Big Ten Basketball: Ranking all 18 programs after adding Oregon, UCLA, USC, and Washington

7. Michigan

Michigan won the national championship in 1989 then rode the Fab Five to a pair of Final Four’s a few years later. The Wolverines then disappeared from the national spotlight for over a decade until John Beilein led them to multiple trips to the national title game. Current head coach and Fab Five member Juwan Howard is hoping to bring more success to Michigan and he’s mostly been succeeding to this point.

His Wolverines advanced to the Elite Eight in 2021 and Sweet Sixteen in 2022, though that latter team really underachieved throughout most of that season. Combine that with a 2023 team that missed the Big Dance altogether and we’ve got two sides to the coin in Ann Arbor. Last year’s Michigan squad was loaded with talent but couldn’t even advance to the NCAA Tournament and will be faced with an even tougher conference in the years to come.

First and foremost, we can’t ignore Michigan’s recent deep runs, even before Howard was hired. This Michigan program is not the team from the early 2000’s that couldn’t even make the Big Dance or win the important games in the conference. The Wolverines are expected to beat these other high-level Big Ten foes and make these postseason trips, but the recent disappointments can’t be ignored either.

If Howard keeps recruiting and developing talent at a high level, then we can expect great things from the Wolverines, but it’s hard to rank them among the very best in this conference. Michigan has been great, finishing at or above .500 in conference play for eight straight years, but is that something that can keep up for years to come?