MADISON - Defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard met with the media as the Badgers continue prep for their second Big Ten opponent, Illinois.

Leonhard spoke on a number of topics, including what went wrong against Ohio State, Illinois' offense, Bret Bielema's return to Madison, and more.

It was a poor showing all around for Wisconsin against the Buckeyes, but Leonhard's defense looked especially lost against C.J. Stroud and company. Ohio State put on an offensive clinic, and the Badgers didn't have an answer all night.

"You look back at the tape, a lot of execution," Leonhard told reporters. "There's things I wanna do better, there's things I can do to help them schematically. We had a lot of things that were not characteristic of what this defense has been, from physicality, communication, you talk just alignment, assignment football, we were all over the map in that game. You play bad teams and you get exposed when you play that way. You play great teams and it looks like that."

Leonhard wouldn't call anyone out specifically, but mentioned that some players got into a detrimental mindset from the jump.

"We had some guys that kinda got shell-shocked early, and it took them a really long time to get out of it...There's plenty of things I'll put on my plate. As a player, I think you gotta own the technique, own the communication and eyes. We had a little bit of guys seeing ghosts. Like, 'this happened and this happened.' Nope, that's not what it was. Definitely things were moving a little fast for some guys."

Leonhard wasn't shy about taking blame, but also made it clear that the lights were a little too bright for some of his young starters. There's a lot to clean up after a performance like that, but no other team on Wisconsin's remaining schedule has an offense quite like the Buckeyes.

Last season, Wisconsin got back on track following their 1-3 start with a road shutout over the Illini. In that game, Illinois' passing attack was completely shut down. Their starting quarterback, Artur Sitkowski, started an abysmal 0-12 throwing the football. By the time he completed a pass, Wisconsin was already up three scores.

This year, the Illini boast a revamped offense. Led by quarterback Tommy DeVito and running back Chase Brown, the Illini are a much more competent group offensively than a season ago. The tailback Brown enters week five as the nation's leader in rushing yards, with 604.

"I think the offense is really well designed...they know what they do well, they do it really well, they play fast and confident, and then they have a lot of things to try to slow you down. It's a lot of eye discipline on the back end, for instance their runs and RPOs or their screens and their shots. It all plays off of each other really well...They do a good job of forcing you to be disciplined, one, but two, hesitant."

Discipline was a major issue for the Badgers last week against Ohio State. Assignments, tackling angles, and everything in between. Against a less talented Illinois offense, Wisconsin's defenders should have more of a chance to diagnose plays. But with their well-conceived scheme, the Illini hope they can make the Badgers defense pick up right where it left off against the Buckeyes.

Wisconsin's pass rush has been somewhat overlooked thus far, as other issues have been rearing their ugly head for this defense. Star outside linebacker Nick Herbig has four sacks through four games, but the rest of the team has only accounted for four more. No player besides Herbig has more than one.

"What kind of coordinator is not gonna want more pressure?" Leonhard asked playfully when asked to evaluate his group's performance rushing the passer. "I think it's been a little bit up and down. We've played some teams that were a little more conservative, especially after we got ahead, so they weren't gonna expose quarterbacks. Obviously as we get into Big Ten play, tighter games, bigger moments, I think we're gonna have a little bit more opportunities to create pressure."

Leonhard has a good point, which is that in games like Illinois State or New Mexico State, there's simply less opportunities to sack the quarterback. Not only did Wisconsin win time of possession, but after those teams got down big, there were lots of dejected handoffs. Leonhard doesn't expect this to be the case now that the schedule is filled with Big Ten foes.

"I thought we'd done a great job on third down up until this last week. We didn't get them into many third-and-long, third-and-pass situations...We know with what we're seeing from (Nick) Herbie we gotta do some things to make teams identify and find him, because he's getting a lot of attention, which is great and well deserved by him."

Leonhard's focus now seems to be scheming up pressure outside of base formations, and scheming Herbig to get more chances to do what he does best: hunt quarterbacks.

Bielema, Illinois' head coach, will return to Madison as a coach for the first time since 2012, when he headed the Badgers' program. Leonhard was asked about his time with Bielema and what kind of impression he made on the program.

"His energy coming in was different...that was kinda the number one thing going into my senior year. We knew we had a talented group, especially on defense, and you just kinda felt that energy. The confidence that he brought in, the whole team kinda felt it."

Leonhard was also asked about what kind of reception Bielema should expect to receive in Madison.

"I would anticipate him getting booed, just because that seems what fans do nowadays, whether it's right or wrong. Obviously he had a great run here...He took over the program in a good spot, and left it in a good spot...who knows? Like I said, I've seen hall of fame players get booed because they left for a year."

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