Michigan men’s basketball coach Dusty May meets football coach Sherrone Moore
Michigan new men’s basketball coach Dusty May meets football coach Sherrone Moore, March 26, 2024.
Michigan basketball coach Dusty May had an idea that his team could be quite solid as summer moved to fall.
Though it’s still early − the regular season hasn’t even started − May believes early indications during the exhibition portion of the schedule only confirmed what the staff believed. The Wolverines defeated Oakland 92-48 on Oct. 20 at Little Caesars Arena, before they survived a feisty Toledo squad, 95-92 on Friday, in which they saw a 16-point second-half lead turn into a one-point game, before closing out the win.
“What we thought came to fruition,” May said Monday, one week before his team tips off its regular season against Cleveland State on Nov. 4 (8 p.m., Big Ten Network). “We spent a lot of time watching our own team, studying our own team and following trends in basketball. Yes, have flaws, but a lot of time to fix those if we’re intentional.”
May discussed one of those flaws postgame and again Monday morning, which was finishing through traffic.
In the aftermath of the victory, U-M’s new head man said he felt his team was more “skilled” than it was “physical” and that showed in an inability to finish around the rim even though the Wolverines finished with 46 points in the paint and averaged 1.17 points per possession on 82 trips down the floor.
Of course, that’s also one of the reasons May scheduled the Rockets. He saw a team capable of making individual plays on offense and challenging the Wolverines with a solid man defense that would sprinkle in some press break (May said his team executed three of four of those occasions correctly) and wanted to see how his group would respond.
“They punished us, got to their spots, made some really, really good one-on-one individual plays,” May said. “But when you look back, that last four minutes was as good of a late game practice pressure situation as we could be in.”
Since the Toledo win, the Wolverines have turned their attention to Cleveland State. It’s rare to have this much time before one game, and with all due respect to the Vikings, U-M should be able to handle that game with relative ease.
DUSTY IS CONFIDENT: Michigan’s Dusty May confident in Year 1: ‘We could have a really good basketball team’
That’s why there was some thought this could give U-M a chance to look ahead to some of the tougher games in the non-conference portion of the schedule like Wake Forest (Nov. 10) or TCU (Nov. 15) the next few weeks, but May said there has not been any extensive scout started just yet.
Instead, he watched a ton of basketball over the weekend: He went to Pistons vs. Celtics, saw the majority of Tennessee and Indiana’s exhibition and was planning to watch the film of Ole Miss vs. Illinois Monday evening.
It’s all part of building toward the bulk of the season, with each day being intentional.
“Going to double down on that, wining is important, but it’s also a byproduct,” May said of his belief in this team. “It’s more ‘Let’s have a great work day today in mind, body and spirit.’ Then, when Big Ten tournament is here in March and playing our rivals in February. … then we’ll be ready to play.
“If we didn’t have the talent or the experience in our locker room I wouldn’t be as confident saying it, but I think we have a good team. I love our guys, I believe in them and I’m going to leave it at that.”
Some more odds and ends to know about May and company heading into the season: He’s not actually the one who will generally handle substitution patterns, that instead belongs to whomever is the scout coach for that team (it’s Kyle Church for the regular season opener) but early on it was Mike Boynton handling that duty for Toledo.
From the sounds of it, U-M actually has pretty set rotations. The starting five seems relatively locked in with Tre Donaldson, Roddy Gayle Jr., Rubin Jones, Danny Wolf and Vladislav Goldin, with Nimari Burnett and Will Tschetter first in line off the bench.
“We have a set who’s going in,” May said. “Now, the time may be different if Vlad gets tired because the tempo of going up and down, try and use the media timeout for Vlad because we expect a lot out of the big fella.
“But we know who our first guard is going to be, we know who our first forward is going to be. Then as the game settles in. … it’s the staff still on the substitutions.”
Now all that’s left is one final week of practice before the season begins. It’s a new-look Big Ten with 18 teams and a ton of unique matchups. U-M will have a double-dip West Coast trip to play both Los Angeles schools, will face John Calipari and Arkansas at Madison Square Garden in December and that’s not to mention tournaments and challenges against Virginia Tech and Oklahoma.
But mostly, if there’s one lesson U-M took from the preseason, it was a lesson in closing out Toledo. Michigan looked like it was about to pull away in the second half, when it allowed a 10-0 spurt to the Rockets, who had a chance to tie or take the lead in the final three minutes. The Wolverines didn’t clam up, and held on for a win.
Results will come and go, but it’s the process May is focused on.
“Are we playing good basketball on offense and defense − that’s it,” May said. “If you’re playing sound, you’ll be in position to win. Then because we have veterans who are talented, we’re going to be fearless. … but at the end of the day if you’re in a bunch of one-possession games, odds say you’ll be .500 … so have to find a way to get that separation.
“But in our program as long as you’re trying like crazy to get better, you’ll be in good graces with us.”
Next up: Vikings
Matchup: Michigan (8-24 in 2023-24) vs. Cleveland State (21-15 in 2023-24).
Tipoff: 7 p.m. Monday, Nov. 4; Crisler Center, Ann Arbor.
TV/radio: Big Ten Network; WWJ-AM (950).
