Wisconsin Badgers guard John Blackwell wants to be ‘defensive menace’ in 2025-26

ROSEMONT, Ill. — John Blackwell put his phone on the table as if he was a reporter recording an interview as his coach began a press conference at the Big Ten's basketball media days.

“Mr. Blackwell, you got the first question,” Greg Gard said.

He asked who the funniest player on the team was, and Gard agreed with him that it’s probably him. Gard (perhaps wisely) didn’t answer his teammate Nolan Winter’s question about the ugliest player on the team.

“Who on the team would you not let babysit your child?” Blackwell later asked. (Gard’s answer was Riccardo Greppi.)

When Blackwell hasn’t been asking his coach the hard-hitting questions, the 6-foot-4 guard has been focused on improving his defense following a breakout 2024-25 season and some time testing the NBA draft waters during the summer.

“I want to be a defensive menace,” Blackwell said in a one-on-one interview with the Journal Sentinel amid his onslaught of media interviews. “I want to try to make all-defense this year. I think that would help my team.”

Blackwell’s impressive 2024-25 season was highlighted mostly by marked improvements on the offensive side of the ball. He nearly doubled his scoring from 8.0 to 15.5 points per game while shooting a slightly improved 45.1% from the field. He also had improvements in rebounding and his assist-to-turnover ratio.

 “I know I can score the ball, but defense — that’s what’s going to push me to that next level,” Blackwell said. “And I just got to do it consistently.”

Blackwell, a 2025 all-Big Ten honorable mention, thought he was “solid” on defense. After all, he was an important part of a team that ranked 24th nationally in KenPom’s adjusted defensive efficiency last year. But he sees room for improvement.

“Obviously I’ll make mistakes, but cutting down on the mistakes,” Blackwell said. “Cutting down on getting back-doored or foul trouble. I was in foul trouble last year, so cutting down on those, playing smart, playing how my team needs me out there.”

With 71 games played in his first two years under Gard’s tutelage — including as a starter in all 37 games in 2024-25 — Blackwell’s experience obviously helps on the defensive end.

“Any time you can keep adding rings to your tree, so to speak, as he gets older, those things all help,” Gard said. “ … He played a lot as a freshman, played even more as a sophomore, and now it’s his time. As I always tell the guys, ‘You’re out of halftime of your career, it’s time to take a big jump.’ And I think he’s ready to do that.”

His quest to show more defensive tenacity follows a summer where he tested the NBA draft waters and received feedback before returning to the Badgers. Gard had previously said that he thought Blackwell’s draft process “showed him how good he can be.”

Blackwell also learned “new things I can do to take care of my body,” he said during his press conference at Big Ten media days. That led him to a diet that some may consider sacrilegious in the state of Wisconsin.

“I do no dairy,” Blackwell said. “So I do no cheese ... no ice cream, rarely any sweets. And it’s helped me. It’s helped me sleep better. It’s helped me recover, not a lot of inflammation in my body from the milk or the cheese.”

That's in addition to his daily goal of drinking a gallon of water.

Gard has taken notice of how Blackwell has “changed his body for the better.”

“I think he’s leaner, stronger, got more power to him on the offensive end in terms of when he gets downhill,” Gard said.

If the dairy-free and leaner Blackwell improves his defense in the same way he apparently improved his humor, the Badgers will be in good shape in 2025-26.

“Funniest player on the team?” Gard started to answer Blackwell’s first question of the press conference. “Oh, you think it’s yourself? Probably is, probably is. You used to not be funny, but you are now.”

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Wisconsin's John Blackwell wants to be ‘defensive menace’ in 2025-26