Third-ranked Michigan is one road win away from accomplishing something no Big Ten Conference team has pulled off since Bob Knight’s Indiana club went unbeaten on its way to the 1976 national championship.
If the Wolverines prevail Thursday night at Iowa City, Iowa, they’ll be the second team in conference history to go unbeaten on the road.
Michigan produced an 84-70 road win Friday night over then-No. 10 Illinois. It wasn’t really that close, as Michigan (27-2, 17-1) led by 21 with 6:49 remaining. The Wolverines limited the high-powered Fighting Illini to 26 of 63 shooting from the field, including 9 of 29 on 3-pointers.
“We looked like a team that was motivated but also still fresh mentally this late in the season, which is a good sign going forward,” coach Dusty May said. “They genuinely care about each other and playing the game with each other the right way.”
A peek at the stats backs up that assessment. Michigan is top 10 nationally in five key categories — points per game (89, eighth), field-goal percentage (51, eighth), rebounds (37.4, ninth), assists (19.2, fourth) and blocked shots (5.9, sixth) — all numbers that reflect how connected a team is.
Yaxel Lendeborg’s 14.3 points per game lead a balanced attack that has four players in double figures and four others between 7.2 and 9.7. But one of the key bench pieces, L.J. Cason, tore his ACL at Illinois and is out for the remainder of the season.
While the Wolverines keep making their case for a No. 1 seed, Iowa (20-9, 10-8) embarks on a difficult final week of regular-season play. After this game, the Hawkeyes must visit No. 9 Nebraska on Sunday.
They didn’t exactly get off to a running start on those games with a 71-69 upset loss Saturday at Penn State, which sits in last place in the league at 3-15. But the Nittany Lions got the job done in that game, drilling 64.1 % from the field, including 9 of 15 on 3-pointers.
“They individualized us a lot,” said first-year Iowa coach Ben McCollum. “They took individual matchups and tried to punish them. They punished us inside, gambled for a few steals and they punished us on the perimeter in individual matchups.”
Michigan presents a dilemma to the Hawkeyes with its overwhelming height. Iowa is likely to double on inside touches and force the Wolverines to try to beat it with jumpers. But the Hawkeyes rank 353rd nationally in rebounds at just 27.1 per game.
But they do have one of the best guards in the country in Bennett Stirtz, who averages 20.5 points overall and 22.9 in conference games while shooting 51.1 % from the field. He also dishes out a team-high 4.5 assists.
Iowa’s only other double-figure scorer is forward Tavion Banks (10.5). Guard Cooper Koch offered a spark at Penn State with a career-high 18 points, boosting his average to 7.1.
