Within an hour of securing a high-profile commitment in the Class of 2025, Dusty May stepped onto the stage at the Crisler Center media room for Michigan men’s basketball media day. Appropriately, one of the first questions he fielded was about recruiting.
“We like where we are,” May replied. “I don’t know what we’re allowed to comment on now and what we’re not. We’re pleased. We have a staff that’s very connected, and they work really, really well together. And then you factor in how aggressive our players are in recruiting and wanting good players to join this program. It’s been fun to be in the recruiting foxhole with this group.”
The Wolverines earned a verbal pledge from Winters Grady on Friday afternoon. Trey McKenney, a five-star combo guard prospect, has Michigan among his finalists and will announce his decision early next month. And 2026’s sixth-ranked recruit, Miikka Muurinen, recently took an official visit Michigan.
May on Friday spoke about balancing roster building between a short-term desire to win and the long-term necessity to build a program.
“We’re aggressively recruiting a lot of high school players because we believe in what Michigan has to offer,” May said. “We believe in our ability to develop relationships, help players get better, and we think those things will play a part in retention. Obviously, then you factor in the NIL dollars and the opportunities off the court. So I guess it might be — I don’t know what the word would be.
“We might be a little bit naive, but we think we can continue to help guys get better and retain talent. So for us it’s not just one year, but obviously we always have to be one eye looking toward the future while the other eye looking toward the very near future.”
At his introductory press conference earlier this year, May spoke of prioritizing NIL and non-basketball responsibilities in order to maximize Michigan’s success. “I probably spend about 25-30 percent of my time on NIL, and recruiting donors, giving access to our program, doing everything we could to provide opportunities to our players,” he said at the time. That landscape is changing further with revenue-sharing coming to college sports in the near future.
And on Friday, May was clear of his hopes from Warde Manuel and Michigan Athletics.
“What are we looking for? We’d like to have one of the top budgets in the Big Ten and in the country and have the ability to retain our roster and help attract other high-performing players and driven players,” May said. “There’s nothing concrete, but we’ve had several discussions.”
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