had the idea of winning a national championship in our minds,” senior Duje Dukan said.

Kentucky is Wisconsin’s Russia and Duke their Finland.

Having knocked off the best team in college basketball, 71-64 in Saturday’s national semifinal, the team with nine McDonald’s All-Americans that many pegged unbeatable, the Badgers now have the task of coming down from certainly one of the more memorable victories in NCAA Tournament history.

“After [the 1980 US hockey team] beat Russia, we had to beat Finland,” Wisconsin Women’s Hockey Coach and former Olympic Gold Medalist Mark Johnson told Bo Ryan.

“Most people think that Russia was the gold medal game,” Ryan continued. “I think it was Finland, wasn’t it? I’ve been reminded on a few text messages that Finland is Duke, both really good teams.”

If Wisconsin goes on to win the national championship, it will have been by way of the most difficult road possible and the toughest run since the tournament expanded to 68 teams.

In the Sweet 16, the Badgers beat North Carolina 79-72 in the Sweet 16, their first-ever win over the Tar Heels in program history. Wisconsin then topped Arizona in the Elite Eight 85-78 for the second-consecutive season. Saturday’s win over Kentucky was the program’s second win against a No. 1 seed in the past two seasons and first over the Wildcats in over 30 years.

In the third Associated Press Poll, each of Wisconsin’s last four opponents, which includes Duke, were ranked in the top six along with the Badgers.

“To be able to beat North Carolina, Arizona, Kentucky and now have a chance at Duke, that is pretty remarkable for a school that is not considered a powerhouse,” Gasser said.

Since Ryan’s arrival in 2001, Wisconsin has been the exception to the rule in college basketball.

Winning without a high influx of elite high school recruits, the Badgers get things done and their own way. Beating a team with nine McDonald’s All-Americans in Kentucky, Wisconsin will have to do the same again with Duke, who also has nine McDonald’s All-Americans.

Wisconsin has just one former five-star recruit and have had just two total in Ryan’s 14-year tenure.

The Badgers do have something no team in the country has, however.

“We have seven Wisconsin all-stars, and they (Duke) have none,” Gasser joked.

But Wisconsin, especially Ryan, has never been concerned with the national perception of his program.

“I don’t know about perception,” said Ryan. “I do know these guys have established themselves as being a pretty good group of young men that have come together.

“Whatever this team accomplishes Monday night, one way or the other, it’s still who they are. They proudly have represented the University of Wisconsin, the Big Ten.

“I’m never really concerned if there are people that perceive us a certain way because we are who we are. We play the way we play. We’re sure happy with it. So we can live with that.”

While his players will play in their first-ever National Championship Game, this is not Ryan’s first rodeo. The 67-year-old won four national titles at Division 3 Wisconsin Platteville.

While Ryan will underplay the national perception of his program, he won’t understate what a championship would mean to the state of Wisconsin, who has waited 74 years for another opportunity like the one they earned Monday night.

“They (Badgers) know that they have a chance to make a mark in history,” he said. “They understand that. They’ve already done some of that. But when you’re an athlete and you’re competing, there’s unfinished business here.

“It’s just like in ’91 when that Platteville won the national championship. The first thing I did is I looked at the crowd because I wanted to see how happy everybody else was, to see how happy the players were. This team affects a lot of people and their emotions.

“For the state of Wisconsin, for them to get a national championship, yeah, I think that would have a lasting impression.”

You might say.

The Badgers are playing Duke, which beat Wisconsin early in the season. Wisconsin has changed a few things, and Duke probably has as well.

There are a lot of Duke haters, for reasons I don’t get other than Duke’s perpetual success under coach Mike Krzyzewski, who got his 1,000th win earlier this season. Duke’s players play well (although they seemed nonchalant on defense the last time I watched them, but tell that to Michigan State), graduate, and are generally good representatives of their university.

The difficult thing for both teams is that they had only Sunday to prepare, as opposed to having an entire week to get ready for the semifinal. So Wisconsin has had little time to prepare for Duke’s Jahlil Okafor, but Duke has had little time to prepare for Wisconsin’s Frank Kaminsky, winner of numerous national player-of-the-year awards, or Sam Dekker, both of whom present major matchup problems, as the teams that have lost to UW can attest.

It should be a great game. On Wisconsin.

Not since the days of Stu Jackson, Michael Finley and Rashard Griffith have Wisconsin basketball teams been known for their offense.

Thanks, however, to defining offense and defense by ways other than the score, which reflects tempo almost as much as the ability to put the ball in the basket, the 2014-15 Badgers are believed by the stats types to be better on offense than defense.

