Michigan basketball opens Big Ten play with red hot Badgers: ‘Shows you where you are’

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A lot has changed in college basketball since Michigan basketball head coach Dusty May was in the Big Ten.

The last time May was involved in a game involving the conference was 2000, just before he finished his undergraduate degree at Indiana, when he served as a student manager under Bobby Knight. Back then, there were seemingly two portions of the season: nonconference and conference.

Naturally, one finished before the other started.

Michigan Wolverines head coach Dusty May looks on in the first half against Tarleton State at Crisler Center in Ann Arbor on Thursday, Nov. 21, 2024.

That’s no longer the case. With Big Ten expansion (even before it moved to 18 teams this year) and TV contract money going way up, the league saw an opportunity to get more eye balls on the conference early if it threw in a pair of league games prior to the calendar flipping.

That’s why newly ranked No. 23 Michigan basketball (6-1) is preparing for its first league game of the year when it travels to take on No. 11 Wisconsin (8-0) at the Kohl Center in Madison, Wisconsin on Tuesday (9 p.m., Peacock) just five days after Thanksgiving.

“If I was the czar of basketball, I’d probably finish the noncon first,” May said Monday morning at Crisler Center before practice. “But I’m all for it. Whatever it is, both teams, everyone in our league has the same thing.

“You kind of see where you are. You play two games, you could be 2-0, 1-1, 0-2, and you realize you still have a lot more left and it just shows you where you are in early December, and you have to be a much better team in January if you haven’t performed well.”

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Red hot Badgers

The Badgers are not one of those teams that has started slowly. Coach Greg Gard’s group was a popular pick to take a step back this season considering he needed to replace three starters. Senior forward Tyler Wahl graduated, last year’s leading scorer AJ Storr went to Kansas, and…

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Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/michigan-basketball-opens-big-ten-111000948.html

Author : Detroit Free Press

Publish date : 2024-12-03 11:10:00

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