Michigan Dominates Rutgers To Win Big Ten Opener

Coming off a 10 day hiatus after dominating the Players Era Festival in Las Vegas, the No. 3 Michigan men's basketball team (8-0 overall, 1-0 Big Ten) didn't lose any of its momentum, dominating on both sides of the ball on its way to a 101-60 win over Rutgers (5-5, 0-2) in its Big Ten opener.

The Wolverines were led by sophomore forward Morez Johnson Jr.'s 22 points on 9-for-11 shooting, as well as junior guard Elliot Cadeau's 11 points and nine assists with no turnovers. Graduate forward Yaxel Lendeborg also added 14 points, eight rebounds, and three assists.

The Wolverines got out in transition early, forcing Rutgers turnovers and collecting points on easy looks around the rim. In fact, 22 of Michigan's first 24 points came in the paint — 10 of which were courtesy of Johnson — with the other two coming from the free throw line.

By the time the clock ticked under 12 minutes, the Wolverines had already opened up an 18-6 lead. A big part of Michigan's success in the Players Era Festival was its ability to put opponents away after opening up a double-digit lead and not letting the opponent back into the game.

And the Wolverines continued that trend against the Scarlet Knights. Blink and you miss it, back-to-back triples from Johnson and Lendeborg stretched the lead all the way out to 20, at 39-19, with just under five minutes to play in the first half.

It wasn't just Michigan's offense that helped earn the big lead, its defense continued its reign of terror as well. Rutgers simply couldn't get into a rhythm, shooting just 34% from the field and turning the ball over 10 times in the first half.

So, led by its suffocating defense and Johnson's 15 points, Michigan took a comfortable 50-25 lead into halftime. Even with 10 days off in between games, the same Wolverines came to play in front of their home crowd.

Out of the break, Michigan came out with the same energy. In the first four minutes of the half, it scored 10 points. Everything was coming up maize and blue, as Johnson knocked home his second 3-pointer, both of the game and of his career, and Lendeborg followed suit, stretching the score to 60-33 by the under-16 minute timeout.

The threes kept raining in, too. Sophomore guard L.J. Cason knocked in three of them in under four minutes, while Lendeborg and freshman guard Trey McKenney added ones of their own. All of the sudden, the Wolverines' lead stretched to 37 with 12 minutes to play, with the score at an unsightly 77-40.

From that point, the faint idea that the Scarlet Knights might mount a miraculous comeback had gone out the window, but the Wolverines still didn't slow down. They continued to work on defense, making life very difficult for Rutgers, as well as continuing to push the pace and get easy buckets in transition.

Michigan head coach Dusty May used the final eight minutes of the runaway game to play some of his deeper bench guys, and they took advantage. Freshmen guard Winters Grady knocked home two 3-pointers, redshirt freshman forward Oscar Goodman emphatically slammed home a baseline dunk, and freshman forward Malick Kordel caught an alley-oop from Goodman to get himself into the stat sheet.

As the final buzzer sounded, Michigan earned its third straight 100-point outing and eighth win on the season in its 101-60 win over the Scarlet Knights.