Blue By Ninety - March Madness is Here

Episode Date: March 18, 2026

Justin and Joel breakdown Michigan's path to the Final 4 and react to our first look at the 2026 Football Team!

All right. Welcome back to Blue By 90, presented by Feldman Chevrolet of Highland. It is March Madness season. We're recording this on Wednesday night before the Thursday game for Michigan. And it feels good. I mean, to be honest, it was St. Paddy's yesterday. It was snowing here in Ann Arbor still, you know, which is the usual. But usually at this time of year, at least like March Madness and the weather. there's turning, the sun comes out, peeks out for the first time in four months. So, man, it feels good, though. It feels really good just to have, like, college basketball.

You were watching the first four last night, too, and that was all on. But it's that time of year. I love it. Yeah, obviously, it's hard to watch every game because you can't have, like, six games on a TV at a time, but it's nice how they got the little, the score up top so you can flip back and forth. Yep. Definitely, arguably, one of the most exciting times of the year in terms of sports in general.

That's true. Just a mass amount of basketball. And a lot of times people who, like, don't watch basketball all year will now tune into March Madness and act like they're super fans, which is pretty interesting. So, yeah, it's going to be a lot of fun, excited to dive into it. Obviously, Big Ten tournament did not go necessarily as planned. I got to watch a little bit of that as I was sitting in the shade in Jamaica. You know, no man is tougher than the sun, and I am certainly not as well.

So, yeah. Your skin tone doesn't fare well with the Jamaican sun. No, no, it does not. It does not. Luckily, a lot of umbrellas there took huge advantage of that. so there you go um yeah uh you know especially after the winter that we had here like i i had to travel for work to uh miami and got absolutely scorched went to uh cobo for brad robin's wedding as well and uh me and moody and everybody was we're just sober sober yeah ray baker was out he was

out and about and he greeted me uh very firmly he's a powerful man but But yeah, going back to the Big Ten tournament, as you mentioned, I think that, you know, okay, you watch Michigan all year long. They lose one, you know, game in the Big Ten, you know, only two games total, one of them to the actual number one team in the country, right? So you feel really good about your team, but then you watch this team in the Big Ten tournament and this offense was not clicking at all. You know, you barely beat Ohio State kind of, you know, and then you lose to, you lose to Purdue where I thought Purdue dominated that game, to be honest. You know, I thought that the refs sucked. Guess what? Ref suck all the time. It is what it is. You know, we've benefited from it plenty as well. So, you know, I'm not going to say that that's going to be like, you know, the big thing for that game. But, I mean, Purdue's big men, sorry, TKR, they dominated.

That was the first time I thought that Marez Johnson and Adai Mara like really just didn't have an impact on the defensive side. Right. And I mean, they get into foul trouble early, right? And we still struggle to take advantage of that. And obviously Mara was a really good pastor and he was displaying that very well. and they got obviously guys like Brayden Smith who's been there for 25 years and obviously he's a really good ball player facilitator game manager and yeah yeah it was frustrating to watch obviously in the first half we looked solid you know and then they started to gain the momentum going into halftime and really never gave it back which was frustrating to see because it didn't look like we were never. necessarily playing to win. We weren't, it didn't seem like we were as aggressive and we were more kind of panicking the whole second half, which, you know, like you said, we really hadn't seen all year. So I was a little frustrating to see. But, you know, it is March and everybody is, I was thinking about this earlier, like there's a finish line coming and everyone's diving for the finish line. So they're given their best effort. Obviously, some people are diving from farther away like Ohio State. But, uh, you know people might say oh the rivalry that's why it was so close well it wasn't like that all year

and alow state really wasn't an issue for us it's just a matter of you know let's not make the moment too big let's just play michigan basketball we've been extremely dominant all year and that's probably going to be our key going into march is just to play stop worrying about what everybody has to say obviously we've been a little bit uh confident and that has benefited us and it seems like lately maybe we haven't been that way for whatever reason um maybe you like that maybe you don't like that but it obviously worked right like yaxville before we played uh peru in the season you know he said what he said and and we responded to it right we beat them at their place um that's i mean that's kind of been the ammo all year though is like these guys have kind of talked their

shit and been able to back it up a little right yeah exactly yeah and that that doesn't happen that often. Usually you eat your words at least a couple times, you know. Obviously they did on, you know, against Purdue, but, you know, and okay, you got to see, you got to give them credit for beating Wisconsin. The, you know, the buzzer beater was electric by Axel. I think that Wisconsin team is very good. I'd pick them to go pretty dang far in their, you know, region. But you still didn't feel like they played, like Michigan played, like Michigan played well in that game. It was like, it felt painful and you, you know, you just barely ended up in the position to, you know, to win it at the end. But, you know, all year long, Michigan was like,

you know, no matter what anybody threw at them, it didn't really matter outside of those two games. Like, you know, you go on the road to MSU, you go on the road to Purdue, on the road to Champagne, you know, you have the crazy crowds, these people, I mean, Dusty's sitting on the bench and everyone's MF and M, you know, and they didn't care. They weren't phased at all. And then you walk into this Big Ten tournament and it's like, you know, I think that they kind of tried to sleepwalk through the Ohio State game, to be honest. I thought that it was just going to be like, all right, you know, we're fine. And you have a little rust to shake off when you haven't played in, you know, in a week as well. And Ohio State had played the day before.

