The Wisconsin men’s basketball team started their overseas tour of France on Wednesday against the Paris All-Stars. Greg Gard spoke about his team’s performance in the win per Jeff Potrykus of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

The Badgers won the 1st game of the 4-game exhibition by a score of 81-66. Steven Crowl was the team’s leader in scoring with 13 points, and not too far behind was Chucky Hepburn with 12 points.

“It’s exactly what we need,” Gard said in a video posted on the program’s Twitter account. “We need to play a lot of guys. We need to get tested. I thought the Paris team got really physical with us…which was good. It exposed some things that maybe our younger guys weren’t accustomed to.”

While Gard will be happy with getting the win, there was a turnover problem for Wisconsin. The Badgers finished the game with 25 turnovers. However, the Wisconsin HC is focusing on getting his players all the experience they can get.

“Sloppy at times,” Gard said. “But we’re going to continue to use this trip to get guys experience. “I’m really not consumed with what the score says. I’m more concerned with making sure guys get experience, specifically guys that are either new to the program or haven’t played a lot in the past.” 

Here is the full video clip of everything that Gard said after the game: