3 takeaways from Michigan basketball win over Wisconsin

On February's national signing day and the news breaking about football coach Steve Clinkscale remaining in Ann Arbor, the basketball program secured its most pivotal win of its abysmal season. It was also a much-needed birthday present for Juwan Howard. As a result, Michigan basketball gets out of the cellar for the time being and now has three quad one wins which ranks in the top 25 for that particular category.

Here are three of the takeaways.

1. Michigan's interior defense was outscored 40-20 in the paint

15 of Wisconsin's points came from three, while 13 were converted at the free throw line, but the final 40 came from inside the paint. A.J. Storr had 20, he was their leading scorer. Storr made one of his four three point attempts and was perfect from the charity stripe. Overall he was 50% on the night and has scored in double-digits in all but two games this season.

Tyler Wahl's 12 points all came from down below the bucket. He went 6-7 with the most rebounds for the Badgers. Chucky Hepburn and Max Klesmit were the only two other Badgers who had more than 10 points in the loss. The bench was basically non-existent and Will Tschetter single-handedly outscored four Badgers combined.

Dug McDaniel paved the way for Michigan basketball, more importantly, though, others helped him out to pull out the win. Olivier Nkamhoua was a basket short of a double-double, while Taris Reed Jr. did a little bit of everything for the maize and blue. Getting everyone to play at this consistent level for the next month is something the coaches will burn in the players' minds if they want to save any type of hope for a late run.