MADISON, Wis. – Have the Badgers made tremendous change, or were they the benefactors of an easy schedule?

No.18 Wisconsin looked like a different team than the one that started Big Ten play with a home loss to Michigan and a road loss to Illinois, two of the top five teams in the league. The Badgers had won five straight conference games by an average of 16.2 points but did against teams in the bottom half of the conference.

After faltering on defense against UCLA on Tuesday, how good is Wisconsin?

BadgerBlitz.com talked with Wisconsin Basketball color analyst, and former All-Big Ten center, Brian Butch to get his perspective on where this Wisconsin team is following its West Coast swing.

BadgerBlitz: Spending the night in Los Angeles after losing to UCLA, what was the mood like on the flight home for this team?

Brian Butch: It was kind of like a normal trip. It wasn’t like when you lose a game and immediately have to get on a flight home. Not that they are upset or a little bit down, but this was a flight where guys knew the areas where we messed up, know the areas we have to improve, and we’ll be fine. I think everyone thought they didn’t play their best basketball, but they had a chance to win the game, having the ball late down by two.

You look at where they are with the three Big Ten losses by a combined 11 points, I think they feel like they are in a real good spot. They have a couple things they need to improve on and things they can improve on.

BadgerBlitz: Spending a week in California and splitting the two games, what did you learn about Wisconsin on this trip that you didn’t know about beforehand?

Butch: I think the biggest thing with this group that it doesn’t matter where they go, situation, environment, distance, you’re going to have guys step up every game. You don’t necessarily know who that is going to be, but this team is going to be able to travel well and play well on the road, handle whatever the moment is. Is it always going to result in a win? No, but they are never going to get blown out. This isn’t a team that is just going to collapse. They have a lot of guys who understand what the moment is like. This team’s vision and focus are right where it needs to be.

BadgerBlitz: Where would you rank this team’s defense on a scale of one to 10 and why?

Butch: To start the year off, I would probably say a three. I thought they were trending more toward a five or six, but it’s like a four or five after the UCLA game. That’s average, right? That’s where they are at. I thought they were trending toward that six area where they were getting better and better, and I think the UCLA game is one game. I still think they’ll be better and be like a six or seven (defensively) out of 10 by the end of the year. The exciting thing for this group is they have been getting better and are trending in the direction they need to trend, even with the setback Tuesday.

BadgerBlitz: It feels like a low-post player has taken advantage of Wisconsin in these Big Ten losses – Illinois’ Tomislav Ivisic on the glass, and Michigan’s Vlad Goldin and UCLA’s Aday Mara scoring a lot of their points at the rim. Do the Badgers have a weakness in defending low post bigs?

Butch: I don’t think so. When you look at Vlad, he’s been doing it to everybody, so Wisconsin is not the only one. I thought against Illinois’ big they did a really good job. I didn’t think it was Illinois’ big that caused the loss as much as missed free throws and Tre White playing really well. Tuesday night, I mean, if you were going to tell me Mara was going to score 20 plus, you’ll live with that. I don’t mean it in a bad way, but that’s a guy you aren’t anticipating that from and is hard to stop him once he gets going.

If there’s an area where they struggle, it's that they get spread out too much. This leaves the paint open, which puts more pressure on the bigs to be rim protectors. The bigs aren’t rim protectors.

USC is a one-on-one team. Who hurt them Tuesday? Sebastian Mack. Mack got to the bucket. The missed shots he put up were cleaned up because of the pick-and-roll. If they were tighter, I don’t think Mack would get to the paint. You saw that in how Wisconsin wants to guard that based on a team like USC. I think they got too spread out. UCLA is a team that you want to pack it in, play tight, know your matchup, and fly out to shooters. How many flying out to shooters were there on threes? There wasn’t a lot of that.

When you look at the game plan, I feel like I knew what they wanted to do in pack the paint, fly out to shooters, know who the shooters are and who the shooters aren’t, and live it with, especially with the way UCLA shot it. They didn’t follow the rules or the plan in place.