Wisconsin, it still felt like, it just never felt like they got in a rhythm. And then for Purdue, you know, they just got, they just got beat. You know, it was really just like, that's what it was. I thought Braden Smith was really, really good. And he, you know, in the battle of the point guards, like it wasn't really close with Brady Smith versus Elliott Kudow there. So the one thing that I'm, you know, we'll talk about in a second here, like the path and where Michigan's at in the bracket.

but the one thing that I'm looking at after watching, I don't want to overreact to a three-game stretch versus, you know, the 31 games before that, right? Right. But I think the one thing that I'm looking at is with LJ. Kaysen out, where is the rhythm in the offense going to come from? You know, you see it in spurts from Elliott Kano when he's running the offense. When he sits the bench, I just don't know that Trey McKinney can run this off. offense quite yet as a freshman who hasn't frankly handled the ball much all year. He's been, you know, an off the ball guy.

And, you know, so I don't know, what are your thoughts on that of just like, obviously Michigan could shut down pretty much anybody on defense with what they've got. But they're going to have to score at some point. Right. Yeah. And I have to look different, like you said. We don't have LJ anymore. And we haven't for some time, you know, so they've had some time to kind of figure that

out. and yeah for whatever reason in the big 10 tournament they just really seemed kind of lost like they didn't know who they wanted to be and maybe you know maybe they thought that they were just going to roll through the tournament i don't know i kind of find that hard to believe considering the talent in the big 10 and just the way dusty may coaches but i think uh you know tomorrow's game will be very telling on how the tournament's going to go i i know i said this last time uh I was on here, but I think, I hope that the loss to Purdue is a motivator and they're able to kind of snap back into, you know, the fiery Michigan team that we watched all year.

So we'll see. I think Purdue also did a really good job of like their big men are huge. And they're, they were, they were preseason number one for a reason. That's because their big men are, you know, some of the best big men. like proven big men in the country right and and they're not just tall but they're like solid dudes mara is you know more of a lanky guy and the kind of the issue that we got into is we were doing a lot of switching and so now our point guards are defending their big men down low which like is not going to work at all and mara's on the three point line trying to guard like trying to stay with braden smith

and that's yeah exactly you know yeah so So I don't know. I mean, I understand, like, people having some concern going into the NCAA tournament. But, like I said, I hope this is a motivator in that they can come out with that fire. You know, maybe it takes one game to really kind of get that momentum back. Obviously, we got Howard tomorrow. So we'll see how it looks. But nonetheless, I'm still excited to watch them.

Of course. I mean, you have to be excited about Michigan being a one seed, right? Yeah. You know, you're still a top seat in the tournament. You earn that by playing really, really well all year long. So, you know, I'm always like a, I'm a sicko a little bit where I kind of love that all of a sudden, like you have a bad three game stretch or you lose one game. Everyone's kind of writing Michigan off. Like, oh, they're not going to win their region.

you know, there are a couple people that have picked them to go to the final four or win it all or whatever. But I think people, you know, watch that three-game stretch and forgot how dominant Michigan was all year long. Right, yeah. And that's just a recency bias, right? Like you see what happens lately. And I don't know. Obviously, Dusty May took Florida Atlantic pretty deep in the tournament a couple of years back, right? And that's a Florida Atlantic team that didn't get to play a hundred.

high level of competition all year like Michigan has. And so he obviously knows what it's going to take to move through this tournament. And it's full of good teams. There's no mistake in that. And, you know, I think a couple years ago, right, we saw the first 16 seed beat the number one seed. And it was UMBC, which, so I'm glad that Howard beat UMBC just because otherwise there would, that would be the whole narrative of the game, right?

Right. But I did see that, I forget who posted, it was like an upset watch. And they had the Michigan game in there. And then I also saw somebody else of favorites to win the tournament. Michigan was the number one based on like some analytics. I don't know where those came from. Right. So you really can't trust anything anybody says.

We'll find out. We'll just find out as we go along. Well, that's also the magic of March is, you know, you put in every analytic possible. and you have every expert opinion and none of them end up being right. And that's why March Madness is the, that's why they call it madness, you know. Right. And so I think that, you know, that it is like you do have to bring your A game every day. It doesn't matter, you know, if you were, if Michigan was playing Howard in November and, you know, like nobody's thinking,

oh, there's a chance that they could get upset, right? but you put them in a bracket against each other in March, and then they're all of a sudden on, you know, upset watch. Yeah. It just is, you know, it is what it is, but that's the beauty of it. So. Yeah. And I will say, like, so the Big Ten tournament,

obviously you've scouted these teams all year. You've played them throughout the year. March Madness is much different. Like, you're facing a lot of teams very quickly that you don't have a ton of time to scout. And I think Michigan might play to that. advantage just considering the talent that they have. So that'll be interesting to see. Obviously, as you break from the weekend, there's a couple more days to scout the next

team you're going to play. But just in terms of going from a Thursday to a Saturday game, I think they're going to benefit pretty largely from that. Yeah. And I also think, too, the big thing that I think Michigan, you know, has an advantage in in this tournament is they're really. isn't anybody else who has bigs that can hang with Michigan, right? We saw Purdue do it, obviously. We saw Duke do it with, uh, with Boozer. Um, but outside of that, like,

there isn't really any team in the country that has, you know, a seven foot three got center, also a six foot 10 basically center in Res Johnson. And then a six foot power forward slash point guard slash whatever you want to call him in Yaks. Right. So I think that, you know, the, the ability to go with that big, that three big lineup for Michigan is going to be like, there's going to be games here, especially in the early rounds where, you know, Mara, Johnson and Yax all have like 20 points apiece just because no one else can stop them. Yeah, 100%. And I saw that Yax came out of the Big 10 tournament with a minor sprained ankle.

Yeah. Don't really think that's anything to worry about. Like, he'll be all right. Yeah, I think so too. I think it's like, thank God it. It was only minor because it happened in the last two minutes of the Big Ten championship that really didn't matter to Michigan, you know, at the end of the day. They're trying to win a national championship right now.

