Really, it was supposed to be this way all along.

University of Wisconsin women's basketball coach Lisa Stone would be able to send in waves of fresh bodies that would wear opponents down. The Badgers' quality depth would be too much for them to cope with.

Then again, nothing has really gone according to plan this season for a UW team that is just now putting together the type of consistent performances it expected going into the season.

But that depth has played a key role in the Badgers' recent surge, particularly in UW's last two wins.

And the timing, while maybe later than expected, couldn't be much better, considering the Badgers' Big Ten Conference matchup with Minnesota today in Minneapolis will be their third game in six days.

"Short week, end of season, Big Ten tournament ahead -- usually this is the time where bodies wear down," said Stone, whose team has won three in a row and six of eight. "You need depth, and the fact that people are understanding their roles and we're healthy and the depth is really becoming an impact for us, this is a great time for that to show up."

UW's bench showed up in a big way in Monday night's 79-65 win at Northwestern, outscoring the Wildcats' reserves 36-16. Sophomore forward Mariah Dunham, freshman guard Alyssa Karel and freshman forward Lin Zastrow accounted for 34 points, and were the main instigators of an 18-3, first-half run -- they scored 11 of those points -- that erased an early deficit.

The 36 bench points were the most this season for the Badgers (14-11, 7-8 Big Ten), who are 10-4 when their reserves outscore the opponents' bench. That's happened in each of the last nine games, a stretch during which Stone believes some players have begun to better understand -- and accept -- their roles.

"I just think that everyone's just realizing what their limits (are) and kind of what they can do, and when they go into the game not to just try to do everything at once," said Dunham, a Watertown native. "There's no 10-point basket that you can score to help make the team win. That's kind of how everyone, their mindset kind of switched a little bit now. It's just kind of like they go in there and they just do their part."

In Wednesday's blowout win over Indiana at the Kohl Center, UW held a 27-8 advantage in bench points, led by Dunham's 11.

"Every game, every day in practice Coach Stone kind of challenges us that our depth needs to be our strength, and our bench needs to be productive," said Karel, who had five points, four assists and three blocks against the Hoosiers.

It's taken time for that to happen, though. The Badgers' bench only topped 20 points twice in the season 's first 16 games, and one of those was thanks to a 19-point performance by Karel against Michigan State. It's done so in all but one since.

And considering Minnesota (18-9, 9-6) generally uses an eight-player rotation, UW's depth could serve it well again today.

"We've got some quality coming off the bench," Stone said. "To me it 's rotation, it's not really bench. They're in the rotation. The rotation's pretty solid right now."