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With the football team entering the last month of the season, Michigan’s basketball team takes the court in Friday’s exhibition with Wayne State looking to be the toast of Ann Arbor for the second straight year.
Michigan basketball has enjoyed success over much of its history and won a National Championship in 1989, but has still always been considered second-rate on campus behind the boys on the gridiron.
But with the recent growing pains of the football program, the rejuvenated basketball program in its third year under head coach John Beilein, enters the season with high expectations. Michigan ranks 15th in the preseason Associated Press and ESPN/USA Today Coaches polls, the first time in 12 years it enters the season ranked.
And for the first time in recent history, Michigan fans look forward to the end of football season and the beginning of basketball season.
With a 22-14 record last year, and a return to the NCAA Basketball tournament for the first time in 11 years, a pair of John Wooden All-American candidates and another year of experience for last year’s youth should help the squad challenge for the Big Ten title.
The team:
Guard Manny Harris is the star after leading Michigan in scoring (16.9), rebounding (6.8), assists (4.4), steals (1.2), minutes (32.9) and free-throw percentage (86.3 percent) last season as a sophomore.
The junior from Detroit opted to forgo the NBA Draft and return to help Michigan build upon its success. Harris was named to the 2009-10 Naismith Preseason Men’s College Basketball Player of the Year Watch List in addition to being a candidate for the John Wooden Player of the Year award.
Senior forward DeShawn Sims led the team in blocks (27) and field goal percentage (50.5) and was second on the team behind Harris in points (15.4), rebounds (6.8), steals (1.1) and minutes (30.7) last season.
A true team player, Sims has embodied Beilein’s unselfish system, coming off the bench for nine of Michigan’s games last season, yet still earning All-Big Ten Second Team honors.
Sophomores Zack Novak, Stu Douglass and Laval Lucas-Perry give the backcourt experienced returning talent.
Novak was Michigan’s best three-point shooter last season at 34.4 percent and had perhaps his biggest game in leading Michigan to an upset over No. 4 Duke.
Lucas-Perry also shot 34.4 percent from downtown, though on about half as many attempts as Harris and Novak. He gives Michigan size and quickness at the guard position.
Douglass is a slightly smaller version of Novak, a streaky sharpshooter who averaged 6.1 points per game last season.
Another wing player with a lot of experience is redshirt junior forward Anthony Wright. While his numbers won’t blow anyone away (he averaged just 2.7 points per game last season), Wright came up big in the second round of the NCAA Tournament, scoring 14 points against Oklahoma. His experience should pay off this season.
Senior center Zack Gibson returns to fill the middle. The 6-10 forward averaged 3.9 points and 2.2 rebounds a year ago and gives Michigan a big man that can occasionally step out and hit the three, although not as well as he seems to think he can. Michigan fans would prefer him to stay inside.
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