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

EVANSTON, Ill. ? This wasn’t supposed to happen.

Most teams that lose half of their scoring from the
previous year, including a first-team All-American, the program’s leading
scorer and the highest scoring duo in school history, generally don’t come back
the following year and win conference championships outright.

But as they proved again Saturday, the Wisconsin
basketball team is not most teams.

In earning an undisputed Big Ten title with a 65-52
win over Northwestern, Wisconsin turned in a performance that typified how a
team without much big-name star power or a specified go-to player was able to
win the Big Ten.

?We didn?t get away from what we?ve done,? senior
forward Brian Butch said. ?When we do get away from what we do, we?re not that
good.?

They did it with balanced scoring.

Without All-American Alando Tucker and classmate
Kammron Taylor to lean on, it was an egalitarian offense for UW for most of the
season. The Badgers ? a team that had a five-game stretch earlier in the Big
Ten season with a different player scoring 20 points or more in each game ? got
20 points from Butch, who in the final regular season conference game of his
career, also matched a career high with 14 rebounds.

But just like it has all season, Wisconsin didn?t
just get scoring from only one place. Two other Badgers besides Butch (Jason
Bohannon, 15 points; Marcus Landry, 12) broke the 10-point barrier, and a
fourth player, Joe Krabbenhoft, ended only one point shy of double digits.

?That?s the unique thing about this team,? Butch
said. ?We just don?t have ? and I kind of sound like a broken record when I say
it ? but we just don?t have one guy that you can key on. ? I think that
explains how we?ve been all year.?

They did it with defense.

The Badgers entered Saturday?s game allowing the
fewest points per game in the nation, just 54.4 every contest, a defense that
gives up nearly four points less than the second-best team in the Big Ten and
ranks third nationally in defensive efficiency, according to statistician Ken
Pomeroy.

That stifling defense was on display again, as the
Wildcats scored just 52 points on 59 possessions, an average of just over 0.87
points every time down the floor.

It was that sort of defense that helped alleviate
some of the burden of losing Tucker and Taylor?s scoring and became the
identity of this Badgers team.

“On the
defensive end, they were willing to make that commitment to cover, help, pinch
and sink,” Ryan said. “This group, defensively, gave themselves an
opportunity to be champions in the Big Ten.”

They did it with
rebounding.

Coming into the
game, the Badgers were one of the better rebounding teams in the Big Ten, outrebounding
their opponents by an average of just over five per game.

The same gritty
toughness that shaped the defense also came through in the rebounding game, as
the Badgers pulled down as many offensive rebounds (14) as the Wildcats did
defensively.

Four Badgers
grabbed five misses or more, as Wisconsin nearly doubled Northwestern?s
rebounds, winning the battle 38-21.

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

A lot of that was
due to Butch. The forward dominated the glass and the undersized Northwestern
front line for his 14 rebounds, but he missed a potential career-high for that
statistic as several loose balls bounced away from him late in the second half.

Balanced scoring,
defense and rebounding. That was the successful formula for Wisconsin Saturday,
and that was the concoction that won the Big Ten championship, even without a
superstar.

?Last year I was so
confident, I would say maybe 90 percent in Alando Tucker and 10 percent in us,?
Krabbenhoft said. ?This team is a complete team. I?m just glad to be a part of
it.?