[media-credit name=’JEFF SCHORFHEIDE/Herald photo’ align=’alignright’ width=’336′][/media-credit]

EVANSTON, Ill. ? Wisconsin?s basketball team never learned the
importance of sharing. Saturday, Northwestern was forced to find out the hard
way just how determined UW was to keep things for themselves.

Needing a win to claim sole possession of the Big Ten?s
regular season title, the Badgers handed the Wildcats a 65-52 loss to eliminate
the possibility of sharing the title with Indiana and Purdue.

?When someone says, ?Who was the Big Ten champs this year??
they won?t say Wisconsin, Indiana and Purdue; they?ll just say Wisconsin,?
junior Marcus Landry said. ?For us to have that we had to come out there,
contribute and play our hearts out.?

The Badgers had claimed partial possession with a win over
Penn State last Wednesday, but the weekend win sealed it up.

?To win it outright is nice because then it eliminates some
of the conversation about this part of the season,? Badger coach Bo Ryan said.

It was never much of a game Saturday.

Brian Butch played one of his best games of the year,
scoring 20 points and grabbing a career-high 14 rebounds, and the Badgers were
quickly able to dispatch the Wildcats ? winners of just one Big Ten game this
season.

?It?s a great feeling to be able to close it out like that,?
Butch said. ?Hopefully we made a little statement here.

?All I care about is winning. ? It?s nice to put up numbers,
but when it comes down to it, it?s having a title, having a championship.?

Wisconsin had trouble dealing with Northwestern?s 1-3-1
defense early on, however, turning the ball over 16 times for the game. But
experience playing against the defense helped the Badgers, or at least the
older ones, break the defense in the second half.

?You can ask some of our freshmen [about the zone]. ? That
experience is so important because of the unique kind of basketball that they
play,? Butch said.

Wisconsin was able to make up for the turnovers by
dominating Northwestern on the boards. The Badgers outrebounded the Wildcats
38-21 and were able to convert 14 offensive rebounds into 14 second-chance
points.

?Their guys are just big strong guys, and we weren?t able to
keep them off the backboards and off the block,? Northwestern coach Bill
Carmody said. ?They were getting very good position and sort of overpowered us,
I thought.?

The Badgers never trailed after starting the game with a 6-0
lead, but the Wildcats? defense quickly got them back into it. With 5:27 to go,
UW?s lead was just 21-20.

Wisconsin held Northwestern scoreless for the rest of the
half, however, and Jason Bohannon hit a buzzer-beating shot to help finish the
half on an 8-0 run that extended the lead to nine points.

?There are runs when you play every team, either for or
against,? Ryan said. But we can take 30 minutes of every game and they?ve
knocked the crap out of the other team.

?When you prepare to play them, those kinds of runs where
you get eight in a row, that?s like 20 against some other teams, believe me.?

Landry went on an 8-0 run of his own in the second half that
spanned less than a minute and extended UW?s lead from eight to 16 points that
helped put down NU for good. The forward hit a pair of 3-pointers and a layup
in the 60-second stretch.

?The second half I just let [the game] come to me, and I was
being patient and it ended up opening up for me in the second half,? Landry
said.

UW was also able to once again shut down Northwestern on the
offensive end, holding its opponent to under 60 points for the sixth straight
game.

?Defense is what got us here today and in position to do
this, and it is what won it out here today,? junior Joe Krabbenhoft said.
?You’ve got to be so disciplined against a Northwestern team who runs that
Princeton offense, and what Bo Ryan team isn?t disciplined on defense??

The Badger defense may have quieted the Wildcat offense, but
it did draw quite a loud response from the stands.

Though Northwestern?s crowd was listed as a sellout of
8,117, the overwhelming majority of fans were wearing red and cheering on
Wisconsin as the team finished off its championship-winning regular season.

?It was incredible just seeing all the fans everywhere, just
red,? Landry said. ?When you look up in the stands and you see majority red,
you?re like, ?We’ve got to get this done in front of our home crowd.??