BASKETBALL: Michigan defeats Minnesota 69-60

Michigan Basketball's Jordan Poole Photo by Detroit Free Press

It may be 10 degrees in Minneapolis Minnesota but Michigan Men’s Basketball team was on fire last night with a 69-60 victory over the Golden Gophers of Minnesota. In the prior game against Minnesota it was down to a last-second shot to win it by Charles Matthews to win that game and last night  Michigan trailed once for 31 seconds. Jordan Poole and Jon Teske led the way for Michigan with Poole going 5-9 from three-point land in leading scorers with 22 points, while Teske had 17 points, seven rebounds, and five blocks.

Minnesota’s game plan to start with was to go after Teske get him into foul issues early and not only did that fail Teske had one foul the first half and held the Gophers to 18 points the lowest point total all season. Leading Gopher scorer Amir Coffey had a terrible shooting night as he missed his first 10 shots and was 2-15 which did not help Minnesota get in the game against Michigan. Other Wolverines played well in Zavier Simpson had 12 assists and 3 steals, and Ignas Brazdeikis added 10 points and had two 3 point baskets when Minnesota came close that kept Michigan a 10 point cushion the whole night.

Overall Michigan shot 46 % from behind the three-point line compared to Minnesota’s 10% from the three-point line. The victory for the Wolverines is the 13th out of 14 wins over Richard Pitino and placed the Gophers on the bubble for the NCCA tournament field. Michigan kept pace with the Michigan State Spartans and remained tied for first and now the showdown everyone has been waiting for is here.

Michigan will take on the Spartans 3.45 Sunday at Crisler and if you do not have a ticket get a loan as they are going for $1500 per ticket on the resale lot. One team will remain in first and the other team will look for payback in a game in East Lansing in a week.