Football
While Gary Andersen and his staff lost some players over the weekend, they gained one on Sunday night with the commitment of three-star running back Davon Crookshank. The Texas native is the 16th commit for the class of 2015. Crookshank attended the same high school as former Arkansas running back Kniles Davis.
To put into perspective how athletic, explosive and talent Melvin Gordon is, he was named No. 2 among NFL.com's Mike Huguenin's list of the most explosive athletes in college football. Yeah, that's good.
While left tackle Tyler Marz isn't quite as athletic as Gordon is, he's still equally important to the production of offensive line and offense as a whole. The Springfield, Minnesota, native is No. 5 on ESPN Madison's Zach Heilprin's list of most important Badgers for the 2014 season.
Sadly, the Badgers won't have the same balanced offense they had a year ago, and the below stat really puts into perspective what Jared Abbrederis meant to the offense.
Did You Know: @BadgerFootball was the lone team in the nation to boast two 1,000-yard rushers & a 1,000-yard receiver last season.
— Dan Vasta (@CI_StatsGuru) July 21, 2014
I agree with Fox Sports Wisconsin's Jesse Temple's article about preseason watch lists; they're essentially worthless.
Badgers in the NFL update: Coming off a Super Bowl victory in his second year in the league, quarterback Russell Wilson's jersey was second among those sold on NFLShop.com during the first quarter of the league's fiscal year. Wilson wasn't as high on ESPN.com's Ron Jaworski's list of NFL quarterbacks, but still checked in at No. 9 (Insider). J.J. Watt continues to be one of the greatest guys that ever stepped foot on the UW campus, delivering Papa John's pizzas every Tuesday to Houston Texans fans around the area during the season. In return, the company will give 10 percent of the proceeds toward Watt's foundation. Punter Brad Nortman made a cameo on ESPN's "My Wish" series, as teammate Cam Newton and the Carolina Panthers hosted a little boy. What a great job by the Mothership.
Basketball
We knew Frank Kaminsky and Duje Dukan were solid contributors on the court, and now we know they excel off it as well. The Illinois natives were named to National Association of Basketball Coaches Honor Court, given to men's basketball players who achieve a 3.2 grade point average or higher.
Quick hitters
Wisconsin booster Andy North was on the Dan Patrick Show on Monday. While he didn't talk about the Badgers specifically at all, it's never lost time when North talks about golf.
Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby had some interesting comments at the conference's media days. In essence, he argued cheating in the world of college football has little to no repercussions and far more advantages, because the NCAA department designated to this realm is too internally weak. All the while, it looks like another division for the power-five conferences is on the top of the agenda.