Michigan basketball loses heartbreaker to Oklahoma, 87-86

On December 19, 2024By Littum

The Michigan basketball team almost left the Queen City feeling like kings.

Instead, for the second game in a row, it’s just the joker.

Michigan, which has largely played well through the first month-plus of the young season, again blew a break at halftime for a powerful attack. This time, after building an 11-point lead with less than 10 minutes to play, UM allowed Oklahoma to put together a 21-4 second half.

Even still, Michigan led by three points late and appeared to win, but Roddy Gayle Jr. ran into Jeremiah Fears’ legs on a 3-point attempt with 11.5 seconds left. The freshman not only made the long ball, but added the free throw to go up one. Michigan’s Tre Donaldson missed a 3-pointer with three seconds left, Danny Wolf’s put-back attempt fell short and the Wolverines were stunned in an 87-86 loss in the Jumpman Invitational at the Spectrum Center in Charlotte on Wednesday.

While much of the blame can go to the inconsistency in shooting from long range — Michigan made just 4 of 28 attempts, while the Sooners made 12 of 25 — this game was more than that for the Wolverines.

Michigan led for more than 30 minutes (31:36) but couldn’t come up with enough stops down the stretch as the Sooners made five of their last seven shots and scored 30 points in the final 9:42 of the game.

This comes after last week’s performance at Madison Square Garden, where Dusty May’s group led Arkansas by 15 before eventually falling behind by 18 in what ended up being a close loss.

UM now leaves the last of its six tests against high-major competition in the nonconference portion of the slate at 3-3, and wasted another huge performance from its 7-foot duo recently nicknamed “Area 51.”

Vladislav Goldin had a career-high 26 points and 10 rebounds; Danny Wolf added 15 points, 10 rebounds and five assists; Gayle scored 15 and Tre Donaldson added 14 for the Wolverines, who have dropped two straight for the first time this season.

Michigan (8-3, 2-0 Big Ten) has just two games remaining against Indiana Purdue Fort Wayne (Dec. 22) and Western Kentucky (Dec. 29) before league play gets into full swing in the new year.

Wins in the paint early

It was clear that Oklahoma had no answer for UM’s frontcourt early on. After the Sooners got out to an early lead, the duo had a 9-0 run of their own as Goldin hit three buckets in the paint, sandwiched around a Wolf that hit a deep 3-pointer.

The only reason Michigan didn’t blow out Oklahoma in the first half was because of long range shooting. Michigan struggled, making just 2 of 14 attempts, while the Sooners went 6 of 12 behind the long line; three of which came over the next four minutes by Glenn Taylor Jr. and Kobe Ellis.

While OU’s shooting kept the game close, they went cold near the end of the first half, going 5:59 without a bucket.

That streak ended when Luke Northweather got a layup on a busted coverage on a defensive under-the-basket out-of-bounds play with 10 seconds left to send Michigan into halftime up 43-38.

Wolf and Goldin had 27 points on 11 of 15 shooting, while the rest of the team had 16 points and made 6 of 19 shots as UM went into halftime with a 28-12 advantage in the paint, a 22-16 edge on the glass and perhaps most importantly just six turnovers.

“We did a good job early on getting them both involved,” May told ESPN’s Myron Medcalf heading into the half of Goldin and Wolf. “Then we settled for too many threes when we did a good job at the rim.”

Michigan can’t survive freezing shooting

UM’s lead lasted less than a minute as OU made consecutive buckets to tie things at 43, but Goldin found Wolf on a pass to take the lead, then Gayle went on a tear.

The junior transfer from Ohio State was credited with an and-one floater after he was fouled and the shot attempt was called goaltending, and on the next down he got an offensive rebound and was fouled. He made both free throws and then made another bucket on the ensuing drive for a personal 7-0 spurt.

Meanwhile, Oklahoma missed six consecutive shots and turned the ball over three times, and after a Donaldson layup, Michigan put together an 11-0 run to take a 54-43 lead with 15:13 left.

Oklahoma used a quiet 8-2 run — Michigan’s icy outside shooting extended to 2 of 21 on the night with 10 straight misses to that point — to get within five before Goldin got back into the game when he finished off a hard left-hander layup.

After a pair of flagrant OU free throws, Nimari Burnett made a pair of free throws, Rubin Jones made a three from the left side and Donaldson forced a Porter Moser timeout after a crossover and layup capped a 7-0 run in a minute. and put UM back up double digits, 68-57.

Oklahoma responded with a 12-3 run in less than three minutes to get back within two points when Wolf found Goldin on a pick-and-roll to set up a spinning layup, but the Sooners battled back.

Fears and Miles hit back-to-back long balls, quickly adding a 9-0 run in 1:29 to take its first lead since 10-8.

Down by four with three minutes to play, UM scored six straight as Burnett made a pair of free throws and lay around a Goldin bucket to take the lead, 84-82. After OU shared free throws, Goldin got an offensive rebound and made two from the line to go up three with 1:14 left.

Wolf came away with a steal on defense with 58 seconds to play, but Gayle turned the ball over with 3 seconds left to give the Sooners another chance within one possession, leading to Fears’ game-winning shot.

Tony Garcia is the Michigan Wolverines beat writer for the Detroit Free Press. Email him at [email protected] and follow him on X at @RealTonyGarcia.