The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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JANUARY 2024 ❱ THE WOLVERINE 57 ❱ OLYMPIC SPORTS UPDATE Men's Cross Country A 27th-place individual finish from graduate Tom Brady headlined U-M's output at the NCAA Cross Country Championships Nov. 18. Brady's time (29:37.1) and placement helped lead the Wolverines to a 19th-place team finish at Panorama Farms in Charlottesville, Va., an improvement of 10 spots from a year ago. In addition to earning All-America honors with his finish at NCAAs, Brady was named the Big Ten's Cross Country Ath- lete of the Year as well as Great Lakes Region Athlete of the Year by the U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association. He is the sixth member of the U-M program to win the conference award and the first to do so since Devin Meyrer during the shortened 2020 campaign. Women's Cross Country Graduate Kayla Windemuller represented Michigan as an individual at the NCAA Cross Country Championships and finished with a 20:37.7 time to place 92nd overall. The event marked the end of a season in which Winde- muller finished in the top 20 in six of seven races and logged a 6K time under 21 minutes in four of five starts. She finished as the lead U-M runner in every team competition that she participated in during the 2023 season. U-M's Lani Bloom was selected as the wom- en's Big Ten Freshman of the Year Volleyball Michigan fell in four sets to Indiana (19-25, 21-25, 25-18, 23-25) on Nov. 25 at Cliff Keen Arena, bringing the 2023 season to a close. The Wolverines ended the 2023 campaign with a 7-22 overall record and a 5-15 mark in Big Ten play. Senior Kendall Murray finished with the team lead in kills with 282, senior Brooke Humphrey led in digs (230), freshman Morgan Burke topped the squad in assists (488) and sophomore Serena Nyambio paced the team in blocks (88). Humphrey also was selected as the team's Big Ten Sportsmanship honoree. Men's Gymnastics The second-ranked U-M squad kicked off its 2024 campaign with the annual Maize and Blue Intrasquad Meet on Dec. 9, with the Blue squad taking the meet 246.600-245.400 inside Cliff Keen Arena. It is the Blue team's first win since 2019. The meet was made up of an alternating team format where both teams competed in the same event in a rotating fashion. Each team won three events on the afternoon, headlined by gradu- ate Paul Juda (Blue) placing in the top three of five separate events, earning a place on the podium in every event except for parallel bars. Freshman Pierce Wolfgang (Maize) had a strong showing, winning the all-around event over Maize teammate and junior Rithik Puri by a 78.900- 76.650 mark. The regular season kicks off on Jan. 6 at 1 p.m. when U-M hosts Greenville and Simpson in a tri-meet at home. Men's Swimming & Diving U-M closed out its showing at the Georgia Invitational on Nov. 18 with a fifth-place finish among six teams competing in Athens with Florida, Auburn, Georgia and Florida State leading the way. Georgia Tech finished behind U-M. Junior Gal Groumi had the highlight per- formance of the event for the Wolverines by winning the 200-yard butterfly in a time of 1:40.54. Sophomore Tyler Ray finished second overall, while freshman Colin Geer finished fourth. Other top-10 finishes in the meet included sophomore Eitan Ben- Shitrit, sixth in the 200-yard backstroke with a 1:43.08; senior Bence Szabados, seventh-place in the 100-yard freestyle; and senior Ansel Froass, 10th in the 200- yard breaststroke. U-M holds a team record of 1-1 on the season heading into an extended break before returning to competition on Jan. 19 at noon at home vs. Indiana. A trip to Co- lumbus to take on the Ohio State Buckeyes follows on Jan. 20. Women's Swimming & Diving The 20th-ranked Wolverines finished strong at the Georgia Invitational, grabbing a trio of victories on the final day to secure a third-place finish behind Florida and Au- burn. Georgia, Florida State and Georgia Tech all trailed Michigan at the event. Freshman Stephanie Balduccini claimed a victory in the 100-yard freestyle with a 47.26-second time, helping her pick up an NCAA 'B' cut. Freshman Hannah Bellard finished first in the 200-yard butterfly with a 1:53.21 also grabbed an NCAA 'B' cut. Balduccini, Claire Newman, Lindsay Flynn and Christey Liang grabbed an 'A' cut time of 3:10.30 in a win in the 400-yard freestyle event in the third win of the day for U-M. Michigan is back in the pool on Jan. 19 when hosting Indiana at home before heading to Ohio State on Jan. 20. Wrestling Michigan had five individual place win- ners en route to an eighth-place team fin- ish at the 41st annual Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational on Dec. 2. Their effort was headlined by a runner-up performance from graduate heavyweight Lucas Davison, who finished 4-1 in the event. Fifth-year Cameron Amine (165) finished fourth, while graduates Michael DeAugustino (125), Will Lewan (157) and Jaden Bullock (184) finished sixth in their respective weight classes. Next up for Michigan is a trip to Sioux Falls for a nonconference matchup with South Dakota State on Jan. 7 at 7 p.m. CT. —Anthony Broome Graduate Tom Brady finished 27th at the NCAA Cross Country Championships in Charlottesville, Va., earning All- America honors to go along with being named the Big Ten's Cross Country Athlete of the Year in 2023. PHOTO COURTESY MICHIGAN PHOTOGRAPHY Fall/Winter Sports Roundup