Michigan has been to two National Championship games in the last six years and has more NCAA Tournament wins than any program in the same span, tied with North Carolina.
Head coach John Beilein and his team will have a legitimate shot to reach another Final Four this season, essentially guaranteed of a top three seed (at least) and still in the discussion for a one depending on how they finish.
Beiliein told CBS recently he’s been so focused on winning a Big Ten regular season championship that he hasn’t had time to think about the postseason.
“This is hard to believe, but it actually sneaks up on you. You’re just in this survival mode all the way through the season, then you get into the NCAA Tournament and so much goes into every game,” Beilein said. “All of a sudden you’re going, and that week is a blur … then if you win that semifinal, it’s really a blur.
“I thought we handled it better this time than last time as far as knowing what to do, but Villanova is just so good. I think they were as good as any National Champion has been for a long time. I’m not going to allow myself to get down on it because it gave the kids a great experience …”
But it’s clear he’d like to win one for them.
“I’d like to try to do it again,” he said.
Asked if one NCAA Tournament memory stood out, Beilein said it was tough to differentiate.
“But I’ve never had one like one we had against Houston [last year],” he said.
In that one, then freshman Jordan Poole hit a contested, 28-foot triple to win it at the buzzer.
“We think we’ve got a slight chance of winning, then it becomes a highlight out of all time great NCAA Tournament games,” he recalled. “I just stood there. I didn’t even know what to do. To watch how our kids react … that’s the good stuff.
“I kept talking myself into it, that we deserve that. There have been several times whether at West Virginia, even a couple years before (here) against Kentucky where they made shots like that that knock us out, so it was like all right, we deserve this one time. It’s okay. Because you feel guilty. Houston played such a great game and it was such a lucky shot.”
He got over the guilt, however, and led the Wolverines to the title game.
A few years earlier, he admitted, he wasn’t sure he’d ever get the chance. U-M missed the NCAA Tournament in year three and Beilein was struggling. He never would have predicted his program would become one of the most consistent in the country, he said.
“Boy, I didn’t see that coming. They hadn’t been to the NCAA Tournament in 11 years, so the whole Idea was how can we go back to the NCAA Tournament and then let it sort of happen from there?” he said. “But there was no goal have to get Michigan back to the Final Four. It was we have to get Michigan to be competitive in the Big Ten and get into the NCAA Tournament again. That’s the goal. We did it in the second year, the third year was a bad year, then all of a sudden we were picked 11th. [in the Big Ten in year four].
“We were coming to media day in the Big Ten and I told my wife driving out the driveway, ‘this is probably my last Big Ten media day.’ Year four and we’re picked last. Now the last seven years have been just magical.”
With the hope of even more to come.
“Everything is do or die. Magical things can happen because of those things,” Beilein said of what he likes about the Tournament. “Just this unity at every school that is really a tremendous, magical fairy tale, when kids go out and get to realize their dreams.”
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