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Wisconsin’s Vitto Brown sings national anthem at Red/White Scrimmage (VIDEO)

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Wisconsin Athletics

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With the loss of Jared Berggren, Mike Bruesewitz, Ryan Evans from last season’s 23-win squad, Wisconsin head coach Bo Ryan will rely on returnees such as guards Ben Brust and Josh Gasser and wing Sam Dekker to lead the way in 2013-14. Also of importance for Wisconsin is the arrival of a talented five-man freshman class, including guard Bronson Koenig and forward Nigel Hayes.

With two of the team’s top three scorers from last season (Berggren and Evans) gone those newcomers will have an opportunity to earn a spot in the rotation (they also took a summer trip to Canada to help with the learning curve). 6-foot-8 forward Vitto Brown is one of those players, and he can belt out a tune as well. Prior to the start of the team’s Red-White Scrimmage on Saturday Brown, a native of Bowling Green, Ohio, sang the national anthem.

As for the scrimmage the Red team won 67-65 with Brust and George Marshall leading the way offensively with 16 and 14 points, respectively. Dekker led the White team with a game-high 18 points, but more important than any stats from the game was the fact that Gasser made his return to the floor after tearing his ACL prior to the start of the 2012-13 campaign. In 26 minutes of action the redshirt junior tallied 11 points and two assists.

Without Gasser last season more was asked of both Marshall and Traevon Jackson, with the latter making 28 starts and posting averages of 6.9 points and 2.8 assists (led the team) per game. Now with Gasser healthy and the arrival of Koenig, the Badgers have a lot more depth at the point guard position than they did a season ago.

Wisconsin may have lost some key contributors, but since Ryan took over in 2001 the Badgers have yet to finish worse than fourth in the Big Ten in any season (that includes ties for fourth). If the newcomers prove themselves capable of helping out the returnees, Wisconsin will have a good chance of keeping that streak alive.

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