Michigan basketball didn’t exactly come out blazing against Marquette, but the Wolverines found their rhythm in time to take control and roll to an 84-70 win.
The matchup came against a Marquette team ranked 31st in Kenpom, with Michigan sitting 26th. Even with that close positioning, the Wolverines separated themselves and won going away. The finish to the first half gave Michigan a lift, and the quick start after the break kept Marquette from ever getting back into it.
A big part of the story was Michigan finally getting real production from deep. True freshman Quinn Costello knocked down five shots from 3-point range, giving the Wolverines the kind of perimeter boost they had been missing.
It also offered a first extended look at J.P. Estrella and Moustapha Thiam with both big men fully healthy and on the floor for real minutes.
Michigan’s defense also looked the part. The Wolverines showed a lot of the same traits that worked for them last season, and while this may not end up as a quadrant-1 win, it was still a solid result for Mike Boynton and his team.
J.P. Estrella was the clearest winner of the night.
The Tennessee transfer has already looked like a major addition, and against Marquette he backed that up with 18 points on 8-of-12 shooting, eight rebounds, two assists and three blocks. He also hit a 3-pointer.
Estrella was especially important in the first half as Michigan built its edge, and through three games he’s already looking like a bigger piece than expected, even with the Wolverines asking him to handle eight more minutes a game so far this season.
Costello joined him in the bucket column with a breakout shooting night. The freshman finished with 15 points in 25 minutes and went 5-for-6 from beyond the arc.
Michigan had been under 30 percent from 3-point range in its first two games, so Costello’s shooting gave the offense a much-needed jolt. The 6-foot-10 McDonald’s All-American also contributed on the other end with four rebounds and a block.
He’s not at Trey McKenney’s level yet, but he could end up giving Michigan a similar kind of bench impact this season.
Moustapha Thiam didn’t have his best scoring night, going 3-of-9 from the field, but the rest of his line still made him one of the game’s biggest positives. The 7-foot-2 center finished with 12 rebounds and three blocks, and Michigan was plus-23 while he was out there. His offensive game should be better than what showed Wednesday, but his length and activity already caused problems.
The defense as a whole did plenty of work. Marquette shot 38 percent overall and 35 percent from 3, and while the Golden Eagles did hit 12 threes, they only managed 10 assists on 21 field goals.
They also shot just 34 percent on 2-point attempts, committed double-digit turnovers and got to the line only nine times. They had to grind for every point to reach 70.
The one rough spot came from Michigan’s guards. Trey McKenney, Elliot Cadeau and Roddy Gayle combined to go 5 of 15 from the field, and they also piled up nine of the team’s 15 turnovers.
That trio will need to clean things up against stronger competition later on, even if this game wasn’t enough to raise major alarms. For now, McKenney, Gayle and Cadeau remain the least of Michigan’s concerns.
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