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Michigan uses dominant second half to surge past Alabama, earn berth in Elite 8
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Michigan allowed 49 points in a forgettable first half, but the Wolverines only trailed Alabama by 2 points as they trudged to the locker room on Friday night in Chicago.
The deficit wasn’t just manageable though, it was miniscule, and the top seed from the Midwest Region had no problem in the final 20 minutes, as Michigan steamrolled its way into its first Elite 8 since 2021 with a 90-77 victory over the fourth-seeded Crimson Tide.
Amazingly, Michigan snatched the lead in the first minute of the second half and never let go of it. Yaxel Lendeborg nailed a 3-pointer 51 seconds after the second half started, giving the Wolverines a 50-49 lead. At that point, the ESPN play-by-play gave Michigan a 68.1% chance to win, even though it only led by 1 point at that time.
That hefty winning probability was backed up by the Wolverines’ relentless attack. Another Lendeborg 3-pointer with 15:34 left jacked the lead up to 9 at 60-51, and Michigan was on its way to a dominant final 20 minutes that carried it into Sunday’s Midwest Regional final.
Who will the Wolverines face for a trip to the Final Four in Indianapolis? That was being determined late Friday night when No. 2 seed Iowa State faced off with No. 6 seed Tennessee in Chicago.
When Elliot Cadeau knocked down yet another 3-pointer for Michigan (34-3) with 12:51 left, the lead had swelled to 13 and Alabama (25-10) simply had no answers for the Wolverines. Labaron Philon Jr. briefly got Bama back within single digits with a 3-pointer of his own with 7:49 left, making it an 8-point game at 75-67.
But that was as close as the Crimson Tide would get, with Michigan’s cushion quickly getting back to double digits. It was time for the Wolverines to celebrate their first trip to the Elite 8 in 5 years, with Michigan overcoming Philon’s game-high 35 points, to go with 7 rebounds and 4 assists.
The beasts from the Big Ten shut down everybody else on Nate Oats’ high-octane SEC team, which was missing the suspended Aden Holloway, so Bama wasn’t quite at full strength during this tournament. The Tide finally paid for it, as Michigan held Alabama to 36% field goal shooting and pounded the Crimson Tide on the glass by a 46-32 margin.
Meanwhile, Michigan blazed away with 50% shooting from the field and a 48% clip from 3-point territory. The Wolverines shared the ball very well, rolling up a whopping 22 assists, and they controlled the paint with 8 blocks as a team.
Lendeborg led the way for Michigan with 23 points, 12 rebounds, 7 assists and 2 steals in 34 stellar minutes. Cadeau added 17 points, 5 rebounds and 7 assists, and the Wolverines also got big contributions from their bench, with Trey McKenney pumping in 17 points and Roddy Gayle Jr. chipping in 16.
And Gayle had the honors of putting the finishing touches on Friday night’s victory with about a minute to go.
With Michigan making it 4 Big Ten teams in the Elite 8 (so far), here is what the Kalshi market currently sees for the teams still in the mix to make it all the way to Indianapolis next week:
