The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/465847
sophomores to the NBA (Nik Staus- kas, Glenn Robinson III and Mitch McGary), they also saw five-year big man and leader Jordan Morgan head out and play professionally in Italy, while fellow veteran Jon Hor- ford transferred to the University of Florida. Injuries to LeVert and Walton then finished stripping away the heart Jerry Palm: Wolverines Not In The Discussion Michigan has made it to four straight NCAA Tournaments, and five of the last six. That streak is about to take a hiatus, according to Jerry Palm of CBSSports. com, one of several tournament bracket gurus around the country. "I'm not even looking at Michigan right now at 13-11," Palm said, even before the Wolverines dropped their last two contests. "If you're not four games over .500, I'm not even looking at you. They are a two-game winning streak from landing on my radar. If they do get to that point, quality wins are a big thing, and they're 1-8 against the top 50. That's a lot to overcome." Palm noted the Wolverines are simply up against long odds, given the struggles they experienced in the non-conference season, along with the Big Ten road ahead. Never say never, but he's issuing a pretty firm "not likely" at this juncture. "There's still four and a half weeks to go, so with that much time the range of possible outcomes is still really wide," he said. "Two weeks from now the teams that would considerably have a chance will be much smaller, but there will still be three teams included that would have been in the NIT." Michigan's other remaining opponents include Michigan State, Ohio State, at Maryland, at Northwestern and Rutgers. "Even if you get to 11-7, losing once the rest of the way — most likely at Maryland would be that game — I don't even know that that's enough to offer hope going into the Big Ten Tournament," Palm insisted. "It depends on what other teams would do, but I don't know if they have that much of a résumé even at that point." That sort of talk is why the Wolverines are focused on the possible over the probable, noted U-M assistant coach Bacari Alexander. Meanwhile, Michigan junior guard Spike Albrecht will leave all the numbers crunching to others. He just knows they haven't put the basketballs away yet, and that means Michigan has a chance. "I don't really know what goes into that," he noted, regarding bracketology considerations. "There's all kinds of stuff. The coaches may know better. I just know that every game is really important, and we'll take every one we can get … because we need them." — John Borton & Chris Balas