MADISON, Wis. – Can Wisconsin return to its defensive bedrock in 2025?

A glimpse into Tuesday’s two-and-a-half-hour practice inside the Nicholas Johnson Pavilion showed that Wisconsin’s defensive principles still figure prominently in whether the Badgers can compete for a Big Ten title in 2025.

While the Badgers spent extensive work doing five-on-five refereed contests in preparation for Sunday’s Red-White Scrimmage, Wisconsin spent a large chunk of practice on defense, beginning practice working on closeouts around the perimeter and rotating back toward the paint or forcing the offensive player to the sideline.

UW also worked on late shot-clock situations in four-on-four settings, seeing the clock only reset to 12 seconds if the defense made a mistake. During the lengthy drill between three five-to-six-person teams, the offensive only delivered points on a handful of possessions.

“It’s about building habits and understanding why the system is in place that it is,” head coach Greg Gard said. “Individually within it, some can roll the dice a little bit more than others because of recovery time and size and foot speed and length and all those things. They are still learning what their limitations are and what their extensions are defensively.”