The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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4 THE WOLVERINE ❱ JUNE/JULY 2026 THE 'BIG' BLUEPRINT Fox Sports college basketball writer Michael Cohen published a May 7 article entitled "The Blueprint: How Michigan Built a Formula Col- lege Basketball is Racing to Copy." The article was shared on "The Fort," our message board for TheWolverine.com sub- scribers. Here's an excerpt from the article along with a batch of responses that followed. "Let's just put it this way," [Dusty] May told me last week, "this would be a great time to be the financial advisor of a quality post player, or the agent. There have been times this spring, before we were able to finish our class, where we thought that the market was so inflated. We considered kind of leaving and going a little bit smaller again. Maybe even try to sign a bunch of [wings] with a point guard and spread you out, just because we felt the bigs were so overvalued." … Those bigs should write Dusty a thank you note. Wanting to play big is a not new thing, but now everyone wants to try to replicate what Dusty and Co. pulled off. Which isn't easy to do. There's not many college players like Yaxel Lendeborg and Aday Mara out there. [Mo] 'Rez Johnson Jr. is a bit more conven- tional, but he fit perfectly next to those guys. Pickles24 "Inflated" and "overvalued" is interesting terminology. Given he was considering aban- doning his system and playing a small-ball wildcard brand if he couldn't land a kid — that's a pretty big consequence. Which would suggest good bigs are, in fact, that valuable. Chicago_Blue Until people start winning small ball again. Which will 100 percent happen. When teams adjust to that somebody will go back to play- ing big. Happens in football, too. Most of the time the "new" system isn't even new. It's a retread with minor tweaks. Because of the emphasis on big men, somebody is going to be able to get 4 great shooting guards for cheap. Then that'll be the "new" thing. Trogdor I think it was @MiamiWolv who observed a few weeks ago that the other major col- lege basketball coaches of America seem to be taking away the wrong lessons from the incredible team that Dusty put together. Good — that's better for us in the long run. wolverineluke I love that we have a coach that can win in multiple ways. He created the Monstars blueprint that everyone else is trying to fol- low, but he made the Final Four at FAU with a very different type of roster. This isn't about having a huge roster budget and just paying a bunch of guys, but having a value mindset and a strategic approach to building a roster, knowing what the win conditions are for a specific group of players with their specific skill sets. Ahodesu Just because the market wants to pay huge money to a big doesn't mean Michigan should. Dusty knows what he is talking about. If he feels as if those players were getting too pricey, then that doesn't mean it's a failure if Michigan doesn't come up with whatever amount of money is required to sign them. It means they are going to try to win in another way, which is absolutely possible. Signing bigs because that is how you won last year is fool- ish if you believe the investment isn't worth it. Ahodesu I think that Dusty views roster building kind of like a game in the same way you see those posts on X — the ones where you are given X amount of dollars and you have to choose how to allocate the funds to field the best team. You can do it multiple different ways and still come away with a good/great team. JaxGoBlue16 It does seem like teams are maybe taking the wrong lesson from what Dusty did this year. It was a lot more than just running three bigs on the floor and watching them steam- roll every opponent. Hell, Dusty almost went smaller before things clicked at the Players Era. I honestly just don't think there are very many coaching staffs that would've been able to get the same result from the same pieces as what we witnessed last season. Harbaughs Psychedelic Side His 'all the transfer bigs will be playing in the NBA next year' comment tells me Morez is not coming back. On roster building, I have complete faith in whatever direction Dusty would want to go. I have no doubt he could develop a winning formula playing small ball. Guy is just that good. Wharfrat1 ❱ Be Heard! Send your letters to: Wolverine Letters P.O. Box 2331 Durham, NC 27702 Or email: mark.panus@on3.com Letters may be edited for clarity or length. Letters/From Our Website: TheWolverine.com June/July 2026 • Vol. 37, No. 12 ISSN 1048-9940 TheWolverine.com Senior Editor Chris Balas Senior Writer John Borton Staff Writers Clayton Sayfie Anthony Broome Ethan McDowell Drew Hallett Contributing Editors Stu Coman Matt Herb Cathy Jones Chris Riffer Steve Downey Layout And Design Jeanette Blankenship, Chris Miller Contributing Photographers Lon Horwedel Per Kjeldsen Cover Photo Nike Hoop Summit/Nike Basketball Editor & Publisher Mark Panus Business Analyst Sarah Boone Circulation Coordinator Beverly Taylor Marketing Coordinator Elena Rehberg Advertising Sales Maria Taustine (502) 552-4390 Customer Service Shelby Cragg, Cathy Jones, Elena Rehberg (800) 421-7751 The Wolverine is published monthly. A one-year (12 issues) subscription is $74.99. The Wolverine is printed at The Papers in Milford, Ind. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to The Wolverine, P.O. Box 2331, Durham, NC 27702. 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