Michigan basketball head coach Juwan Howard continues delivering his State Of The Union address (Michigan basketball version), with nine games left in his first regular season at the helm.

The state right now? Tenuous, drifting toward dire.

In reality, Michigan isn’t far off from where many thought they might be, four months ago. At 13-9, 4-7 in the Big Ten, they’re more reliable than Iowa primary results, but far less of a lock than bitter partisanship in D.C.

And their journey to this point couldn’t have been projected by any prognosticators.

They started out looking like potential Big Ten champs, beating down the pyrite version of North Carolina’s Tar Heels, then overcoming Gonzaga to become the kings of Paradise (Island).

Then they went to Hades in a hand basket.

An untimely injury to arguably their best player — junior forward Isaiah Livers — inconsistent play and a couple of big whiffs at home dug a huge hole. They’re still trying to dig out.

Recent Past — Disappointing, and getting desperate. You can’t lose home games in this league, where visitors are treated like a gate-crashing Mike Hart at Mark Dantini’s retirement party.

The Wolverines did anyway, sleepwalking through a home loss to Penn State then out-playing a very good Illinois crew, only to shoot free throws like Wilt Chamberlain on a bad hangnail night. Nobody would have picked them to get out of the Big Ten gate at 2-6 following a 7-0 start.

But in this league, you doze off for 10 minutes and wind up covered with shaving cream and permanent marker on your face.

Here’s the partly encouraging part for Michigan fans. The NCAA door certainly hasn’t slammed shut … but it might be starting to creak.

Additionally, pieces of the puzzle keep getting enhanced. Junior guard Eli Brooks picked up the Zavier Simpsonless-slack at Nebraska, and sophomore forward Brandon Johns Jr. played like he owned Madison Square Garden.

Present — Michigan had to have one against Ohio State. A third straight home loss would mark a gut punch from which the Wolverines might not recover.

So, they dig a 16-7 hole right out of the gate against a key player in college athletics’ Axis of Evil. They fight back to within one at the half, Johns dropping eight — including a pair of threes — to keep the Wolverines in it.

Then it becomes a Big Ten fistfight, officials refusing to call anything that didn’t involve incidental amputation. The Wolverines keep fighting, and face the final 54.1 seconds still down one, 57-56.

Simpson drives to the bucket, getting fouled by OSU’s Kyle Young, but is called for a flagrant foul for grabbing and ripping Young’s jersey. Both make their free throws, and the Buckeyes get the ball back on the flagrant.

That forces U-M to foul CJ Walker, who drops both free throws in the double bonus to make it 61-58 with 17.9 seconds left. Brooks misses a corner three with a half-second left, and that’s that — three straight home losses.

Howard sounded dumbfounded by the flagrant on Simpson, and rightly so. He was getting an explanation from an official while a monitor near the bench began showing the replay. The official instructed the monitor operator to shut off the replay immediately.

“I was like, ‘Wow, let me see what happened,' ” Howard said. “He was explaining it to me, and I couldn’t believe it.

“It was explained to me that Zavier went up for the layup, and as he was coming down, he ripped [Young’s] jersey. He said, ‘Yeah, look at his jersey, it’s ripped.’”

Howard confirmed with the official that Simpson grabbed the jersey to brace his fall.

“He said, ‘Yes,’” Howard recalled. “I said, ‘I guess that means he needed some help, and did not want to absorb the contact or the momentum of hitting the floor.’ That was it.”

Asked how he could coach his players when a steadying clutch to avoid injury counts as a flagrant, Howard answered in measured fashion.

“Hey, if you have the answer, please,” Howard said. “Share it with me. That’s a good question.”

The question now involves, what’s next? For the Wolverines, it’s back to the drawing board … perhaps on little sleep.

“It’s a tough one to swallow, I swear,” Howard said. “This one hurts a lot…

“It doesn’t feel good, at all. It’s going to be hard to sleep, not just for myself but all the players, staff, and I’m sure a lot of the Michigan fans. I know there are a ton of folks that left this building really upset with the outcome.”

Future — It’s a whole new show next season. Michigan suddenly isn’t looking for diamonds in the rough anymore. Howard seems determined to get back to the days of collecting more carats, in abundance.

And it’s working.

A top-five recruiting class could help Michigan once again shock the world — and that has to be Howard’s plan. But he’s not looking to settle for a no-dance intro in the meantime. Barring a big turnaround, he might not have a choice.

So the State Of Michigan’s Union involves seeking a streak at present and huge potential down the road. Where it goes from here, at least for 2020, stands as dubious as a balanced-budget promise.

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