Michigan Basketball: Predicting Wolverines’ starters without Isaiah Livers

Michigan basketball could be without Isaiah Livers next season and here’s what the starting five might look like.

It wasn’t a huge shock when Michigan basketball announced that Isaiah Livers was declaring to the NBA draft and testing the draft waters.

Essentially, when Livers spoke to the media Monday, following his decision, he said it was something he decided on before the season even began. He was always going to test the draft process and it sounds like it’s really a 50/50 decision.

It seems like if he feels like he will be drafted, then he will stay. Or if he’s told that he should return to Michigan basketball for another year, he seems very comfortable with that too. It will be an interesting situation and to follow and we probably won’t have a final answer until June.

But if we assume that Livers is going to stay in the NBA, it seems like a good time to look at the roster again and see how thing might look without him. Here’s how I projected the starting five to look next season with Livers and here’s how I believe it could look without:

Starting 5:

PG: Eli Brooks

SG: Josh Christopher

SF: Franz Wagner

PF: Isaiah Todd

C: Hunter Dickinson

Bench first 5:

PG: David DeJulius

PF: Brandon Johns

SF: Terrance Williams

SG: Cole Bajema

C: Austin Davis

Analysis:

Without Livers, the starting lineup still has a chance to be really good, but it depends on a few things. One, we don’t know yet if Franz Wagner will test the NBA draft, however, we shouldn’t be surprised if he does. His stock is probably already higher than Livres due to his long-term upside.

The other questions are about Christopher and Todd. Christopher is projected to go to Michigan and 100 percent of his crystal balls on 247 sports have him going to the Wolverines. Todd is already committed but hasn’t signed and until both sign their national letter of intent, it’s not a sure thing they will be part of the program.

If both do come to Ann Arbor, Michigan could easily have three freshman starting. I’d give Hunter Dickinson the edge at center, although I wouldn’t count out Brandon Johns, who could be an intriguing five or Austin Davis.

Davis isn’t a guy I see playing much more than 20 minutes or so per game, but he could start and help set the tone, before giving way to others. That could happen early in the year too, if Dickinson, another kid with an NBA future, isn’t quite ready.