Greg Gard's red, musty eyes nearly told the entire story.
It wasn't long after Wisconsin's stunning end to its 2024-25 season, a 91-89 defeat to No.6 BYU where the Badgers climbed out of a 14-point deficit only to see a potential game-winning shot fall short on the final possession when Gard was asked to make an opening statement to the media.
Three wins short of the Final Four in San Antonio, five shy of immortality, slipped past, and in its wake was a seven-tournament streak of not advancing out of the opening weekend.
But the sadness Gard expressed in his opening remarks late Saturday night had nothing to do with his legacy or the stigma that he can't build a team for a sustained tournament run (for the record, he could care less of outside opinions of him) and everything to do with a team that impacted him as much as any other.
"I've been doing this a long time, almost 35 years, and as I told them, watching them grow together from the time we got together in June to now may have been the most fun, enjoyable year in my career," Gard said. "We were highly doubted early. We weren't even supposed to be in this tournament, supposed to be finishing 12th in the Big Ten, and this group just bought in and committed to each other and were so much fun to be around every single day and so much fun to coach, and the joy that they played with and how they bonded together is really, really special."
He's not wrong. Instead of being the 12th-best team in the conference, the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee named the Badgers the 12th-best team in the country, rewarding them for a top-four finish in the conference and a runner-up finish in the tournament title game.
However, it's hard to blame the selected Big Ten writers who voted from accurately evaluating the Badgers based on their roster in early October.
UW went into the season looking to replace three starters, including leading scorer A.J. Storr and starting point guard/defensive stalwart Chucky Hepburn, with three portal players who spent the previous season either at the mid-major level, mostly injured, or both.
One player has yet to work out because of injury and illness (Camren Hunter) and another (Xavier Amos) became an impactful reserve once he adjusted to the Big Ten's physicality. The third transfer changed the perception of the program.
Despite being ranked sub-200 in transfer portal rankings, John Tonje put together one of the best offensive seasons by a Wisconsin player in school history. His 724 points ranked second, his 231 free throws and 90.9 free-throw percentage ranked first, and his 37 points against BYU were the most by a UW player in an NCAA Tournament game.
He averaged 25.1 points against ranked teams, scoring at least 20 points 15 times and at least 30 six times. Most importantly, Tonje melded well with Wisconsin's core seniors, which included starting center Steven Crowl, vocal leader Max Klesmit, and their top two reserves, guard Kamari McGee and forward Carter Gilmore.
“Experience is key," Gard said. "If you look at the history of this program, 20-plus years I’ve been here, our older teams and more mature teams have competed toe-to-toe with really talented individual players at other places. The experience is the equalizer."
Regaining that veteran presence now becomes Gard's challenge, which is different now in today's era than it was five years ago. When Gard first started, Wisconsin recruited high school prospects and developed them for multiple years through redshirting, scout team, and bench minutes before, hopefully, turning them into two-year starters and fifth-year seniors.
It used to be simple to project what a roster would look like every year, with seniors graduating and underclassmen taking their place. Now, teams are acquiring experience through the transfer portal by targeting players who have matured, developed, and played multiple at other programs while balancing bringing in those high school prospects to develop.
"The objective is to win games. How do you win games? You have to stay old and mature," Gard said. "In years gone by, there was a different way of doing it ... Now we’re in a different era where staying old comes through other sources. Who you recruit as freshmen is really important. You have to have people who want to be here, who are invested in the long haul and know that it’s going to be a long haul. That it’s really hard.
"If you look across college basketball, there aren’t a lot of players making a splash as a freshman and winning at a high level. Maturity wins. Experience wins. Making sure your freshmen understand that and you have the right people here who really want to be here and didn’t come here for a dollar sign, they came here for what this place represents and what this place can do for you over the course of your career. Those things are emphasized and talked about. You have to continue to develop. You develop every day in practice with what we do. You develop by going against older guys and maturing and growing that way.
"It is a challenge. Every program in the country is trying to find the right path for them. We all want to win at the highest level. By and large, you are doing that with older guys."
While nothing is certain, Wisconsin feels comfortable that juniors-to-be John Blackwell and Nolan Winter will be back next season and be critical pieces the program can recruit and develop around.
Taking over the point guard role after Hepburn's stunning departure, Blackwell tied Tonje for the team lead in minutes (31.2) and averaged 15.8 points, and 5.1 rebounds per game with a 1.05 assist-to-turnover ratio. Over the final 10 games, Blackwell averaged 18.2 points per game.
Winter failed to score in double figures in 36 games as a true freshman, but Wisconsin was 15-2 when he scored at least 10 points this past season. Like most Wisconsin centers, Winter can shoot from the perimeter (35.8 percent) but can put the ball on the floor and attack the paint like a guard. He shot a team-best 56.4 percent from the floor and was the team's leading rebounder at 5.8 per game.
Both players thrived in Wisconsin's revamped offense, which emphasizes tempo, ball screens, and spacing the floor to yield high-percentage three-point shots and lanes to attack the rim and draw fouls. The change has led to Wisconsin being ranked 12th nationally in adjusted offensive efficiency (122.8 points per 100 possessions) and has developed into a more appealing offense to prospects.
"It’s up-tempo but it’s also really efficient," Gard said. "It’s smart. It’s not wild. For the most part, we are really under control. The spacing, the threes, whether it be in transition or the half court. The ability and opportunity to play in pick and rolls which they all want to play in at the next level. Regardless of whether it’s NBA or overseas, you have to be able to play in a pick-and-roll. That’s just where the game is right now. And then you have bigs who shoot it. Those who are larger than average that we are talking to, they see us play and roll hard to the rim, play out of short rolls and middle ball screens, and then shoot threes, it’s an appealing way to play.
"It's moved the needle pretty drastically in a short period of time. And you win at a high level. In recruiting, who we evaluate through the portal, are they coming from a winning program and been around winners? You want winners in your locker room and been a part of a winning culture."
With programs forced to now operate yearly instead of a four-year window, Gard said he and his staff targeted specific players to balance out an older roster.
He'll be tasked to do it again, building off one of the better coaching jobs from roster management to offensive development with the hope his program can outperform what will likely be meager expectations for a second consecutive season.
And with another year further away from Wisconsin's last deep run in the NCAA Tournament, the Badgers will hope they can finally find a way to move from very good to great.
"How do you snap all that together? I think this team is a good example of that of the start of this new era of year by year putting a team together," Gard said. "You have to make sure you have enough of X but not too much of Y, and how do you balance all that?
"Having depth and the right pieces across, what does next year’s team need? Who will be back? Those are all questions we continuing answer and go forward with."
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