And that would have been devastating to lose him, you know, in a game that, like, quote, unquote, doesn't matter. Even though I think it does matter. I think every game matters. But, yeah. So I do think that, you know, looking. at the bracket here. I don't know what your take was as they were releasing the bracket. It's funny. I have, you know, a couple different group chats that, you know, a lot of guys texted in and then somebody said, you know, toughest region by far. We got screwed. We got, you know, it's like, you know, wow, we are really like, you know, it's going to be the hardest, hardest path to the final four. And then another group chat's like, man, we got an easy draw. That's also how it goes too.

Yeah, it is. I will say, looking at our region, the team I might be most interested to see how they perform is Akron. Akron has won three Mac championships in a row, I believe. And now they're in the Mac, and it's Akron. So you're like, don't really know what you're going to get. They're face off against Texas Tech first. Yeah. So I'll be interested to see.

Yeah, I mean, obviously there's good teams in our region, but there's good teams in every reason. And it's freaking March. Like, everybody plays well in March. And anybody can on any given day, right? Right. Yeah, 100%. Yeah. Yeah, I think to be honest, as I'm looking at this, I'm not trying to jinx us here by any means,

but I really think that Michigan should get out of the first weekend pretty easily. I think that, you know, obviously Howard, you know, I don't think they should have any trouble with. And then Georgia and St. Louis don't, they don't scare me, really. I don't think, I mean, I don't know. Although I do think that St. Louis, I believe the Billikins, if I'm not mistaken, great mascot name if you're like, if you're one of those people that just picked based on the mascots. and then I think that they have the guy. I don't know if you remember this guy from before, like big white dude that wears goggles.

Yes. Yeah, I think that they have that dude, which I'll be honest, he does scare me. He's one of those big guys who can shoot, which makes it worry a little bit. And he's got the Rexbacks. Everybody knows somebody with Rexpex. And they are typically pretty scary.

Actually, Mazzie Smith showed up to Michigan with Rex Bex. He played with them for like two years. That's unbelievable. Got to get some contacts, man. I got to figure this out. That's so good. Yeah, you're not looking very intimidating on the defensive line. No matter how you can be the biggest, baddest guy out there.

But you put Rex specs on the D line. You automatically, you're like, what's going on here? Yeah. And then in the middle of the game, they're like, all right, you know, we're doubling Rexbex to the lineback. You're like immediately or defeated. You're like, golly.

That's so good. But I, okay, Texas Tech is an interesting one. I think, so looking at the second weekend, it would be hypothetically for Michigan. You know, you have Texas Tech who their point guard is an absolute stud.

His name is Christian Anderson. Was committed to Michigan since eighth grade for under Juilli. Ron Howard. So he would, and he like, he now averages above 20 points a game. He's unbelievable. He's been, I remember, like, he was committed in seventh or eighth grade to Michigan and dropping, like, 31 a game in high, like on the varsity team. So he's unbelievable. Now, the one thing that they'll, they'll be missing is J.T. Toppin is their, like, number two guy, and he's hurt now, I believe, for the rest of the season.

So they've got a guy out. And then at the Alabama side of it, which is the four seed in there, you know, their guy got arrested for having two, over two pounds of weed in his apartment, which is just insane. So, you know,

not that you want guys hurt or want guys out because of that stuff, but, you know, looking at, you know, matchups, it's not a bad thing for Michigan. Yeah, that'll be. be interesting. Obviously, both of those teams pretty dominant throughout the year. And I think that's why they see the logo, right? And they're like, are extremely tough region. But then when you dissect kind of where the team's at now, it's a little bit different than that. And, you know,

Michigan is too. LJ. Jason, right, not in. But I'm excited. I think it'll be a really good opportunity for him. Obviously, Georgia, not anymore, but previously Tom Crean, head coach of Georgia, he was done there in 2022. If you didn't know this, he is Jim Harbaugh's brother-in-law. Yeah, fun fact. Fun fact. I always thought about that when it was like, when he was at Indiana coaching, I think, I think Carbabo's early, it was early years at Michigan. Just thinking about like, Thanksgiving or Christmas that had

John Harbaugh, Jim Harbaugh, Tom Green, like all just talking ball. Like those had to be some of the best conversations of all time. I mean, or like wrestling in the big round. Yeah, 100%. Those guys and like the Harbaughs specifically are just absolute,

absolutely dialed in when it comes to X's and O's. Like they love, they love. they love the game of football to an insane amount. Yeah. Or like if you if you're trying to talk to Harbaugh about football, like you're probably going to feel a little bit dumb because he just understand so much about it. So yeah,

those are probably pretty interesting Thanksgiving. I'm sure his parents were probably getting annoyed to the conversation. Probably not his dad though. His dad is probably in those conversations as well. Jack is probably hosting. He's probably holding court there. Oh, 100%. That is, that's one guy.

I feel like so. honored to be able to have met during, you know, all this. Because if you ever had an interaction with Jack Harbaugh, it probably went longer than it needed to be, uh, because he just wouldn't stop telling a story or talking. Unbelievable story. Oh, my God. Unbelievable. He, I can't remember the story or who was involved.

It was a boxing story that he had told us twice. Now, typically when somebody tells a story twice, you're like, oh, dude, I've heard this before. But it was like watching Forrest Gump. Like you're locked in. Yeah, you've seen it before, but it's still just as interesting the fifth time. Like to the point where I was sitting in the front row and he was going through this whole boxing story and he tells me to stand up. And he's like simulating the fight. And he ends up like getting about an inch away from my face with a punch.

And I was a little concerned because, you know, he is, you know, he's in his older days. So I'm like, you know, what kind of motor skills do we got here? They're still very good. He didn't punch me in the face. I was a little concerned, you know, grab me, grab me by the shirt, did a little tug and pull there. But, yeah, unbelievable storyteller. Sorry, we're getting a lot off track.

