He's the rumored author of this article.

Why is anyone talking to him?

He was a joke with a comment on the sign stealing.

Then accusing Howard of using a cellphone during a game (it was a fricking notecard).

Now he's gonna write about our culture and non bball things?

The same guy that never wrote or investigated a single thing regarding the numerous sexual assaults his favorite coach covered up?

I posted about Illinois basketball's drastic team turnover before this seaon, and also before last season.

Interestingly enough, as much as we have laughed at Brad Underwood for not winning the B1G, his team is currently 23-8, and 14-6 in the B1G.

This is with a program that, for two years in a row, has lost at least 4 of their top 6 scorers, and minutes producers.

This season's strong team has a top five scoring group of Terrance Shannon, Marcus Domask (Transfer from SIU), Coleman Hawkins, Qunicy Gurreier (Oregon transfer), and Justin Harmon (JC transfer).

Last season's tem was led by Texas Tech transfer Shannon, Matthew Mayer (Baylor transfer), Dain Dainja (2nd year transfer from Baylor), Jayden Epps, and Skyy Clark (both HS frosh).

Two seasons ago, the team was led by Kofi Cockburn, Alfonso Plummer, Trent Frazier, Jacob Grandison, and Andre Curbello with the sophomore version of Hawkins as the 6th man...

A couple of points.

One is that Underwood seems to really be adept at changing his team on the go, and continuing to win at the same level.

Another interesting take is that both of the freshmen transfers off of last season's team, Epps and Clark are both playing well as sophomore in their new programs- Yet Ilinois doesn't seem to miss them much.

One thing that seems to be becoming a pattern in college basketball: Top mid major conference scorers dominating or at least contributing at a high level for their new programs- Domask is a poor man's Dalton Knecht, who may very well end up being in the POY converstaion for Tennessee as a Northern Colorado transfer.

Honestly, Underwood's teams give me hope that, with the right guy making the moves and bringing in the right fits, a program can overcome a lot of turnover, and rebuilds don't have to take years.

In addition, Illinois recruits nowhere near as well as B1G rivals IU, MSU, or OSU, yet still finishes above those programs in the rankings most years.


The ability to rebuild has eluded not just Michigan, but other programs like OSU and IU, who is struggling despite putting together a group of highly-ranked freshmen and transfers, yet still struggling to an MSU-level 18-13, 10-10 conference season.

The key to basketball's future is finding a guy like Underwood, who can switch and replace huge parts of the lineup from one season to another, and still win 11-15 B1G basketball games each year...In this new transfer/NIL world, team and talent building is the most important part of success, and is necessary in order to keep one's job as a college basketball head coach.

Michigan just needs to get the next guy in, and hope that he has Underwood's success on rebuilding.

But if we find the right guy, the turnaround shouldn't take a ridiculously long 3 or 4 years...We shoud knwow soon if the new guy can handl it

Talk is there’s a “settlement” negotiation currently underway and that’s hindering the new hire from occurring. @Josh Henschke whats this all about? He wasn’t even on leave or under contract anymore? A settlement implies there’s some dispute between Hart and UM and he wants compensation for it.

This entire saga is beyond bizarre. Only at Michigan. A legend leaving (and we don’t even know why) while fighting his school.

so The Big Ten has BTN and BTN+, a paid subscription service, already in use.

Do they they feel that is enough so they may broadcast the Wednesday games in the BTT?

NOT SO FAST! It's only broadcast on Peacock. So you get to pay another fee to watch the games.

Fortunately Michigan is playing on Wednesday and they way we have closed out our season, I am not sure just how many people will pay to see that game.

Still, just why is someone paying for BTN+ & BTN?

Nobody has had any new info about it, and he’s supposedly going to be hired this week.

Props to Sherrone keeping this thing under wraps. Impressive.

I was a guy in my 20s and it was huge back then. However I watch these AE special on Sundays about these guys from that era. Man these guys were f... up. Just watched the Scott Hall special. Wow what a sad thing. Just had so many demons and he apparently killed a guy. Just threw his family away. Aweful.

Update: Now I am hearing from some folks that an article on Michigan basketball’s culture is expected to come out.

Considering what happened with Sanderson and all that, I’m not surprised. We’ll see if and when it comes out.

—

Have spent the better half of this morning/today reaching out to anyone I could possibly think of who might have some sense as to what's happening in regards to talk of an article coming out that portrays the Michigan athletic department in a negative light.

