Michigan has won three games in three days to win the Battle 4 Atlantis tournament championship after defeating Gonzaga this afternoon, 82-64. Now undefeated, U-M will play at Louisville next in what will likely be a top-five or top-10 matchup.
Here are some thoughts and takeaways from the championship game win:
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1) Michigan is a championship program under Juwan Howard
U-M was a championship program before Howard came back to coach his alma mater. John Beilein had the program winning Big Ten championships and advancing to national title games. This week in the Bahamas gave U-M the chance to win a championship, the first in the Howard era, and that's exactly what it did. Many questioned if Howard could carry the success over from what Beilein built, and as of right now, he is.
U-M is looking like one of the best teams in the country. Other teams will improve by the end of the year, but so will the Wolverines. Nothing is final at this point, and Howard will have to continue to have success, which is easier said than done. But, this is a tremendous start to a tenure and there's going to be many more opportunities this year to prove this program, under Howard, can hang with the best in college basketball.
2) Michigan will be in the top-10 next week
The Wolverines may even be ranked in the top five, but at least will be among the top-10 when the next rankings come out. The success U-M is having early in this season is just another reason why preseason and early season rankings are largely irrelevant. U-M currently has the best two wins in college basketball, at this point in the season. They're the only team to win two games over top-10 opponents so far (UNC and Gonzaga).
Junior forward Isaiah Livers told reporters after the Elon game that U-M will use the Battle 4 Atlantis as an opportunity to prove to the rest of the country how good this team is. He said they were "big-time underrated." It's obvious that Livers was right.
Next Tuesday's game with Louisville will be a different challenge in and of itself. U-M will have to play its first true road game of the season. Louisville, like U-M, looks like a complete team and a team that has things put together early on. The only difference between the Cardinals and the Wolverines, is U-M has played a much tougher schedule. If the Wolverines win at the KFC Yum! Center in Louisville on Tuesday, they'll be ranked No. 1 in the country just a month into the Juwan Howard era. That's pretty incredible.