I know. We're on a tangent. Now, the last thing I'll say on that was the thing about Harbaugh, though, I would love to know about him and, like, Tom Crean talking or really just any coaches. He's so inquisitive, too, that I bet you that he was so, dialed in asking questions about like so when you run the pick and roll like why do you you know drop this guy and you know have or like how do you know when they go into do a two three zone why do you do this like you know he he definitely like even though it's not football he's like he wants to know the

why of like why are you doing that and so yeah like yeah he wants to know every single detail about anything like we would be installing plays and you know know if we had you know six plays to install we would be on play five and all of a sudden he's just like hey uh can you go back to play two i got a question about this and then just asking like the smallest detail of the play to just get something cleared up or like dude you're really thinking back there like you're really putting that nog into work if i was the OC i'd be so nervous every day that i was going to like forget one thing oh you're brutal Yeah. Well, if you, for the listeners out there, if you were wondering how this podcast was going to go with me and Joel now, we just turned a March Madness conversation into a hard boss story.

Yeah. Yeah. That's about how it's going to go. We got on Thanksgiving quick and there we go. All right. We'll bring it back to Michigan's region here. The two teams that I think I'm most worried about, which is who Michigan. would meet in the elite eight is, is Virginia and Iowa State, the two and the three seed. Virginia just took Duke to the, I mean, to the final buzzer in the ACC championship. They played Duke as good as pretty much anybody has all year. So that was impressive. And then Iowa State's just been, I know they play in the Big 12, which I just, I don't think it's very good.

I don't know that it's as competitive day in and day out than, you know, as the Big Ten or even maybe the SEC. But they're a really good ball club too. Yeah. And Iowa State is always like this. Like regardless of where they're seated, they're always extremely competitive when it comes to March. And obviously, Virginia has been good for, you know, some time now. And so it'll be interesting to see that match up. Obviously, if they make it there, I don't really know much about Santa Clara or Tennessee State.

But, yeah, obviously, likely we'll get one of those two. Tennessee still has to have their playing game determined tonight. But Iowa State is like always that team that just shows up in March that everybody kind of forgot about. Totally, totally. And then they just show up and you're like, oh, crap, like they are the real deal. I agree with you on that. That'll be an interesting matchup if it happens. Yeah, and they've got, their two highest scorers are their big men.

They've got two forwards. I don't even know how to say this. Milan, Milan, Mylan, Mama Lachovic, something like that. And then Joshua Jefferson, which is a lot easier to say. But they've got two big men. So that, I mean, once you get to that point, you know, it would be an interesting battle between those two and, you know, Mara and Johnson and Yax.

So we'll see, though. And here's my other thing. The last thing I'll say about, like, you know, people talking about how hard or easy it is, you know, on your paths of the final four, you mentioned it a little bit, but like it's the NCAA tournament. They're good teams. That's why they're here because they've won a lot of games to get into this tournament. And then especially once you get to the Suite 16, the Elite 8, you know, the final four,

it's like those are the best teams. You can be in any region, and sometimes you get Loyola, Chicago, right? Like Michigan did in 2018. Well, guess what? They won four games to get there, too, and beat really good teams, you know? So, you know, it's half the luck of the draw, right? It's half, you know, just you're going to have to play and beat good teams if you want to get to the final four and, you know, eventually cut down the nets.

And some of these teams don't have the opportunity to play like this level of talent, like your Michigan's. Yeah. And so when they come to the tournament, they got nothing to lose. And that's kind of where they benefit from. I just, like I said earlier, I hope Michigan gets back to that point where they just have that fire where they are extremely confident. Obviously, you're not overconfident, but extremely confident in the sense that they can just go out and play their game to win and not go out there and play to not lose. Because that's in any sport, when a team comes out and they play not to lose is when bad things start to happen. And, you know, so we'll see.

We'll see. It's March. It'll be fun. It'll be interesting. It'll be more fun when Michigan remains in the tournament for all of us here. Well, and I will say. So I want to talk about Howard and this weekend for a second, but not looking forward to it, but I just got a text that said Saturday is going to be 65 and sunny out.

So, I mean, we could have ourselves a day on Saturday. We absolutely could. We also had snow here. I live east of Columbus. I know that's contradictory of I went to Michigan, but we had snow on the ground here. It is melted now. Let's have a nice little extended weekend here, Thursday to Sunday, really for us. Thursday and Saturday matters.

Yeah. And so a little plug there. We will be at Hopcat this weekend in Ann Arbor. You know, I don't know how many times you've been to Hopcat. I'm sure you've seen it as you were going into Skeeps back in the day. Crack fries. Crack fries. They're cosmic fries now.

We can't say crack fries. They're cosmic fries? They are cosmic fries. But they're still the same. They're just as good. but we will be at Hopcat all weekend long. They've got drink specials with Woods and Whiskey going on and a bunch more. Thursday, they've even got a burger and a beer deal.

That's incredible. So we will be there all weekend and they'll have the games on all weekend. Specifically, we'll be there on Thursday night for the game doing a watch party. My guy, DJ, a Ray, will be there spinning and we'll have a bunch of giveaways. You know, I've got Blue By 90 hoodies and hats and things like that. I want to give away, even some Woods and Whiskey merch too. So if you're in the area, we'd love to come see you. We'll be there Thursday, and then barring a win, we'll be there on Saturday as well.

But they'll have the games on all weekend long, so pretty pumped about that. So interesting enough, though, going to Buffalo this weekend is, I'm not going to be there, but both Michigan and Michigan State are in Buffalo this weekend. So for the people that are there, you know, a lot of hatred going on in that rivalry. I'm curious as to, you know, what type of, they won't play each other, obviously, but what type of interactions will happen there as well. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, obviously, we both are representing the mitton, you know, Michigan and Michigan State.

