Before Bo Ryan became the winningest basketball coach in Wisconsin school history, and one of the best coaches in the game, he was a rookie coach at a school where basketball was an afterthought. There were a lot of unknowns surrounding Coach Ryan when he first arrived in Madison. But guard Kirk Penney immediately shattered the uncertainty by leading Bo Ryan and Wisconsin to back-to-back Big 10 titles.
In 2001, Penney, a junior, was one of the only returning players from the (dare I say fluky) Final Four run in Dick Bennett’s final season as head coach two years prior.