In the Sports Academy Directors' Cup standings for the 2005-06 year, Wisconsin athletics was ranked fifth overall. The standings, which are released by the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics, include men's and women's cross country, soccer, women's volleyball, women's field hockey, Division I-A and I-AA football and men's water polo.
The team that most contributed to the school's ranking was the men's cross country team, whose NCAA title on Nov. 21 earned UW 100 points. Finishing in the Elite Eight in volleyball earned the school 73 points while the No. 15 ranking in the USA Today/ Coaches Poll for the Badger football team gave the school 45 points. 20th place for the women's cross country team at the NCAA meet awarded UW with 34 points and women's soccer qualifying for the NCAA tournament earned the school 25 points. UW's total of 277 points was second in the conference only to Penn State's 308.5 points. The next best Big Ten team was Ohio State in tenth place.
Finishing first was Notre Dame with 412 points, followed by Penn State, Stanford with 282 and Duke with 280.
The finish was an improvement from last year's ark, when UW took 19th place, the school's highest since the 1999-2000 rankings.