But I would have to imagine that there will still be a lot of hatred and very little support. It's not, okay, I wanted to ask you this, too, because this is more football, but it's, I think it ends up being, you know, pretty much every sport. There's not the SEC, like, camaraderie where they're, you know, when I remember when Georgia was beating you guys in 2021, uh, in the, the college football player, they started chanting SEC at us. And I'm like, I don't think we would ever think about starting to chant big 10. No, no one would chant big 10. I mean, like some people would obviously talk about it.

Oh, you know, Big Ten over the SEC. That's great. But listen, when it comes to Michigan versus Michigan State, there is not any love. There is no love there. It is like when I look back to my days of playing, obviously Ohio State, Michigan is a huge rivalry. But it is a very historic rivalry. Everybody watches that game. Michigan, Michigan State is probably the grittiest rivalry of the season.

in any sport like we do not enjoy Michigan State I was a I was talking to a guy of the name of Ben Newman he's a he's a performance coach and he like posted a video of his office and he had a Michigan State helmet in there and I said hey you know you got to get a winged helmet in there yep and he goes no shot I went to MSU like all right man like okay whatever yeah fine like you support Michigan State I'll stay on the guy's side here. So, yeah. I mean, if I see a guy with a Michigan State sweatshirt in the airport, I'm not going to make eye contact with them. Like, I don't want to deal with you. And I think everybody can resonate with that pretty well. A hundred percent. And I think that it'll be, it'll be interesting

to see if, you know, Tom iso and Dusty May have any interactions this weekend. They, you know, when you're in a city like that, like you're, you know, they all work out in the same like buildings, right? They're all probably in similar hotels and all that stuff too. So, and then obviously all the fans, like I'll, you know, I'm sure no, to your point, though, there's no support. Michigan fans aren't going to show up to Michigan State's game and root for them. They might show up in hate watch and vice versa, you know, but there's not going to be any support just for the mitt in there, that's for sure.

No, no, absolutely not. All right, let's, I wanted to ask you one more thing about basketball. basketball before we flip the script to spring football. But who, if you're looking down the road, who are you worried about for Michigan? Once it got down to the Final Four national championship, you know, Elite 8, whatever it is, is there somebody out there or a couple teams out there that you're like, man, I really think that this could be a bad matchup? Yeah, I mean, obviously Duke has been super dominant all year.

I think that's a pretty obvious answer. We played them really close during the season. And if both of us have the pleasure of meeting in the national championship, that's where we would meet. I think that would be an unbelievable matchup, just considering the tournament experience for both teams. Another team is Houston. Houston is a really good ball club. And I predicted them in Duke to play in the final four. So we'll see about that.

Those are the two teams when I look at it right now that I'm probably the most weary of. So we'll see kind of how it all plays out. Obviously, there's a lot of basketball in between those matchups happening. But, yeah, I mean, Duke's obvious answer just with their tenure throughout the season and just historically. Yeah, I mean, I think that, you know, it's funny because you, I don't want to be like, oh, I'm worried about the one seeds. But yeah, that's kind of who I'm worried about. It's like they're one seed for a reason. Right.

You know, I think that Houston, Duke, Arizona, and this is what I was talking about with Iowa State, too, they all work through their big boys. That's kind of how, you know, the reason for, not the sole reason, but a big reason for their success is they've got big men that rebound and they, you know, they crash the glass and they attack it and all that stuff. And so, you know, I think that's Michigan's advantage, obviously. But, you know, obviously you saw what happened in the Purdue game, you know, is, you know, sometimes they can get bullied on the glass and stuff like that. So I'm looking to teams that have, you know, big men that can possibly match up because, you know, if Michigan doesn't have the advantage in size, I just don't know about the guard play if it's good enough to win a game for them all the time. Right. Yeah. I mean, we lost our facilitator, and we've talked about that, you know, a handful of times. And hopefully, Yax, he wasn't super productive in the Big Ten tournament. Yeah.

And hopefully we can see it kind of change in that play and see him, you know, play with that confidence. You know, hopefully the ankle heals up and, and which it should. He'll be fine. You know, if it's not fully healed, they'll give him a little vitamin T, a little tort all. And it'll be feeling just fine out there on Thursday. But, yeah, I think, I agree with you. Anybody you can match up sizewise with Michigan is obviously an area of concern. Yeah, for sure.

And the one thing I'll say about Yaks too is what he was so good at all year long was letting the game come to him. He never, it never felt like he was forcing anything. You really, it was like you didn't feel like he was even playing that well. And then you look up and he's got 18 points, 12 rebounds, and five assists, you know. Right. So that was what was so great about Yax all year long. I feel like in the Big Ten tournament, because nobody else was really producing, he felt like he needed to be the guy. And like the offense had to run through him.

And that was just, it felt unnatural. It felt abnormal. And so I wonder, you know, how they're going to think about that. And, you know, that would be a concern of mind of like if the, he's unbelievable, right? If he really needs to get to the basket, he can. And I think that, like, they need to, Dusty and his staff need to realize that if the, if the offense isn't like humming, they need to just tell the acts like, hey, man, go be selfish. Like, you ever been selfish all year long?

You can get to the bucket on pretty much anybody on the floor. Go get buckets. Right. And make the defense collapse and kick out, right? We got three-point shooters. So, yeah, I agree. Let's make it happen. And hopefully with some time to prepare, he can maybe get into the right mindset of stepping into that role of being the facilitator now.

