BadgerExtra columnist Jim Polzin looks back on the career of former Wisconsin men's basketball coach Bo Ryan, who will be inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in August.
A coveted member of the last three University of Wisconsin men’s basketball teams has found a new place to play next season.
Point guard Chucky Hepburn committed to Louisville on Thursday according to Stadium. He joins a rebuilding Cardinals roster under former College of Charleston coach Pat Kelsey.
Hepburn made the shocking move to enter the portal April 18, leaving Wisconsin without perhaps its most important all-around player going into next season. It came on the same day that AJ Storr, last year’s leading scorer for Wisconsin, announced his transfer to Kansas — marking a low moment for the Badgers program after a much-improved season ended in disappointment in the NCAA Tournament’s first round.
In three seasons, Hepburn spent more than 3,300 minutes on the floor (32.1 per game) and started all 103 games he played. But he was just starting to realize his potential by averaging 15 points and 5.3 assists in the final four games of Wisconsin’s season. That includes a Big Ten Tournament semifinal performance against Purdue, a 76-75 overtime win, when he scored 20 points and a 22-point outing in the Badgers’ loss to Illinois in the title game.
He had displayed some elite moments early in his time with the Badgers, most notably by banking in the go-ahead 3-pointer against Purdue late in the 2021-22 regular season, helping Wisconsin secure its share of the Big Ten regular-season title.
Despite leading the Badgers in scoring, Hepburn didn’t take as much of an offensive jump after he was named to the Big Ten’s all-freshman team in his first season with averages of 7.9 points, 2.2 rebounds and 2.3 assists per game. The Omaha, Nebraska native averaged 12.2 points, 2.8 rebounds and 2.8 assists per game and was all-conference honorable mention in his second season.
Hepburn didn’t fit seamlessly into the role of a go-to scorer at the end of games for a Badgers team that lacked off-the-dribble creators, despite being Wisconsin’s best perimeter defender and making strides as a standstill 3-point shooter. He raised his 3-point shooting average from 34.8% to 40.5% but dipped a half-percentage point in his shooting.
Hepburn told BadgerExtra it was because he lacked confidence when he shot throughout the season, and he was also nursing a sore knee that was the result of him carrying extra weight. But Hepburn dropped 10 pounds while maintaining the muscle that has allowed him to become one of the premier perimeter defenders in the Big Ten. And he entered the season determined not to force anything, despite some early showings like a run in the final 4 minutes, 36 seconds against SMU at the Fort Myers Tip-Off when Hepburn scored all 10 of his points to lead Wisconsin to the early season tournament win.
His scoring and shooting took awhile to reach a consistent level but Hepburn maintained a vital impact into a Badgers team that quickly ascended as high as the No. 6 team in the Associated Press men’s college basketball rankings. His 3.19 assist-to-turnover ratio ranked No. 16 in the country and his 2.1 steals per contest were second in the Big Ten last season. But Hepburn always felt there was room to grow with his offensive game, and he realized that in the final few games of the season. He was more aggressive hunting his shot, and looked to be the Badgers’ best offensive player entering the NCAA Tournament.
But he had eight points on 3-of-8 shooting with three turnovers (just the second time this season he’d tallied more than two in a game) performance in a game when the Badgers struggled will be the last game of his Wisconsin career.
Hepburn was one of the players the Badgers featured in a post on Instagram working in the weight room on April 9. His connection to Omaha transfer forward Frankie Fidler made the scoring wing a oft-talked-about target of the Badgers for the ability to play alongside Hepburn just as in high school. Fidler, who averaged 20.1 points and 6.3 rebounds per game for the Mavericks last season, seemed to be a solid replacement for the loss of Storr’s scoring. But the two will now each play elsewhere instead. Fidler announced he will play at Michigan State for his final year of eligibility.
Kamari McGee, Max Klesmit and John Blackwell all have capabilities to run the Badgers’ offense. But the individual importance of Klesmit and Blackwell as scorers for Wisconsin likely will require it to look for a point guard to replace Hepburn next season in the transfer portal, or look to the freshman Freitag to take over the starting role immediately — just as Hepburn did in his first season.
Photos: Chucky Hepburn's Wisconsin men's basketball career
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