Sports
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Tuesday, March 22, 2016 — 7
Michigan’s long-awaited return
T
he night the streak ended,
they rolled out a red
carpet.
It was March 24, 2013, at
Joe Louis
Arena, and
that carpet,
extending
from the
rink’s
entrance,
became the
only thing
separating
Notre
Dame from
its CCHA
Championship trophy.
Its purpose was to celebrate
the Fighting Irish, but as the
carpet unrolled, bit by bit, it also
served to taunt Michigan, which
saw its streak of 22 consecutive
NCAA Tournament appearances
reset to zero that night.
Still in his net several minutes
after the final horn stood Steve
Racine, embraced by his senior
captain A.J. Treais, watching a
strip of red cross out his team’s
sparkling record.
For the ensuing three years,
the broken streak has been all
anyone cared about. Racine’s
senior class, and those that came
after it, were burdened with a
historic legacy as a measuring
stick. Making the tournament
was the expectation that came
with signing a letter of intent for
Red Berenson.
In 2000, when Mike
Komisarek signed his own letter,
that standard was apparent.
Even then, Michigan had
already appeared in the NCAA
Tournament for a decade
straight, and he added to that
total during his two-year career.
When Komisarek returned to
Ann Arbor as an undergraduate
assistant coach in 2015, the
winning standard neither
changed around him nor within
him. To him, the goal for the
Wolverines’ current squad was
simple.
“It’s about getting back to
where we were, where we’re
supposed to be,” Komisarek said
in October.
Saturday, with a 5-3 win
against Minnesota, Michigan
made damn sure it would be back
this year — earning an automatic
bid to the NCAA Tournament
with its victory.
And in a season that has come
full circle from 2013, the fact that
the Wolverines will face Notre
Dame for the first time since that
March night seems like a symbol
of fate.
The road back to this point has
been a long and painful one, to
be sure. It only recently became
a straight path — one on which
Michigan exorcised the demons
that have followed it since Racine
and his senior classmates were
left on the wrong end of the red
carpet.
In 2013, they were tasked with
starting over when, in reality,
a fresh start was impossible.
Twenty-two years on the
national stage erase that option.
For three years, that pressure
continued to mount on their
shoulders, and consistently, it
proved too daunting to overcome.
Each of those years, the
Wolverines entered the conference
tournament needing one extra win
in order for their season to live on.
And every time, their season died
there — first against Notre Dame,
then in the opening round against
Penn State in 2014 and finally
in the championship against
Minnesota in 2015.
Recollections of mid-season
stumbles and late-season
collapses began to simultaneously
push the 22-year run farther
from people’s memories and
further cement it as the measure
of success.
The team’s legacy was being
written, and they didn’t have any
way to edit it.
Michigan entered this season
having felt the pain that comes in
place of a postseason too often.
Its players had fielded questions
at a final press conference with
bloodshot, teary eyes too many
times. And while they never
said it, it sure seemed like they
had heard enough of the 22-year
streak they had yet to rekindle.
That’s why, to begin their
campaign, the Wolverines didn’t
want to leave anything to chance.
They didn’t want to scrape into
the NCAA Tournament. They
wanted to earn their bid in
February. They didn’t want to
just beat teams. They wanted to
bury them.
And while Michigan wasn’t
perfect, it started to turn heads,
and quickly.
The Wolverines won the Great
Lakes Invitational and lost just
three games through Jan. 27.
They swept Penn State on the
season, outscoring the Nittany
Lions, 33-11. Freshman forward
Kyle Connor and junior forwards
JT Compher and Tyler Motte
emerged as a first line that could
be the engine behind Michigan’s
postseason push.
Then it all culminated in a
rematch of the 2015 Big Ten
Tournament championship —
only this time, the script had
been flipped.
The Wolverines had their
NCAA Tournament bid in
hand before the puck dropped
Saturday. Minnesota was on
the wrong side of the bubble,
and Michigan was playing for
reparation. The Golden Gophers
were playing for survival.
And just like the season before,
the team in desperate need of a
win had a nail hammered firmly
into its coffin.
“I wouldn’t say it was a chip
(on our shoulder),” Compher said.
“But I think that we had teams
— we called it, ‘We owed these
teams’ — Penn State being one of
them, Minnesota (was another).
“We came here to play in big
games. That’s why you come to
Michigan, that’s why you want to
be a part of this tradition.”
Compher was right; the
Wolverines “owed them.” But
that would be an understatement.
Minnesota and Penn State
weren’t just teams Michigan had
lost to. They were two teams
that had begun to write the
Wolverines’ legacy for them.
They were two teams responsible
for piling the pressure onto
Michigan’s shoulders. They were
two teams that continued the
wrong streak.
But this past weekend, the
Wolverines made a statement.
They dominated Penn State.
Then they finally won the close
game they had lost for the
previous three years. For the first
time in what felt like forever,
Michigan sent another team to a
press conference with bloodshot
eyes and buried its demons
somewhere deep in Xcel Energy
Center. It ended another team’s
season, and now the Wolverines
are back where they were, where
they’re supposed to be. And
not even that provides enough
satisfaction.
“We know the group we
have in that room, though, that
this isn’t enough,” Racine said
Sunday. “We need to go further,
so we’re just trying to stay in the
moment, be humble and keep
working hard and try to get past
this (round).”
It’s only fitting that Racine is
the man to push the boundaries
of what this team defines as
success.
After all, he was the man in net
when Notre Dame ended the old
streak — the same one he’s been
measured by his entire career.