The offense is going to run through him if it needs to, like you said. I think Dusty May is the perfect guy for the job. I mean, that guy is so just collected in the way that he thinks he doesn't get overstimulated or over-emotional by anything, which is huge. So we shall see. It'll be fun to watch. Hopefully it will be fun to watch. I have confidence that it will be. I will too.

Yeah, we'll see you all at Hopkett on Thursday and all weekend long. I'm super excited. This is like, I mean, like you said at the beginning of the show, this is best weekend of the year for a lot of people, right? So I feel like a collective four-day stretch, this is the best day of the year. Like first weekend of college football is awesome, too. first weekend of NFL, of course, all that stuff. But I just feel like there's not another sporting weekend where you have, excuse me, where you have from 12 noon to like 12 a.m.,

that multiple games on all day long on Thursday. Right. That's fantastic. And listen, if you are near Hobcat and you have the capabilities to make it to Hopcat, you might be sitting here thinking, you know what, that sounds like fun, probably not for me. Enough. Enough.

Just show up. It's going to be a good time. I won't be there, unfortunately. But just show up. It's one of those situations maybe where you're like, man, that sounds like it'd be a good time. You're not sure if you want to go. I can assure you that if you show up,

it is going to be a good time. So show up, support the boys, watch some basketball, eat some cosmic fries now. They're not cracked fries anymore. Sorry about that. But yeah, it'll be a good time. There you go. I'll say this too.

We'll do a little like code word here. Anybody who comes up to us at Hopcat on Thursday night tomorrow and just says Roddy Gale, then I'll give you a $25 gift card to Hopcat that'll cover, you know, at least a portion of your drinks and food there. So you got no reason that to go. There you go. There you go. All right.

So Spring Bowl has started. The boys are back on the field in Schembeckler Hall. It was good to see. You know, we talked about it before, you know, after everything that's gone down with Michigan football in the past couple months, it was just good to see the boys back on the field and start to have something else to talk about here. So it was, you know, it's always, it's always nice to, you know, see the winged helmet back in action, see the boys suited up again. And, you know, Coach Weddingham actually went to the podium for the first time since he did his opening press conference, I believe. leave. So first time at the podium in Ann Arbor with a new captain of the ship.

And so I'm excited. I think that it's a new era. It feels like we've had a new era of Michigan football a few times here in the last couple years, obviously. But it just seems like, okay, we can turn a page now. And I feel really confident about the job that Coach Whittingham and his staff are going to do. Yeah. And. And like you said, it truly is a new era because they essentially cleaned house. I think there's maybe two coaches that remained from the previous staff. But it's a whole new staff. They're implementing their ways of going about managing spring ball and workouts

and their system that they've seen work at Utah. And obviously, I don't know how they run spring ball. Previously, we used to practice one day and then meet the other day, practice for four hours long. Pretty brutal. Don't recommend that. So hopefully he has a different plan in mind. But it is a great opportunity. Obviously, he's been able to coach now. He's been able to implement his systems, the OC as well. So for those guys to get out there and start running through that and get acquainted to that and playing as a team under that new system is going to be huge for them. There's going to be a lot of position battles in the spring. But I'll say this. Like, sure,

somebody might gain an advantage in the spring, but ultimately, when they get to August, that's when it's really going to matter. If you do really well in spring ball, people will remember it, you know, to a degree. If you do really bad, usually what happens is the coaches forget that happen. It's just the way that it works. So I think more so the opportunity for spring ball is to get acquainted to the new system, a new staff, understand how he's going to coach, and he can understand how to get the players all moving in the same direction because obviously that's been a little bit of an issue as of the last year plus. So I'm excited about that and I'm excited for the guys for that. Obviously, I think there is a spring game. Is that correct? They do have a spring game scheduled.

They do have a spring game scheduled. I believe it's either April 17th or 18th, something like that. So I'm excited for that too. And I think that, yeah, to your point, you know, we're here. as we're now, you know, outside of the program, as are you guys, the listeners for the most part. And it's right now we're, you know, it's overreaction season to photos that are posted and videos that are posted on Instagram. You know, somebody has a highlight catch and you're like, oh, my God, that guy's going for a thousand yards this year. And even, you know, just like quotes from a press conference, you know, it's time to, you know,

overreacting. I know Coach Whittingham said like Bryce's QB1, 1,000 percent. That was basically his quo. I think that's good. I think that, you know, it's very different from what Coach Hardball used to do where it was like, you didn't know who the starting quarterback was

until they took the first snap in September. Yeah, he was the king of beating around the bush. He could talk for so long and not tell you a single thing. He was good at it. But yeah, I agree. It is encouraging to see him backing Bryce so much. I mean, obviously, you know, we had a pretty good idea that Bryce was going to be the guy, right?

He was last year. He's a $10 million man. It kind of has to be. But now we have a quarterbacks coach. We have a developer of Bryce Underwood. Extreme talent out of high school, but it's a whole new level of college football. So, yeah, I think him saying that is not only reassuring. to us as fans, but to Bryce as the quarterback, knowing that he has the full support,

there's no gray area, and he can just go out there and play and develop. Yeah. And so I think, too, you know, he's also going to have better weapons, right? Let's be honest with ourselves. I think he's going to have better weapons. Coach Whittingham mentioned Andrew Marsh, Jamie French. he mentioned a couple other guys. So I think that, you know, it's exciting to, to, you know, just say, all right,

it's exciting the thought process of like, hey, we've got elite receivers that can go get a ball that can, you know, get separation. And then, you know, to your point on the coaching side of things, like, I do think that, you know, I love some of the coaches that were in the building last year, but it seems like they've made a step up. And so I'm excited to see what this offense could look like. Now, what Coach Whittingham also did say is, like, they're still going to run the damn ball. They're still going to, the whole identity of their team and their offense and defense is grit and toughness and physicality and all that. So what's your take on like, I know some people would say like, all right, like, we've got a $10 million quarterback. We've got to open up the offense.

you know, but I think that the reality is Michigan football is always going to start with running the football. Yeah, and it's going to look a little bit different this year. Obviously, Michigan of the past was a two, three, tight end offense, powerhouse, run it downhill type of team. Coach Whittingham previously has been more of an 11 personnel, so one tight end in the game, kind of air raid type of guy. So what the running game looks like, I'm not sure. obviously we have really good running backs, really good offensive line, and tight ends we always have. So it'll be interesting to see what that looks like, but it is a necessity. Like, yes, we do have this unbelievable quarterback and extreme talent at the receiver position.

