Michigan Basketball Game Preview: Wolverines Start Season with Oakland

Michigan basketball will begin their regular season with a home matchup against the Oakland Grizzlies. New Michigan head coach Mike Boyton Jr. is taking over the program after spending the last two years as Michigan's defensive coordinator under former head coach Dusty May. Dusty May departed for the Dallas Mavericks head coaching job shortly after winning the National Championship for this Michigan program last Spring.

Mike Boyton Jr. was previously the head coach at Oklahoma State from 2017-2024, where he went 119-109 before being fired, but he'll get a second chance to lead a program with much more potential than Oklahoma State had. Dusty May's fingerprints are still all over this roster, so Mike Boyton Jr. should have plenty of talent to work with this season.

It'll be Michigan's first official game of the 2026-2027 season, though they have played three exhibition games already. They beat Eastern Michigan 87-62, Oregon State 98-93, and lost to Houston last week 83-66.

Houston is by far the best team of the three that Michigan played so hopefully they can take some lessons they learned in that game and use it to help better prepare for this regular season. Let's dive into previewing each team based on what we know pre-season below.

Oakland Grizzlies

Oakland finished last season at a 16-16 overall record, and were 12-8 in Horizon League games. From that team, they bring back almost nobody though, with just two players returning who saw heavy minutes for them last season. They brought in 10 new transfer portal additions this off-season to try to revamp things.

In the pre-season media poll, they were selected as the 4th best Horizon league team and KenPom currently has them projected around 199th nationally out of 365 total who are division 1 teams. Clearly, KenPom is not predicting a great season for Oakland by any means, but with this many new faces they could be a really tough team to predict before seeing them play.

Michigan Wolverines

Michigan guard Trey McKenney dribbles the basketball during a drill at the Wolverines' men's basketball media day | USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect

Michigan's team will obviously look a lot different this year. Gone are Yaxel Lendeborg, Aday Mara, and Morez Johnson Jr. who were all 1st round picks in the NBA Draft. The entire Michigan starting front court from last season was selected in the top 12 picks of the NBA Draft, so there's a ton of talent to replace there.

Michigan's starting back court though remains largely intact with senior Elliot Cadeau returning to run the point, along with sophomore Trey McKenney. Roddy Gayle Jr. also returns after winning a court case this off-season that reinstated his final year of eligibility. Those three players will have to lead this team in a lot of ways if Michigan hopes to be anywhere near as good as they were last year.

In the front court Michigan brought in highly ranked transfer portal additions Moustapha Thiam from Cincinnati and J.P. Estrella from Tennessee. Both have played a lot of minutes in college basketball already so they should be ready to step in right away and play at a high level for this Michigan team.

Rounding out the rotation will be Ricky Liburd who was on the team last year but didn't play much, Kenny Noland a transfer who's expected to be the backup point guard, Jalen Reed a transfer from LSU who's had bad injuries the last two years but has flashed high level play, Quinn Costello a sharp shooting stretch four, and Oscar Goodman who played sparingly last season as well.

They already lost 5-star true freshman Brandon McCoy who went down to an ACL injury while the team was playing in exhibition games overseas this summer. He was expected to start for this team but will now miss the entire 2026-2027 season after having surgery.

All in all it should be a pretty good Michigan basketball team this season. KenPom has this team projected at 28th nationally as they enter the season. It should be a team that easily makes the NCAA Tournament, and could be a top four team in the Big Ten if all things come together. It is a team that will rely on a new head coach and a lot of newcomers in the front court, so it'll be very interesting to see how they develop over the course of the season.

Regardless, the team will begin their season against the Oakland Grizzlies in what should be a nice easy win to begin their campaign.

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