BadgerBlitz: How hard is it to be an elite defensive team in today's college basketball, especially with how the new rules are geared toward increasing scoring?

Butch: To be an elite where you are holding a team to 0.8 points per possession, I think those days are done because you have rule changes that favor offense. Now defensively, the metrics by which you measure yourself have to be evaluated, but you still think that you’re going to have to be a good defensive team to get stops. Tight games, close games, like the three that they lost, how many times did they get those stops? Vlad Goldin went right down the middle when they needed to get a stop, and he got a dunk. Against Illinois, they get scores down the stretch. Against UCLA, I know they had the two stops that gave them a chance, but the majority of the time UCLA got whatever they wanted in the last five minutes of the game.

BadgerBlitz: You have been around and played with a lot of talented players. Can you compare John Blackwell to anyone, especially considering he didn’t play the point guard position last season?

Butch: I can’t think of one. Greg threw out Johnny Davis, who I didn’t see play his freshman year and I would say Johnny’s career was more impact right away. John’s has been slow. I believe John is now the guy on this team, but it’s slower. At the beginning of the year, it was try to figure out the point guard position and try to figure out what I was being asked to do. Even though he’s playing the point, sometimes he still defers to Kamari (McGee) to play the minutes he needs to be able to get him off the ball and to be able to get him going.

Against USC, John got off to a really quick start without Kamari in the game. Against UCLA, he deferred, deferred, deferred, and then ‘oh shoot, we’re down. I’m going to be the alpha and take over.’ I think that’s more the John Blackwell where I go this guy is different.

BadgerBlitz: You have known Gard for a long time, considering he recruited and coached you. How impressed are you by his ability to take Wisconsin from an offensive standpoint and evolve it to today’s game while still adhering to his principles of ball security, movement, and fundamental basketball?

Butch: I think it’s remarkable in the way he’s done it because he’s been open. Most coaches that have had the success that Greg has had, aren’t going to be open to change. They know the way they’ve done, and that’s just the reality of it, which is all ego. That’s why Greg is successful. At no point doesn’t he let his ego get involved with anything he does, and that should be refreshing in a day and age where ego is a big part of it. He’s willing to listen, but he still believes in what he believes in.

Even though the offense they are playing right now is not the swing, if you look at the principles of the swing of getting the ball on the blocks for layups, free throws, and threes, is it really that different from his comfort level? That’s my challenge to everybody out there. I think the way they get those are different, for sure, but the choices are the same.

I would say the only thing Greg has gotten better at communicating, and I think it’s because of the analytics that back this up, is with the swing there were more mid-range shots and more acceptable with a short post, a short corner, or an elbow touch occasionally. The analytics have told everybody that the mid-range twos aren’t what they need to be, so Greg has got that out. The ability to understand that you need to evolve because the rules tell us that we need to evolve because the game is evolving. You can’t be at one point per possession. You have to be around 1.2 if you want to be really efficient.

When you look at Big Ten three, how many transition threes has this team shot compared to nonconference? Not a ton. Everything is more structured and in rhythm. The evolution and where they are is fantastic. I love the way the media is spinning it for Greg and the guys. They are changing! They are evolving! It’s fantastic! I still think the principles are everything he grew up with, which is why he can do that.

BadgerBlitz: Wisconsin plays five consecutive unranked opponents before playing three ranked teams consecutively in Purdue, Illinois, and Oregon. How important is this upcoming stretch for them to start building some momentum before the late February gauntlet?

Butch: Right now, Power Six schools vs Power Six schools, the road team only wins 39 percent of the time. Even though they are winnable games, they are still going to be tough. Northwestern just waxed Indiana.

I think Wisconsin is a top-four, top-five team in the league. I think they need to be able to win those games that are out there. I think the Maryland game is tough because you were on the West Coast, come quickly home, and go out to the East Coast. That’s a hard ask, but every team has a stretch like that.

It’s a challenge but it’s a challenge that a team that is a top-five team in the Big Ten has to take advantage of and go win games.

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