This thread has had an extensive discussion on it and I have received questions from elsewhere: https://michigan.forums.rivals.com/threads/kirk-barton-of-buckeye-scope-unbelievable.358190/

I have spoken with countless people who have all heard the chatter about the article but have not heard anything about the accuracy of the rumors or are aware of anything imminent.

I am not going to sit here and portray the rumors as bunk as I haven't had any kind of firm denial, just a lot of I don't know's and things along those lines.

With that said, if it were going to come out this week, I am going to wait and see what happens and go from there and react accordingly. As @Section_6 said in the above thread, anyone could make any athletic department look like a dysfunctional mess.

We'll see what happens.

Had a very strong senior campaign for Grand Rapids Catholic Central

Another former M lineman cashes in in leaving Green Bay for the Giants in a 3 year $30M contract with $17M guaranteed.

Makes one think that the Lions got Graham Glasgow on the cheap.

Meanwhile the Packers have some significant departures this spring, Aaron Jones, Runyan, Bakhtiari (although he's been injured quite a bit lately).

Building a family culture through work, trust and follow through is so different than bringing a family culture with actual family and friends. One way was successful this year, the other, undermined a program.

Listen to the podcast today. Saying hockey team has criminal rape accusations, the cheating in football only reason they won games and that Warde is going to be outed soon. Just goes on and on. They are so obsessed with Michigan they can’t talk about their team, Ohio State.

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I have no answer so wanted to pose the question - if you’re Warde, how do you know if this was Howard’s version of Harbaugh’s 2020 season or time to cut bait? Consensus was for him to fire Jim in 2020 and he stuck with him for an unprecedented run of success, but it was a gamble. Could keeping Juwan with a revamped staff, contract, etc lead to the same result?

This might sound like I am hedging a bit, which is probably the case because I have yet to hear anything definitive one way or the other but there is definitely some momentum for Quinten Johnson to return to Michigan this season.

My optimism has increased based on what we’ve been hearing.

To reiterate, I haven’t heard he is coming back or not yet but those I speak to continue to work on it and sound optimistic it’ll happen.

More when I have it.

That's something you just can't coach.

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Gets 3 year $57M contract.

Wow.

Lots of smoke he wanted out of Oklahoma and now he’s heading back to Chicago.

Again, no idea if Juwan will be back or not but this was a name on my list if he wasn’t.

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I have largely stayed away from the discussion regarding Warde Manuel and an upcoming decision to whether keep or get rid of Juwan Howard after the season is over.

The expectation has always been that Manuel was going to make a decision one way or the other after the season was over. With it coming to an end soon, barring some type of miracle run in the tournament, we shouldn't have to wait very long to get an answer.

As for the talk of Manuel wanting to keep Howard for another year, I have yet to hear anything credible on that. Just rumors and echo chamber stuff. I can certainly see a scenario where Manuel moves on after this year but I can also see a scenario where he gives him one more year to try and fix things. Whether I think Howard can fix things or not is an opinion I will reserve for a separate discussion.

In short, I have yet to hear anything from anyone that suggests Manuel wants to keep Howard other than conjecture. Nothing concrete or credible has been shared with me like that and no one has relayed anything close to what Manuel's thought process is right now.

It seems, at least right now, that a decision has yet to be made and that things will remain in the dark until a path has become clear.

Again, there are opinions to be had about the path and the right move to make, but that's not my call, nor is this the post to do it.

More when I have it.

Michigan has been working to expand its linebacker board in the 2025 and 2026 classes since Brian Jean-Mary was let loose into the recruiting world.

Jean-Mary recently offered '26 LB Anthony Davis out of Grayson HS in Georgia.

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He was excited to receive the offer and is hoping to learn more about the defensive scheme. He loves how consistent Michigan is every year.

He is hoping to take a trip to Ann Arbor this spring.

Both winners of 4 of 5.

ohio state fires coach in season and gets better.

indiana fans hoped woodson would be fired and now they keep winning.

I live in Cincinnati and the softball team is in town to play Northern Kentucky where I did my undergrad. Excited to take my girls 3 and 9 to see the ladies kick some ass. They play at 10, 1230 and 330 on ESPN. Triple header.

-Brandon Graham is re-signing with the Eagles for a 15th season. It’s cool to see players play their entire careers in one city.

-Graham Glasgow is set to re-sign with the Lions for 3-years with a $9.5M guarantee.

-Mason Graham lands at #1 on PFF’s top ten defensive tackles for 2024.

(Kenneth Grant lands at #6 on same list)