Tonight’s national semifinal is a battle of the number one defense, Kentucky, and the number one offense, Wisconsin, in terms of efficiency. Matt Norlander asks:

So tell me: How can Kentucky beat Wisconsin?

That’s no typo.

How will Kentucky, 38-0 Kentucky, beat Wisconsin?

Let’s get into this, because one of the big reasons this is among the most enticing and attractive Final Fours ever is this game — which has the elements for topping last weekend’s Kentucky-Notre Dame classic — and the diametric forces at work. UK-Wisconsin might end up among the best national semifinals in the history of the sport. It’s obvious why the Wildcats are the five-point favorites and rightfully being framed as presumed winners.

But they’re not likely winners. There are arguments to be had on both sides here. This undefeated Wildcats defense is going to be remembered for its length, size, speed and skyline-high fortification. It’s without debate among the most impressive defensive units in the past decade, if not the best. Kentucky’s 85.6 adjusted defensive efficiency mark on KenPom.com ties 2013 Wisconsin’s crew, of all teams, for second-best ever. A John Calipari team, coincidentally enough, has the best per-possession defensive rating in the KenPom era (i.e. since 2002): Memphis in 2008-09 posted an 85.1 DRtg.

“Having so many tall, athletic players, it definitely doesn’t make it easy,” Wisconsin’s Frank Kaminsky said. “At the same time we know that we’re going to be able to get some stuff just like they’re going to be able to get some stuff going on on offense. It’s going to be a battle, we know that. They have like seven guys over 6-10. … It’s going to be fun. I can’t wait. It’s not going to be easy to prepare because obviously there’s no scout team in the country that can replicate what they have on their team.”

But for as superb as UK is on defense, it’s now facing Wisconsin, which boasts far and away the best offense in modern college basketball history. In a sentence: the Badgers are better with the ball than Kentucky is without it.

“One of our biggest things in the Notre Dame game was giving up backdoors, easy baskets,” Cauley-Stein said. “They utilized that. They kind of pride themselves on, you know, exploiting people’s weakness and taking over from it. So that’s our biggest thing is not giving up easy baskets, not letting them play angles against us.”

If Notre Dame was a river for Kentucky to ford, Wisconsin is a white-capped rapid. The Badgers have an offensive rating of 127.5, meaning they are dousing foes at a blazing rate. UW’s scoring nearly 128 points per 100 possessions. Unheard of at the college level.

Here’s how their shot chart looks. This is every basket attempted this season:

That UW is flirting with 1.3 PPP on a per-game basis is flatly freaky. We should’ve expected a continuation from last season, when the Bucky O clocked out at 120.8, but it’s gotten ridiculous.

And the team’s efficiency keeps rising.

Since March began, Wisconsin’s offense has only gotten better — against better opponents in the biggest time of the season, mind you. …

That Sconnie embarrassed Arizona’s elite defense to the point of jumping its overall O rating almost two full points in the Elite Eight has to be one of the most impressive achievements any team’s had in the NCAA Tournament — ever.

While we don’t have data from prior teams/decades, it’s very possible no group has ever been this efficient on offense in the history of college hoops. It’s all the more likely when you consider the 3-point line didn’t come into play until the 1980s. This team has five guys averaging more than one 3-pointer made per game. …

Kentucky’s defensive assignments are going to be fascinating. Will Cauley-Stein match up on Kaminsky, and if so, who does Karl-Anthony Towns guard? And Trey Lyles? Expect shifts by the possession.

“I think with the guys that we have, we’re going to do a lot of switching anyway,” Cauley Stein said. “Not one person is going to be on that set player during the whole game. You know, everybody in practice has been guarding guards and bigs. We’re just kind of ready for everything.”

Additionally, this year’s Final Four is so intriguing because it’s got the headliner of undefeated Kentucky and that wowing defense — then you see Wisconsin, Duke at 119.8 points per 100 possessions, which is third in the country, and Kentucky with a 115.6 O rating, fifth-best in the sport this season. And then you factor in how Wisconsin doesn’t slice at itself. The team’s foul-per-game rate is 12.4, the lowest in the country, and its turnover percentage sits at 12.3 percent of possessions. That’s also the lowest in the country. It’s done this against the eighth-toughest schedule nationally.

Your offense gets much better the less you give the ball away. No one has mastered this like Wisconsin.

Through this lens, it’s a little surprising we haven’t seen more people make a bigger deal out of what UK’s dealing with. Especially when you factor in that Kentucky and Wisconsin played each other in last year’s Final Four, and that game was a classic.

