The Michigan Wolverines' basketball team is off to an 8-1 start in Big Ten play this season, an impressive feat that perhaps takes on a bit more significance when looking at it from a historical perspective.
Since the 1977-78 season, only two other Michigan clubs had begun 8-1 in league play prior to this year, with both occurrences coming under former head coach John Beilein — in 2013-14 and in 2018-19.
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Both of Beilein's aforementioned teams started 9-1 in Big Ten play before eventually losing their 11th game, with the 2013-14 crew winning the outright conference crown with a 15-3 record in league action.
Beilein's 2018-19 Wolverines, on the other hand, came up just short of a Big Ten championship, finishing 13-5 and in third place behind co-champions Michigan State and Purdue.
While hot starts to conference action (like the one U-M is off to this year) obviously don't guarantee an eventual Big Ten crown, the Wolverines have nevertheless come away with the league championship more often than not in recent history when getting off to starts like the one we're seeing this year.
Below is a closer look at the last eight times U-M has started 8-1 (or better) in Big Ten play, a trend that dates all the way back to the early 1960s.
Michigan has grabbed at least a share of the Big Ten regular-season title in six of the last eight times it started 8-1 in conference play. The lone two times it didn't were the aforementioned 2018-19 season and in 1970-71 under head coach Johnny Orr, when Ohio State went 13-1 and edged U-M by one game for the conference crown.
NCAA tournament success has oftentimes ensued for the Maize and Blue following hot starts as well. U-M has advanced to at least the Elite Eight in six of the eight seasons displayed on the graph above, making it all the way to the Final Four under head coach Dave Strack in 1964 and then the national championship the following year in '65.
Michigan fell to John Wooden's UCLA dynasty in the 1965 title game, with the Bruins taking home the national championship in 10 out of the 12 seasons from 1963-64 through 1974-75.
The Wolverines' 1970-71 squad, meanwhile, went 19-7 overall and 12-2 in Big Ten play but did not go to the NCAA tournament, with the annual event only holding 25 teams that year.
Michigan instead went to the NIT, where it fell to Georgia Tech in the quarterfinals. The only other time on the list above U-M didn't advance to at least the Elite Eight occurred under Beilein in 2019.
The Wolverines fell to a buzzsaw Texas Tech squad in the Sweet Sixteen that year, 63-44, with the Red Raiders eventually losing in overtime in the national championship to Virginia.
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