Michigan Basketball Bounces Back With Win Over Kennesaw State

Following an awful blown lead against Virginia Tech, Michigan basketball bounced back with a strong performance against Kennesaw State on Saturday.

On a Saturday infused with conference title games in college football, Michigan basketball snuck in a good performance against Kennesaw State with an 82-55 win.

The last time the Wolverines were on the hardcourt, they blew a 15-point lead to Virginia Tech in the Big Ten/ACC Challenge. It was a slowly deflating performance against the Hokies, but Michigan got back on track with a promising showing against the Owls Saturday afternoon.

It was a close game through most of the first half; Kennesaw State even had an 18-16 lead just before the 11-minute mark. That was in large part thanks to a keynote performance by Kendrick Ray, who had 15 of Kennesaw State’s 29 first-half points.

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Ray finished the game with 24 points, but Michigan did a much better job in the second half of limiting the good looks the Owls got, and the supporting cast didn’t do nearly enough to keep up with the Wolverines’ offense.

Neither defense had great success Saturday afternoon; Kennesaw State shot 47 percent from the field and Michigan shot 56 percent. The big difference was the Wolverines having four players with at least 13 points, while the Owls only had two players with more than 10. In fact, if you take away Ray’s big performance, Kennesaw State lost 82-31.

That’s what makes the final numbers a little misleading. Ray took almost half of his team’s shots, and he was simply having a good game. No other Kennesaw State player really came close to making a significant difference.

Other than shooting the lights out—30 of 53 from the field and 9 of 20 (45 percent) from behind the arc—the most encouraging sign from Michigan’s end might have been Zak Irvin, who finished with 19 points and 4 rebounds.

It’s how he got those 19 points that’s important. He wasn’t settling for contested 3-pointers or dribbling all over creation before throwing up a step-back 18-footer. Instead, he was using the dribble to get to the rim and create much better opportunities for himself. Along with that, Irvin wasn’t getting his shot blocked at the basket, which was a huge problem last season.

It seems pretty obvious now that the Wolverines’ success will hinge on the play of Irvin. He easily takes more shots than any other Michigan player and has to be on his game. He was against Kennesaw State.

That’s not to ignore Moritz Wagner’s 20 points or D.J. Wilson’s double-double (15 points, 11 rebounds). That was the rounded effort the Owls didn’t have, and it resulted in a 27-point loss.

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Michigan will be back against Texas on Tuesday at 9 p.m. EST on ESPN2.

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