Like last year, we had talent, but we didn't know where it was. Obviously, we figured out Andrew Marsh as the season went on, all right, this is our guy. And so to open up the past game, you have to run the ball. Like that is just general sense of football. I'm sure everybody understands that. And in the same way to open up the run game, you've got to pass the ball. So if we can be extremely dynamic in both of those areas,

I think we'll have the season that Michigan fans have, you know, wanted since 2023, just considering the talent that they continually bring in. I'm not sure what the running game is going to look like, you know, probably, I don't know. A lot of power has been the MO of Michigan.

You can run that with one tight end. Outside zone is effective. It kind of sucks as a tight end, but that is what it is. But maybe we get Bryce running. Obviously last year we knew he liked to run the ball, and he's a tough, gritty guy. So, yeah, you can be a tough, greedy team

without putting three tight ends in the football game. Right. It doesn't have to be. same for sure and that's what um at utah that's what they did uh right they they ran their quarterback quite a bit um right so you know obviously you want to keep him healthy but i do think that you need to be able to use his legs that he's so quick and fast and powerful um you know at at some point you got to be able to to utilize that um and so i think also just hearing coach winning him like that's his one thing saying like we're going to be physical physical physicality

is going to be, you know, a main focus of us. I personally love hearing that because I think we went, you know, you had like the smash thing, but I felt like it was only like in talks, you know. Right, it was informative. Yeah, you didn't really feel like in 2024 and 2025 that Michigan was like the mental, tough and physically, you know, tougher team, you know, when they went into those big contests,

especially like on the road at Oklahoma, you know, it was deer in headlights, right? And so I think that that is like, you know, the discipline, the toughness that even, you know, on the mental side, I think that that is what Coach Whittingham hangs his hat on. And I'm excited to get back to that, which is, in my opinion, the biggest reason why Michigan won, you know, in 2021 through 2024. Yeah. And, you know, for the listener who's concerned about Bryce Underwood running the ball, I get it. And we saw last year that he's not a big slider.

He likes to try to run guys over. I think that is an issue. I get it. You want to be the tough quarterback. Yeah. But you are the quarterback. Like, we need you in the game. We don't have another one of you.

Yeah. Yeah, we need you. So for Coach Whittingham to be able to engage. grain in his mind, listen, you have to get down. You have to slide. Like, if we're going to use you in the run game, you're going to have to slide because if you're just going to try to run guys over, you know, maybe he does it every once in a while. He does it too. And Ohio State DV, great. Like, that's fine. But a lot of these guys on defense, you know, the linebackers are some cinder blockhead dudes who are going to want to take your head off. So get down. If he does that,

it'll be just fine. And it will be extremely effective just to have. so many different options within the team. So I think that is of huge importance. Yeah. And, you know, one thing that Coach Witt said as well was, you know, which I'm not going to say is groundbreaking for anybody to say. But he said, we expect to contend for a Big Ten championship every single year. And that's our plan from day one.

Well, I've heard a lot of coaches say that. There's no doubt about it, right? they always say that but this is what I true I like I believe him that that's kind of what I wanted to get at is you feel like he is like no we are Michigan this is why I came here I'm you know I'm as old as I am I'm not coming here to you know just get one more paycheck it's like I want to go and win the damn thing and so right and he was a lifetimer at Utah like he didn't he didn't need to leave he was going to have the job there until he didn't want it anymore and so The fact that he comes to Michigan, knowing that he can elevate this program, like, says exactly that.

That he is committed to taking Michigan back to 2021, 2022, 2023, Michigan. And I, you know, he really believes that. And so if he can get the guys to, like I said, align to what he believes and all of the coaching staff understands who Coach Whittingham is. So I don't think there's going to be any trouble there. That's going to be huge for him. Yeah, I do. And it just feels like, okay, he is a guy that is, you know, he's not going to meddle. And, you know, a lot of the things that I heard from this last coaching staff is that there was a lot of like,

I need to be involved in every single thing that's going on. It feels like coach Witt is definitely going to be like, no, coach back as the O.C, I hired you to do your job because you're really good at it, you know. and it feels like he's really good at the facilitation of it all and the, you know, putting the pieces together as well. Yeah, he's obviously a great manager. And that's really what a head coach is. Like a head coach typically is not calling plays. Now, obviously that happens with some programs.

And we did that in Michigan. My first two years, Harball was actually my first year Harbaugh called the plays. And then we brought in Pep Hamilton. but to just have a head coach that can manage the entire team and not micromanage each position group like trust your coaches you got in there for a reason and if you truly believe that they're good at what they do then allow them to do that make sure that they understand what your goal is in mind but yeah I think he's going to be a great manager he's been around the game long enough he's been a head coach long enough that he understands what to do and what not to do yeah for

sure. And just like in the in the, all right, let's get guys to buy into a culture and let's, you know, I think that that was one one quote that he had as well, that he feels like he's already got the team bought in and especially at the leaders bought in. That's not easy to do. You're coming in. There's, there are a lot of the same players that were here last year. And so you've got to get them bought into a completely different scenario, right? Completely different people. They, you know, whether as a fan, you know, liked what you saw or didn't like what you saw last year, most people will say that you didn't.

