Preview and prediction: Michigan basketball vs. Maryland

Michigan Wolverines basketball will be without sophomore point guard Dug McDaniel, its leading scorer, for the next six road games due to a suspension stemming from an academic issue, including Thursday night at Maryland.

The Maize and Blue are on a four-game losing skid and have dropped nine of their last 12 outings. Maryland, meanwhile, has fell in its last two and sits at 9-6 on the season.

Here’s everything you need to know before Thursday’s game, including our final score prediction.

Game information: Michigan vs. Maryland

Date	Thursday, Jan. 11, 2024
Venue	XFinity Center
Time	7 p.m.
TV / Stream	Fox Sports 1
On The Call	Jason Benetti (play-by-play) and Robbie Hummel
Radio	Detroit: WWJ-Radio (950 AM) | Ann Arbor: WWWW (102.9 FM) | Grand Rapids: WOOD (106.9 FM) | Stream: MGoBlue.com
On The Call	Brian Boesch (play-by-play) and Terry Mills (color)
Betting Line	Maryland -6, over/under 141
Kenpom Prediction	Maryland 71, Michigan 69 (41-percent chance of U-M victory)

Michigan projected starters

Michigan’s projected starters: Graduate guard Jaelin Llewellyn, graduate guard Nimari Burnett, senior forward Terrance Williams II, graduate forward Olivier Nkamhoua and sophomore forward Tarris Reed Jr.

Michigan injuries: Junior guard Jace Howard has missed the entire season to this point with a leg injury. McDaniel is suspended for the next six road games.

Maryland projected starters

• #1 – Fifth-year senior guard Jahmir Young (6-1, 185) — He’s leading the team with 19.9 points, 4.5 rebounds and 3.6 assists per game and shooting 48.3 percent on twos and 34.1 percent on 82 three-pointers. He’s generating 0.847 points per play on pick-and-rolls (including passes), which is about average. His 32.5-percent usage rate in Big Ten play leads the conference. He’s the only active NCAA player with 2,000-plus points, 650 rebounds, and 400-plus assists.

• #5 – Freshman guard Deshawn Harris-Smith (6-5, 215) — The No. 35 overall recruit in the 2023 class is averaging 7.6 points, 4.5 boards and 2.7 assists per clash. He’s shooting 42.3 percent from inside the arc and 7-of-38 (18.4 percent) from beyond it. Harris-Smith can handle the ball in pick-and-roll situations and looks to drive off of spot-ups. He can really get to the foul line, with 55 attempts on the year, but only makes 60 percent of his free throws.

• #22 – Senior forward Jordan Geronimo (6-6, 225) — The Indiana transfer is registering 6.5 points and 3.7 boards per contest, while connecting on 62 percent of his twos and 2 of his 24 threes. Strong on the offensive glass, he has an 8.1 offensive rebounding percentage. He’s seen 34 of his 97 points this season come on cuts.

• #24 – Fifth-year senior forward Donta Scott (6-8, 230) — The veteran is set for his 145th career game. He’s in his fourth season of averaging double digit points, with 10.1 per game this year. He’s adding 5.1 rebounds and shooting 44.6 percent on twos and 35.5 percent on 62 three-point tries. Scott spots up, posts up, can isolate and pick-and-pop — a player with many traits but not a master of any one thing in particular, a reason why he’s in his fifth season of college basketball and not in the pros.

• #10 – Junior center Julian Reese (6-9, 230) — He’s putting up 13.3 points and 9.5 rebounds per game. He shoots 50.8 percent from the field, all two-pointers, ranks 76th nationally in block rate and draws 7 fouls per 40 minutes. Reese posts up almost as much as anyone in the Big Ten and generates 0.774 points per play in those situations (including passes), which is below average from an efficiency standpoint.

Key bench contributors
• #2 – Senior guard Jahari Long (6-5, 200) — The Seton Hall transfer is in his second season with Maryland, playing 19.5 minutes per game off the bench. He’s posting 5.4 points, 1.7 rebounds and 1.6 assists per night, shooting 62.1 percent from inside the arc and 9-of-34 (26.5 percent) on threes.

• #12 – Freshman forward Jamie Kaiser Jr. (6-6, 205) — Averages 18.7 minutes per game off the bench, playing on the wing and sliding Geronimo and Scott down a spot in the frontcourt. The four-star, top-75 prospect is putting up 4.4 points and 2 boards per game, while shooting 27.3 percent on twos and 23.7 percent on 59 three-point attempts.

What to watch for: Michigan vs. Maryland

Maryland and its size have held up defensively, holding opponents to a 43.1-percent shooting clip from inside the arc. The Terrapins have also been able to limit three-point attempts, with only 27.5 percent of opponents’ field goals coming from behind the arc. That’s a pretty good and effective combination, plus Maryland turns teams over on 20.8 percent of their possessions (42nd nationally).

Michigan and its lack of ball-handlers without McDaniel will face pressure, with Maryland applying it on 23.9 percent of possessions. We assume head coach Kevin Willard will go with even more of it than usual against a team without any depth whatsoever in the backcourt. Maryland goes with man-to-man on 87.3 percent of plays and mixes in some zone.

Maryland’s defense has been good enough to where the Terrapins are an undefeated 9-0 when the offense is able to reach 1 point per possession or more. However, it hasn’t been able to do that against any decent teams, with the Terrapins owning no top-100 victories.

Maryland ranks 168th nationally in offensive efficiency, per Kenpom, and the only real positives on its profile are its 35.3 offensive rebounding percentage, which ranks 35th in the country, and its 46.1 free throw rate (sixth nationally).

Maryland is a poor shooting team (27.4 percent from beyond the arc) and is making only 49.3 percent of its looks from two-point range. The Terrapins struggle with turnovers (17.6 percent of possessions, 176th nationally) and have a low assist rate (46.1). Maryland gets the ball into Reese and Scott in the post and lets Young control the offense on the ball, but it hasn’t been efficient.

Michigan hasn’t been deep all season, so staying out of foul trouble has often been a key, but it will especially be that way without McDaniel against a team that gets to the line quite a bit.

Prediction

It would be surprising if Michigan won any of its upcoming road games without McDaniel — at Maryland, Purdue, Michigan State, Nebraska, Illinois or Northwestern — because he’s been the Wolverines’ only offense at times and is the only consistently good ball-handler. Everyone on this team has already been asked to do more than they’re probably comfortable with, and that’ll only be stressed without McDaniel.

The Wolverines will have to scratch and claw to stay in this one, which is a disappointing fact given how bad Maryland has been.

Prediction: Maryland 75, Michigan 67