Little Back Comes Up Big for Wisconsin in Victory Over Duke : Hall of Fame: The 5-foot-9 Fletcher rushes for 241 yards and two touchdowns as Badgers defeat Blue Devils, 34-20.

TAMPA, Fla. —  One of Wisconsin’s smallest players saved his biggest game for last.

“That little guy is something,” Badger Coach Barry Alvarez said after Terrell Fletcher carried 39 times for 241 yards and two touchdowns in a 34-20 victory over Duke in the Hall of Fame Bowl on Monday. “He’s one of the finest young men I’ve ever been associated with.”

The 5-foot-9 senior set Hall of Fame records for attempts and yardage as he scored from one and 49 yards in the second half to power the Badgers. Fletcher had 160 of his yards on three touchdown drives after the Blue Devils tied the score at 13-13 early in the second half.

It marked the second time in as many games that Fletcher set a career-high rushing total. With a bowl berth on the line, he had 192 yards to lead the Badgers past Illinois in their regular-season finale.

“You always dream about having big games,” Fletcher said, “but I never, ever dreamed about anything like this.”

The Badgers (7-4-1) won four of their last five games in a season dominated by off-the-field news, including one incident involving Brent Moss, the player who started ahead of Fletcher. It was a stark contrast from last season, when Wisconsin won the Big Ten title and the Rose Bowl.

This season, two Badgers were suspended for their alleged involvement in shoplifting, and the team lost two players, including Moss, in separate cocaine incidents.

Fletcher called the victory “an emotional moment for everybody. It was an exclamation point for the whole team.”

No. 25 Duke (8-4) lost four of five after a school-record 7-0 start under first-year Coach Fred Goldsmith.

“They overcame adversity early and really made a great game out of it, one that I thought we really could win,” Goldsmith said.

But in the end, Fletcher was too much for Duke.

“I’d say 90% of the time we’d hit him at the line of scrimmage or in the backfield,” Duke safety Ray Farmer said. “He’s just a tremendous back. He’d bounce off and spin and do whatever he had to do to get the yards.”

The Blue Devils rallied from a disastrous start in which Spence Fischer had passes intercepted on Duke’s first three possessions. Wisconsin turned two of the interceptions into 10 points on the way to a 13-0 lead.

The second of Wisconsin’s two lost fumbles led to a 30-yard field goal by Duke’s Tom Cochran that made the score 13-13 in the third quarter.

But Wisconsin responded with a 76-yard drive in which Fletcher rushed eight times for 56 yards, including a one-yard burst that put the Badgers ahead to stay with 4:05 to play in the third quarter.

Midway through the fourth quarter, Wisconsin put together an 83-yard drive--including 38 rushing yards by Fletcher--that ended on an 11-yard scoring pass from Darrell Bevell to Jason Burns that made the score 27-13.

Duke cut the margin to 20-7 on Robert Baldwin’s second scoring run, a two-yarder with 4:10 left.

But Wisconsin sealed it with an 83-yard march.

This time, Fletcher rushed for 66 yards, including a 49-yard burst up the right sideline for the final score with 1:59 left.