The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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MARCH 2023 THE WOLVERINE 77 A No. 11 seed, Michigan basketball reached a Big Ten-record fifth consecutive Sweet 16 last season by beating No. 3 seed Tennessee — re- garded as the hottest team in the country — in the NCAA Tournament's round of 32. Out of the 200 minutes played by Michigan players in the 76-68 win, only 52 came from Wolverines who are on the 2022-23 team — junior center Hunter Dickinson (38) and junior forward Ter- rance Williams II (14). Dickinson, a 2021 second-team All-American and two- time All-Big Ten honoree, is surely huge to have back, but this season has shown how difficult it is to win with youth and a hefty amount of roster turnover, even if the centerpiece is in place. Michigan was ranked No. 22 in the preseason Associated Press poll — the second-highest Big Ten team — but is 15-12 through 27 games and in jeopardy of finishing below .500 for the first time since 2010. Out of 363 Division I teams, Michi- gan ranks 309th in experience and 275th in minutes continuity (the percentage of a team's minutes played by the same players from last season to this year). On top of that, starting point guard Jaelin Llewellyn, a graduate transfer who started 76 career games at Princeton, went down with a season-ending knee injury Dec. 4, thrusting freshman point guard Dug Mc- Daniel — who was averaging 17.1 minutes per game off the bench — into a much larger role. By necessity, he's logged 30- plus minutes in 16 of the 18 outings since. Being an experienced team is not a pre- requisite to having a successful season in college basketball — take North Carolina, for example, which ranks 25th in experi- ence but has been one of the most disap- pointing teams in the country with a 16-11 record — but it's proving to help in today's game. One look at the AP Top 25 released Feb. 20 makes that calculus pretty clear. Thir- teen of those 25 teams rank among the top 100 in experience. Furthermore, eight are in the top 50, seven are in the top 30 and five are in the top 20. It certainly helps. Penn State (first), Virginia (fourth), Iowa State (sixth), Texas (seventh), Memphis (10th), Maryland (11th), Xavier (14th), Pittsburgh (16th), Miami (27th) and Kansas State (30th) all rank top 30 in experience and have exceeded preseason expectations up to this point. All of those teams except Penn State are currently projected to receive at-large bids to the NCAA Tournament, per Bracket Matrix. Michigan may well make a run to close out this season, but looking ahead at the 2023-24 campaign, a lot of the Wolver- ines' chances to put together a good- to-possibly-great season hinges on the NBA decisions of Dickinson, sophomore guard Kobe Bufkin and freshman wing Jett Howard. * * * Michigan and Texas have flipped the locations of their upcoming football series, with the Longhorns now set to visit Ann Arbor in 2024 and play host to the Wolverines in 2027. At least, that's how it's scheduled for the time being. Many have speculated that the games will be called off, given that USC and UCLA are entering the Big Ten, which could throw a wrench into Michigan's schedule. There's a chance it could play Ohio State, Penn State, one of the West Coast teams and Texas in the same year, which doesn't seem like the wis- est move given that a couple losses could eliminate Michigan from Col- lege Football Playoff contention, even with the field set to expand to 12 teams in 2024. Ohio State, for example, just can- celed its series with Washington scheduled for 2024 and 2025, and it is paying the Huskies a $500,000 penalty to get out of the contract. The Buckeyes were slated to travel to Seattle in 2024, but they'll instead add another home game. It's under- standable they would not want to potentially head west twice in the same season, with the Big Ten hav- ing the ability to send them to play one of the Los Angeles schools. If Michigan does play Texas, the 2024 showdown at The Big House could feature some big-name quarterbacks in what would be an exciting battle. If Michigan's J.J. McCarthy stays for his senior season, he would likely face off with either Quinn Ewers, a current sophomore, or Arch Manning, an in- coming freshman. Both of those Long- horns were the No. 1 signal-callers in their respective recruiting classes, and McCarthy is considered by Pro Football Focus to be the No. 7 Heisman Trophy contender heading into the 2023 cam- paign. It all sounds fun, but it's written in pencil for now. ❏ SAYFIE BLITZ CLAYTON SAYFIE Age Matters Staff writer Clayton Sayfie has covered Michigan athletics for The Wolverine since 2019. Contact him at Clayton.Sayfie@on3. com and follow him on Twitter @CSayf23. Junior Hunter Dickinson is just one of two current U-M players who played in last season's NCAA Tournament victory against Tennessee in the round of 32. This year, Michigan ranks 309th in experi- ence out of 363 Division I teams. PHOTO BY LON HORWEDEL