But, you know, these players had relationships with those coaches. You know, they loved Wink and Ron Bellamy and, you know, et cetera, et cetera, right? And even Sharon, you know, and so I think that getting those guys bought into like, hey, this is the new system, this is how we do things. These are the new people. That's probably the biggest thing that you can do. Yeah, and Jim Harbaugh obviously ran a very tight ship in terms of he didn't allow for a lot of BS and around. Like you were there to play football.

So we still have guys on the team from that era of Jim Harbaugh. Now, Sharon comes into coach, and we talked about this before. I think he was more of a friend first of the players, really tried to push that players coach. And there was some more leniency. my point is that there's really two sides to the players, you know, with Coach Whittingham coming in. You have the ones that are kind of begging for that culture, again, that environment of discipline and accountability. And then you have the other side of guys who only know freedom and being best friends with your coach and talking to them about what you did

on Saturday night. But the guys that have been there and understand the benefits of actually having a firm culture and a high standard will be able to get those guys, the other guys, to adopt to that, which is going to be huge. I mean, that was the thing that happened with us. We didn't really have a culture, especially in 2020. And then we kind of flipped a script on that and guys start to buy in. Some guys don't and they leave and that's fine. They didn't need to be there anyway.

So. Well, and to that point real quick, too, is I think that my bet is that they're weeding some people out right now. Yeah. that's kind of my gut take is there's probably going to be, that's what spring ball is, and especially with a brand new coaching staff, it's like, all right, who's going to step up to the plate and who's not? And, you know, my gut take on how Coach Witt, you know, does his business is like, if you're not on board, man, you got to get out of here, right?

Right. We're not holding our whole team back for just you. Right. And if a guy, a high-level player leaves because he doesn't like the way things are, he was not supposed to be there in the first place. Like, I know that it sucks. But I played on a team in 2020 that had 24 draft picks on it that went two and four. Like, listen, we're going to have talent, but we need to get everybody under the same roof moving in the same direction the same way. And if a guy leaves because he doesn't like that, then that's okay.

Like we don't need any cancers on this team. We need a bunch of guys who love to play football the way that coach Whittingham is going to run the team. And I think that's the way that it is going to go, right? And there is some weeding out that needs to be done. So don't fret if somebody leaves that you are, you know, heartbroken over. Like it's probably going to happen. It's okay.

It's part of the game. Yeah, 100%. And I think that that's, you know, that's going to be a big piece of what happens in spring ball here is, the real true leaders of this team are going to emerge. And I think that, you know, my gut on what happened last year is there are certain guys that they thought that they were leaders, but, you know, just in that performative side of things. Yeah, exactly. Now it's like, okay, who are going to be the real true leaders?

Some of them might be transters that came in. You never know. Some of them might be guys that have been here and gone through it, like a Jordan Marshall or something like that. Right. But I also think the key to, you know, the turnaround in 2021 was also not only coming from Coach Harbaugh and the staff, but it was even more so maybe coming from it within the players, right? Yeah. You have guys that stepped up and said, you know, listen, this is, you know, more, this is not just about letting the coaches tell us what to do.

We need to tell each other what to do. And so I think that that's going to be one of the most important parts of, what happens here in the next month is like, all right, we've been doing workouts. I'm sure there are some guys, you know, that are, I do like the way that coach Witt, you know, he basically put together like a cabinet of captains. And, you know, it's like, all right, who are these guys that are actually going to step up and say, you know, hold each other accountable and, you know, lead from within. Yeah, the leadership council.

Yeah, there you go. Which is a wonderful thing because it bridges the gap between the coaches and the players. Right. Because when you're a 18-year-old to 22-year-old playing college football, you don't really want to go against what your coach says. But that is the beauty of the leadership councils because you can address some of those things that maybe you don't like. And to your point earlier, yeah, I think last year a lot of our leadership was coming from the guys who were performing on the field. and that's not always the case of who the best leader actually is.

In 2020, we had a whole bunch of guys who performed well and were assumed to be leaders, but maybe just didn't fit the bill to be a leader. And so to understand which guys are actually unbelievably bought into the system and can make sure that others will also do the same is important. I mean, I stepped into a leadership role, and I wasn't nearly the best guy on the team. But I just had the opportunity because I was bought into what we had going on. And I think that's what he's implementing now. I think the leadership council is huge.

Already taking a lot of steps in the right direction in terms of getting these guys moving in the right direction and giving them a foundation. A leader of men is what we needed. And that's what we're currently seeing. Absolutely. So we'll see how this month goes. I'm sure we'll get more players, you know, to the podium and we'll see some stuff. I'm hoping that Coach Witt is a little more open to the media than some of the past staffs. Going back to Coach Harbaugh, he legitimately thought I think there were like Russian spies in every single meeting and practice and everything.

So, you know, hopefully he'll be a little bit more open so that we as the fans can see, you know, what's going on and hear about it because that's, you know, that's what you want. You want to be able to celebrate these guys as they're going through a grind of practices. So we'll see what happens in the next month or so. You know, as I'm sure some guys will emerge as stars. And then, you know, then you've got three months until you put the pads back on again for real and find out who's ready to play in the fall. So we've got a big weekend ahead. As we said, we'll be at Hopcat Thursday night. We will see you all there.

Shout out to Feldman Chevrolet of Highland. Go to Felman Chevyofiheiland.com and check out their entire used and new car selection. We've got some great deals going on, you know, as the spring is coming around here. And for us, you can follow us at Blueby 90 on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, at Blueby 90 podcast on YouTube and Blueby90. We appreciate you. Go Blue. Go Blue.