Michigan Basketball: 3 predictions for Wolverines vs Michigan State
Michigan basketball will try to rebound from its loss on Tuesday, by clinching the Big Ten title against Michigan State. Here are the predictions.
It doesn’t get much bigger than Michigan basketball vs Michigan State, with a chance to clinch the Big Ten championship.
The Wolverines have been in this situation before. They had a chance to clinch the championship Tuesday and failed. They also had an opportunity to win a piece of the 2019 Big Ten title against Michigan State but lost that game on the last day of the season.
Following the loss to Illinois, Michigan just needs one win in two games against Michigan State, but there’s no way U-M wants the Big Ten title race extending till Sunday.
The Spartans (14-10) are pushing for an NCAA tournament berth and every win matters right now, especially against a potential No. 1 seed in Michigan basketball.
Juwan Howard split with Tom Izzo during his first season and as in the next round of this rivalry, this should be an intense affair. Here are three predictions.
Hunter Dickinson bounces back
In the game against Illinois, Hunter Dickinson had his worst of the game of the year. It was bound to happen at some point for the freshman and struggling against Kofi Cockburn isn’t new.
The question is how will Dickinson bounce back? He played really well against teams like Wisconsin and Iowa, so even though Michigan State is going to be physical with him, the Spartans really don’t have the horses to guard him inside.
One reason Dickinson has played so well this season is just that he’s remained on the floor. He’s rarely gotten into foul trouble. He did against Illinois and it really hurt.
Michigan State has one player Marcus Bingham (6-foot-11) that’s 6-foot-10 or taller, so that means MSU is at a big disadvantage when it comes to Dickinson who has gotten position and scored over smaller players all season.
Michigan State doesn’t give up a lot of 3-pointers and it will be interesting to see if its forced to double down more on Dickinson because that’s when Michigan’s ball movement is at its best.
The offense thrives when Dickinson is scoring in the post or at least drawing attention from extra defenders in the post. If those things don’t happen, Michigan will have a tougher time winning this game.
I don’t see Dickinson dominating, but I think he will be very effective and will start to establish his own identity in this rivalry with a 16 and 10 type of double-double.