The University of Wisconsin men’s basketball team avenged their 22-point loss to the Scarlet Knights from earlier this season — hanging 78 points on a Rutgers team that entered the contest fourth in the country in defensive efficiency on KenPom. Instead, it was UW who put on a defensive show — forcing 18 turnovers and piling up 14 steals.

After an 11-game absence due to a sprained ankle, guard Kamari McGee returned Thursday and gave the Badgers added juice defensively. While he wouldn’t log a steal on the statsheet — much to his surprise — McGee was part of a key second half run, where a lineup of himself, guard John Blackwell, point guard Chucky Hepburn, forward Tyler Wahl and forward Steven Crowl outgained Rutgers 17–3 in six minutes of action. During that span, McGee scored nine points.

“He understands what this team needs,” head coach Greg Gard said of McGee postgame. “He just brings energy to the floor, he’s a pitbull.”

McGee also praised Blackwell following the contest, describing his intensity and effort on both ends of the court.

The pair combined for all of the Badgers’ bench points, with Blackwell tallying 17 points, eight rebounds and two steals, and McGee notching a season-high 11 points in merely 10 minutes.

“He was all over the place,” McGee said of Blackwell’s efforts. “He’s always locked in and giving his all.”

Overall, guard AJ Storr paced UW in points at 19, while Crowl amassed his sixth double-double of the campaign with 17 points and 11 rebounds (six offensive).

Though Wahl — the only senior on the Badgers roster — was held to just three points on 1-of-6 shooting, he picked up four steals and earned the most important stat of the night, the win.

Checking out of his last game at the Kohl Center with 11 seconds left in the match, Wahl got down and kissed the “W” at mid-court and walked toward the UW bench under a standing ovation.

Wahl goes down as the fifth-most winningest player in program history and as the sixth Badger to collect 1000+ points, 500+ rebounds and 200+ assists in his career. 

Men’s Basketball: Wisconsin falls 91–83 for seventh straight loss against Illinois

As for guard Max Klesmit, the junior went down with what was labeled a lower leg injury six minutes into the second half and did not return. Postgame, Gard said Klesmit was a little sore, but that he’d be okay.

UW got off to a slow start Thursday — enduring two separate scoring droughts of more than three minutes by the eight minute mark of the first half and trailing by as many as nine during that stretch.

Hepburn’s quick hands kept the Badgers within fighting distance, corralling a trio of steals that resulted in six of the team’s first 11 points.

Following the under-eight media timeout, UW found their offensive rhythm, notching a 17–4 run spurred by threes from Blackwell, Storr and Klesmit. The trio would account for 19 of Wisconsin’s final 21 points of the first half — including a buzzer-beating layup from Storr that gave the Badgers a 34–32 halftime lead.

After their offensive burst to close out the first half, UW struggled against the Rutgers’ stingy defense to open the second. In the first six minutes of the period, the Badgers scored just six points, which came from a banked three by Crowl and a 26-footer from Storr, while Rutgers scored on six of their first seven possessions to lead a 15–6 run.

Down seven with Klesmit off the floor due to injury, Gard countered the Rutgers aggressive defense with a lineup of three ball-handlers in Hepburn, McGee and Blackwell. The lineup provided the spark and the intensity that the Badgers needed not only to trim the deficit, but claim a lead.

The final 10 minutes was all UW, as the Badgers stretched their lead to as many as 17 behind 13 second-half points from Crowl, before ultimately claiming a 12-point win.

Now standing 11-8 in conference play, the Badgers are tied with Nebraska and Northwestern for third in the conference and are firmly in the running for a double-bye in the Big Ten Tournament.

If they were to defeat Purdue at West Lafayette on Sunday — a very tall task — the Badgers would clinch a top-four finish in the Big Ten. They take on the Boilermakers at 11:30 a.m. at Mackey Arena on FOX.