McGee didn’t even know what those were. 

The University of Wisconsin basketball junior guard was in his first year with the program following a transfer from UW-Green Bay a season ago. With the Phoenix, he had been used to eating many of the same things. The pregame meal was always pasta and chicken. Breakfast, the same. Lunch, the same.

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But with Wisconsin heading on the road for four of its first six games last season, it didn’t take long for McGee to realize things here would be different. 

Yet … lamb chops?

“Never had it,” McGee said at the time. “Never heard of it.”

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McGee’s confused reaction is like several Wisconsin players who have entered the program over the last few years, often introduced without much warning to strength and conditioning coach Jim Snider’s unique road trip meal-planning methods. But Snider, in his third full season as the Badgers’ strength coach, usually doesn’t leave the players in the dark.

He has a reason for suggesting hotel catering staff serve lamb chops for breakfast: high-protein, high-fat foods are harder to burn, awakening the metabolism at an earlier hour. It’s what Snider calls “reverse paradigm eating” or meal-planning backwards, with more traditional breakfast foods such as pancakes and French toast typically being served as the final meal of the day. Also, no dairy. And rice or sweet potatoes instead of pasta. The variety is abundant and the food choices, for some players, could be jarring.

But Snider tries to make every aspect of his strategy digestible — something players can take with them outside of their dealings with Wisconsin and into the next stage of their life or career. 

Road trips, though, are the time when players are most exposed to Snider’s philosophy. While the Wisconsin athletic department has nutritional staff members that help supply and guide players when they’re in Madison, on the road it’s all Snider. That wasn’t always a responsibility of his, but in the midst of a five-day, two-game road trip for No. 11 Wisconsin (16-7, 8-4 Big Ten), Snider’s holistic approach to strength training now has him mapping out every single road-trip meal. And he considers it a part of his duty to introduce players to new foods as part of a broader education on nutrition.

“When I first came on board I was like, ‘Hey, you want to eat your way? Go right ahead,’” Snider said. “And then it’s like, ‘Huh? Wasn’t working as good.’ And then they listened to the guy next to them: ‘Yeah, man, I tried what (Snider) says, and I actually felt pretty good out there.’ Then the next guy: ‘Yeah, I tried that, too. It was weird, but I actually felt better, too.’ … These guys are young kids. I can tell them all the things, but I’ve realized peer pressure is way stronger than what I’m trying to tell them.”

Before that word started to spread, Snider had to have a first project. Snider joined the men’s basketball team in a part-time role in 2019-20, working double duty with the men’s hockey team until he was hired as a full-time member of the men’s basketball program in April 2021. Snider, always interested in nutrition for its close proximity with shaping an athlete’s body, had experience performing blood and nutrient analysis as an independent practitioner and consultant for professional athletes — a skill that could be pared down to the college level.

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A rising redshirt senior in the summer before the 2020-21 season, former Badgers forward Micah Potter wanted to put himself in the best position possible. The Badgers already had a department-wide nutrition staff, but Potter said due to COVID-19 restrictions his last season he doesn’t remember ever seeing anyone in person. So when he and Snider sat down to meal plan for the summer, they mapped out what he followed every summer since (before the most recent one, when he had to make slight changes to lose weight for his second season on a two-way contract with the NBA’s Utah Jazz). 

“(Snider) is an NBA strength coach, or any other kind of professional sport,” Potter said. “For Wisconsin to have him is super special.”

Snider was able to break it down for Potter by macronutrients: 296 grams of protein, 367 grams of carbohydrates and 92 grams (on a non-workout day) or 100 grams (on a workout day) of fat. Potter bought a food scale, weighing out everything he ate — a lot of steak, rice, chicken and veggies with the occasional no-butter sweet potato mash or baked potato — and tracked everything using the free version of the app MyFitnessPal. Snider also put Potter on creatine as a supplement.

Potter went from 240 pounds to 245. But he lost 10 pounds of fat and gained 15 pounds of muscle. Potter averaged 12.5 points and 5.9 rebounds in 22.2 minutes his final season at Wisconsin, making 20 starts. Snider remembered Potter as one of the first players who came to him. Yet over time, trust started to build in Snider’s holistic approach to strength building — and that extended past the players to Wisconsin coach Greg Gard. 

And of course, winning helps. Snider’s unique and strategic approach to nutrition was something Wisconsin eased into team wide. Yet Potter started to notice some changes by the end of the 2019-20 season. Potter said he’s never met a basketball player — at any level — who can sleep after games, but sweeter, traditional breakfast items were introduced to the postgame meals to allow players to benefit from a sugar crash as they went to bed. The Badgers closed out the 2019-20 by winning a share of the Big Ten regular-season title, and were unable to build upon their title in the postseason with the Big Ten Tournament’s cancellation due to COVID-19. 

It’s around that time Wisconsin’s chief of staff and director of basketball operations Marc VandeWettering remembered Snider’s willingness to involve himself in the meal-planning became even more helpful, as hotels had limited food availability when the Badgers did their travel throughout the COVID-19-impacted 2020-21 season. Yet Wisconsin’s players still appreciated the variety, VandeWettering said. 

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As Snider has taken a more hands-on approach to meal planning, more foods have entered the fold, including duck and smoked catfish, among other things. And of course, the lamb chops. That’s a staple breakfast meal for the Badgers now, even if forward Carter Gilmore joked that seeing it on the table his first meal on the road made him worry he slept through breakfast. McGee, who didn’t even know what they were the first time he saw them, loves them.

“He’ll be down there smacking like six or seven lamb chops,” Klesmit said of McGee, laughing.

“I’ll be killing the lamb chops,” McGee confirmed with a grin.

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Snider and VandeWettering will build the menus. And then there’s the meal times, the pregame meal usually falling three and a half to four hours before tip. VandeWettering then relays those menus to a third party, eventually reaching the catering staff of the hotel where Wisconsin is staying. The hotels are used to feeding athletes, seeing their share of menus. Yet the feedback that VandeWettering hears from hotel chefs, often also relayed through a third party, is usually complimentary of the Badgers’ selections.

Klesmit said Snider has a good understanding of what players like to eat, and there’s always a mix of options depending on the time of day. Even coaches and staff eat the same food. For freshmen and new members of the program, VandeWettering said Snider will make his rounds during meals by skeptical players staring at foods they’ve never had before.

“Just try it,” Snider would say. And with time, they do, because they know it will be good for them.

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Plus, everything is better for the Badgers when they win. Wisconsin’s Fort Myers Tip-Off trip, which featured two wins, is one example. Klesmit remembered the postgame selections were perhaps the best they’d seen to that point of the season: French toast, breakfast burritos, hamburgers, cheeseburgers and cookies. Klesmit loaded five burgers on his plate, bringing whatever he couldn’t finish up to his hotel room.

Klesmit had dropped weight in preparation for the season, but still, keeping weight on in season was an issue in previous years. But Wisconsin — especially on the road — puts out some good food. And Klesmit said it’s nice to be aware that it’s not for no reason.

“It is kind of nice, enjoyable,” Klesmit said, “and then to know what you’re getting out of it as well, (Snider) does a good job of teaching us why we’re doing things.”