OMAHA, Neb. -- The University of Wisconsin men's basketball team was leading Cal State Fullerton by eight points Thursday night in the first round of the NCAA tournament, when point guard Trevon Hughes went to the free-throw line in the double bonus.

After making the first, Hughes missed the second, but tracked down a long rebound on the left wing. What happened next likely made every highlight show from the game.

Hughes drove the base line, with the ball in his left hand, pivoted, switched the ball to his right hand and wrapped a perfect behind-the-back bounce pass to forward Brian Butch on the right block.

Butch threw down an emphatic dunk that gave the Badgers a 62-51 lead and punctuated their 71-56 victory.

So, what was going through the mind of UW assistant coach Greg Gard when Hughes made that pass?

"What the (heck) is he doing?" Gard said Friday. "That was my first thought, until Brian caught it and dunked it."

The education process of Hughes, a sophomore nearing the end of his first season as a starter, clearly continues. If the regular season was Hughes' undergraduate work, consider the postseason the start of post-graduate work.

"For him, he's shown spurts of progression all year long," Gard said. "We just need to continue to work toward consistent progression."

Hughes' pass came one possession after senior guard Michael Flowers went behind his back and whipped a pass out of bounds, drawing a glare from UW coach Bo Ryan.

"I wasn't even thinking about it, until after it happened," Hughes said of Flowers' pass. "After I made the pass, I was like, 'Mike just made the same pass but it went out of bounds.'

"I saw the look (Ryan) had given Mike, and Mike was trying to avoid that look. I was trying not to get the same look. It's just a pass, at the time, I felt I had to make and it got there better than a regular bounce pass. It played out well."

Gard had a slightly different evaluation of the situation.

"That was a point, we were in the double bonus, we needed to continue to try to parade to the free-throw line, foul guys out," Gard said.

"All those things that go into the makeup of a point guard -- 'How do I control a game?' -- that's been part of his learning process throughout the year."

One sign of Hughes' progress is his reduction in turnovers. He had a streak of nine straight games with two or fewer turnovers end when he had three against Fullerton. In the first 23 games, he had 13 with three or more turnovers.

"Basically, it's playing under control, playing under Bo's system, knowing what he wants," Hughes said. "It took me about halfway through the season to figure out what he wants."

Hughes played only a combined 15 minutes in the two NCAA games last year and he seemed to be pressing when he picked up two fouls and played only five minutes in the first half against Fullerton. The second foul came on a charge.

"When he got the first one, when he came to the bench, we talked about how they were going to try and get the second one on him with a charge," Gard said. "Sure enough, five minutes later, he's back next to us."

Another thing Hughes has been learning is to play through aches and pains. He's been bothered by a tender left ankle and he went down hard on his left wrist Thursday, although he said neither will be a factor today against Kansas State in the second round of the Midwest Regional.

"Unless it's bleeding or dangling, we've got to go on," Gard said. "It gets to be a long season, you just have to continue to grind it out."

The next step Hughes has to make in his progression has to do with game management. That means understanding how the score and clock can impact his decisions.

"As they develop and mature, time and score are such huge things, especially from a point guard's standpoint, because of an ability to control a game," Gard said. "That's been part of his learning process throughout the year."