The opening weekend of Big Ten play resulted in three teams remaining undefeated in conference action, with the trio of Maryland, Purdue and Wisconsin sitting atop the standings. Indiana and Iowa are both 1-0, with games to come tonight to see if they can also keep their unblemished records. Conversely, Illinois, Minnesota, and Penn State are all off to shaky 0-2 starts. Even Rutgers notched its first-ever Big Ten win when it held on to beat a cold-shooting Penn State unit on Saturday night. Here’s the rest of the weekend lowdown from an interesting opening slate of games in the wildly unpredictable Big Ten.

AJ Hammons notched a double-double in Purdue’s home win over Michigan on Saturday. (Purdue Exponent)

• Player of the Weekend: Purdue’s AJ Hammons would have definitely been in the mix for Sixth Man of the Year when I listed my non-conference Big Ten superlatives a week ago, but he’s started more games than he’s come off the bench so he didn’t make the cut. On Saturday afternoon against Michigan, however, the junior center was a substitute for the seventh game in a row and it seems as if he’s getting the hang of it. With Isaac Haas in foul trouble, he played a season-high 31 minutes en route to his second double-double of the year. Aside from the fact that he led or tied for the team-high in rebounds, steals and blocks, one noticeable takeaway from the game was the fact that he seems to have really embraced his new role. He appeared more engaged in terms of talking to his teammates, showing emotion when making a play, and genuinely caring about his team and winning, than probably at any time during his first two seasons at Purdue. He won this weekend’s award because of his statistics, but if he can team with Raphael Davis to give this extremely young team some necessary veteran leadership, Purdue could easily turn things around and make a run at a trip to the NCAA Tournament.

• Super Sub of the Weekend: Duje Dukan was just one of four Wisconsin frontcourt players who took turns dominating the game on Sunday night against an overwhelmed Northwestern squad. Sam Dekker drained four threes in the first 10 minutes of the game. Nigel Hayes went 5-of-5 on a variety of clinical post moves that left the Wildcats on skates. Frank Kaminsky contributed five points, five rebounds, and five assists before picking up his second foul and not playing for the last 10 minutes of the first half. But Dukan filled in the gaps for the Badgers, producing 10 points in the first half and finishing with a season-high 14 for the game. He also had an offensive rating of 181.0, as he went 5-of-7 from the field and 2-of-2 from deep. He was simply too quick for the Wildcats’ Alex Olah, taking him to the basket off the dribble and showing (again) that Wisconsin is on another level when all of its composite parts are clicking.
• Best Win: Maryland took another step toward cementing its status as the second-best team in the league with a convincing win over Minnesota in College Park on Saturday. The 25th-most efficient defense in the land held the Gophers to 3-of-22 from behind the three-point line, and the Terps enjoyed a nine-rebound advantage on the glass. While they probably took a few too many threes themselves (8-of-26), this team continues to impress. It can solidly play as many as 10 contributors, giving Mark Turgeon plenty of available options. Damonte Dodd, with nine points, 12 rebounds, and three blocks, was the latest standout for the Terps.
• Worst Loss: Illinois experienced another second half meltdown, losing to Ohio State by 16 points. The Illini turned the ball over a whopping 20 times, and only scored 24 points in the second stanza after leading the Buckeyes by two at the half. Starting off with two road games in league play is never easy, but the way that John Groce’s team lost those games is more disturbing. Things are starting to look a lot like last season, when the Illini were way too dependent on the three-ball. Point guard play is still a problem area as well, as Ahmad Starks just isn’t getting the job done. He shot 1-of-8 in the loss to Ohio State, and the loss of Tracy Abrams to injury seems to be getting more prominently noticeable as the season wears on.
• Most Efficient Performance: Ohio State shone in a number of ways in beating Illinois on Saturday. Wisconsin had the best offensive output of the weekend, but the Buckeyes did their damage on both ends of the floor. They forced 20 Illinois turnovers (28.2% of possessions), and shot 60.0 percent from the field. They also hit 7-of-16 from deep, and the duo of Sam Thompson and Marc Loving combined to shoot 10-of-15 from the floor. In holding Illinois to only three offensive rebounds along with those miscues, Thad Matta’s team caused the Illini to attempt only 45 shots on 71 possessions. An excellent all-around performance by Ohio State.

Brendan Brody (307 Posts)

Brendan Brody is in his fourth season covering the Big Ten for RTC. Email him at brendan.brody@gmail.com, or follow him on twitter @berndon4.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 5th, 2015 at 3:31 pm by Brendan Brody and is filed under big ten, microsites. Tagged: Ahmad Starks, aj hammons, Damonte Dodd, duje dukan, frank kaminsky, illinois, Marc Loving, maryland, Nigel Hayes, ohio state, purdue, Raphael Davis, sam dekker, sam thompson, wisconsin. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.