Oh, right, and Frank Kaminsky is the Player of the Year.

“How much better he’s gotten over a two-year period, it’s almost scary,” Calipari said.

To ask or expect a rematch in the Final Four and for both teams to be putting up peerless numbers is a treat for fans and proof Calipari and Bo Ryan are all-time greats. It’s only fitting they’re both up for Naismith Hall of Fame nominations. (We’ll find out Monday morning if Calipari and/or Ryan earned enough votes for induction this year.)

Kentucky’s the one with the undefeated record, but as Calipari’s repeated often this month, it’s not perfect. His guys faced their best opponent of the season last weekend in Cleveland and they barely won. Notre Dame more than likely wins that game if it scores just one basket in the final two and a half minutes.

Wisconsin going two and a half minutes without a point would be Halley’s Comet-rare.

The question isn’t: How is Wisconsin going to be Kentucky?

The question is: How incredibly lucky are we to get a game of this caliber on the sport’s ultimate stage?

James Pennington adds:

So what does that mean when the No. 1 defense in the country and the second-best defense of any team since 2002 (Kentucky) plays against the best offense, by a wide margin, in college basketball since 2002 (Wisconsin)? Do we have a cliche to easily solve this? Is there any precedent at all for excellence at these levels in direct competition?

That since 2002 was established because that’s when KenPom.com started tracking data in college basketball. Since then, the best offense in college basketball is this year’s Wisconsin team. The Badgers score 127.5 points per 100 possessions. The 2014 Michigan Wolverines (124.1) and 2005 Wake Forest Demon Deacons (124.0) are the only two teams to top 124 since 2002. This is a historic offense.

Kentucky’s defense hasn’t let it down yet. The Wildcats remained undefeated in the regional final because their defense found just enough to slow down Notre Dame — the second-best offensive team in the country — despite the Irish’s near-perfect plan to pull off the upset. The Wildcats’ 85.6 points allowed per 100 possessions is the best in college basketball this year, and the only team better since 2002 was John Calipari’s 2009 Memphis team. This is a historic defense.

The beauty of these two teams playing in the Final Four rather than the title game is that the two coaches will have been planning against each other for a full week in preparation for a direct battle between the nation’s best at each end of the floor. And both teams are great because of how well the coaches deploy their players.

I hesitate to call either Wisconsin’s offense or Kentucky’s defense art, because the most common reaction to watching either at its best is along the lines of, How did they do that?, and the term artistry implies that technical execution is invisible. Moments of artistry-relative-to-basketball pop in and out between strict sessions of regimented offense (in Wisconsin’s case) and defense (in Kentucky’s case).

For instance, the Wildcats: A defense as good as Kentucky’s has to be intensely structured. Calipari is a master of teaching defense on a short timetable. Whereas Jim Boeheim can allow a player to prosper for a few years and quietly master the intricacies of the 2-3 zone, Kentucky has four freshmen that each average at least 50 percent of Kentucky’s available team minutes.

Still, Kentucky’s defense is characterized by its understanding of Calipari’s defense and commitment to execution, paired with immense size and athletic ability used creatively to react to lapses (or perhaps even to proactively take more risks). …

Whereas Kentucky’s athleticism likely overshadows its defensive execution, Wisconsin is the other way around. The Badgers are clinicians. They perfectly mix patience and urgency, rarely taking shots too soon or not soon enough unless they are doing so with a specific end in mind. …

Ryan’s offense is so efficient because of the open looks it creates, but Ryan also allows his players the freedom to use their athleticism and attack the basket at will. ..

Both Dekker and Frank Kaminsky have such a handle on Ryan’s offense that reading ripples in opposing defenses and riffing off of them is a big part of why Wisconsin is so dangerous, and that both of them can move as well as they do enables Ryan to let them loose.

Predicting which will prevail — Wisconsin’s offense or Kentucky’s defense — isn’t the point of the build-up to Saturday. No, the point is embracing the talent and unity of both teams. Neither would be in the Final Four and the best in the country at what they do if it weren’t for the right mixture of talent, unity, coaching and a hundred other factors I nor most readers would ever come up with on our own. One team will win Saturday because the rules of basketball demand it, and the other team, whether it’s Kentucky or Wisconsin, should be remembered for its excellence rather than falling short against the team designed perfectly to stop it.

Well, my rule of postseason sports is that defense is more important than offense. And that’s why I am still picking Kentucky to win today. Sadly.