At a glance, Wisconsin looks like the first genuine three-way race of the long primary. It’s the first state where all voting — even early voting, which began Monday — will occur without the presence of Marco Rubio, who recently ended his campaign. It’s also a region that has basically split between Cruz, Donald Trump and Gov. John Kasich (R-Ohio). Across Illinois, Michigan and Ohio, Cruz won an average 21.7 percent of the vote; in the biggest suburbs of each state, he frequently ran behind Kasich.

That offers Cruz the chance to surprise, and reset the campaign narrative, in what superficially looks like enemy terrain. Even a narrow win would given Cruz a shot at all 42 of the state’s delegates. Wisconsin’s delegate-picking system — winner-take-all statewide, then winner-take-all by district — poses undeniable challenges for both Trump and Kasich.

“We’re gonna do fine here,” Kasich said after a Milwaukee County town hall on Wednesday. “I’m not gonna predict we’re gonna win here.”

And Trump may be a harder sell here than in any Midwestern state. The evidence for that has been collected by Marquette University Law School, in polls analyzed by the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel’s Craig Gilbert. In rural Wisconsin, Trump is broadly popular among Republicans. In the “WOW” counties of Waukesha, Ozaukee and Washington, his negative rating among Republicans is 39 points. It’s almost as high in Milwaukee itself. That’s a radical difference from Illinois and Michigan, where Trump built winning margins in the largest cities and their suburbs.