Now, he’ll be between the
pipes against the Fighting Irish
in Cincinnati.
There will be no red carpet
waiting that night.
If the Wolverines are really
back, they’ll make sure Notre
Dame has no chance to see one.
KEVIN
SANTO
JAMES COLLER/Daily
The Michigan hockey team will make its first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2012 against Notre Dame on Friday.
Wolverines whiff against Cowboys
Michigan takes
one of three from
Oklahoma State
in strikeout-heavy
series
By ETHAN WOLFE
Daily Sports Writer
Michigan
baseball
coach
Erik Bakich has stressed how
important consistency is for a
game as volatile as baseball.
In
its
three-game
series
against No. 19 Oklahoma State
(13-7),
Bakich’s
team
was
consistent, but for all of the
wrong reasons. Despite picking
up a win in Sunday’s game
to avoid getting swept, the
23rd-ranked Wolverines (12-
5) struck out 34 times over the
weekend.
It was Michigan’s pitching
that once again anchored the
team in its victory and kept
the previous two games within
reach.
Wolverine
pitchers
allowed a total of 11 hits while
letting up just 13 runs between
the three contests, typically a
stat line conducive to winning
games.
But as was true in its earlier
season losses, Michigan’s lineup
struggled to even make contact
at the plate versus Oklahoma
State. The 7-8-9 hitters had an
especially rough weekend, as
they contributed 15 of the 34
strikeouts.
The problem was not entirely
with the bottom end of the
lineup, though. In Saturday’s
matchup,
Cowboy
pitchers
fanned 17 batters, and every
batter struck out at least once.
Bakich
was
especially
astonished
by
Oklahoma
State
starter
Trey
Cobb’s
performance — he punched
out 13 batters and allowed one
run in six innings against the
Wolverines on Saturday.
“(Cobb)
was
throwing
a
slider,”
Bakich
said.
“It
tunneled just like his fastball,
and when you get a guy who has
an exploding slider like that,
it’s really tough to hit. He had a
great day. A good pitcher had a
great day.”
Michigan struck out 10 times
in its final game on Sunday and
collected 11 runs in its three
games, but Bakich was reluctant
to point out any notable high
points for the offense over the
entire series.
“I think the easy answer would
be the inside-the-park home
run (by designated hitter Drew
Lugbauer on Saturday),” Bakich
said. “But there are no offensive
highlights when you strike out 17
times and lose the game.”
Currently,
the
Wolverines
rank 66th in batting average
with a .295 clip. Though that
puts them in the top quarter of
Division I baseball teams, they
are tied for 10th in the Big Ten
for runs scored.
Michigan players and Bakich
have shown confidence that
they can win the Big Ten
Championship once again, but
its problems at the plate have
already
proven
costly
this
season. They struck out just 5.6
times per game last year and
have climbed to 7.1 to begin this
season.
Bakich gave advice to his
team how to combat the issue.
“When
you
do
get
two
strikes,” Bakich said, “you just
got to choke up and have the
mindset that, ‘There’s no way
I’m not putting the barrel of my
bat on this ball.’ ”
Cole, McCallum
taking on leading
roles as freshmen
By MATTHEW KENNEDY
Daily Sports Writer
For
the
Michigan
men’s
gymnastics
team,
“upperclassman” is almost a
foreign word this season.
After winning back-to-back
national titles in 2013 and
2014, the senior-led roster was
drained, forcing the team to
rebuild with younger gymnasts.
With just four seniors and three
juniors out of a group of 24, this
year’s team dynamic is different
than two years ago — and almost
any other in the country.
“It’s been a little hard so
far coming in with all of these
freshmen,”
said
freshman
Emyre Cole. “We’re definitely
learning;
we’ve
made
some
mistakes.”
The team is led by 13 freshmen
and four sophomores, a recipe
that has been causing some
issues for the Wolverines (1-6
Big Ten, 4-9 overall) this season.
Yet,
as
the
season
has
progressed, the athletes stepping
up the most for Michigan have
been a pair of freshmen: Cole and
Anthony McCallum.
“They both got off to a slow
start,” said Michigan coach
Kurt Golder. “This is quite
an
adjustment
from
junior
programs, (where) you go to
long competitions where there
is no support, nobody cheering
for you, and you have a meet
every three to four weeks. Now
you have one every weekend …
but they’ve been picking it up.”
Throughout the year, both
McCallum
and
Cole
had
competed in multiple events
each meet, with McCallum
having
competed
in
the
all-around
previously.
But
Saturday’s meet against Penn
State marked the first time both
of them competed in the all-
around.
In his debut performance,
Cole showed that he had been
making the progress Golder
was talking about, narrowly
finishing in second with a score
of 86.850. In every event but the
rings, Cole came in the top five,
including finishing second in
the vault only 0.050 points shy
of first.
McCallum also had a good
night, finishing third in the
all-around with a score of
85.400. Though he was more
inconsistent than his teammate,
he also excelled in the vault,
narrowly beating out Cole to take
home the crown in the event.
“It’s still strange because
I didn’t know how much the
team was going to rely on me,”
McCallum said. “Now I’m kind
of comfortable in that position
(where) the team needs me, and
hopefully the rest of the team
can get stronger so I’m not as
relied on. But I kind of own that
position now; I think that’s the
best thing to do in the situation.”
Fortunately for the rest of
the team, McCallum and Cole
seem to be peaking at the right
time. The Wolverines have only
one more dual meet, against a
University of Illinois at Chicago
team
they
defeated
earlier
this season, before competing
in the Big Ten and NCAA
Championship meets.
And even if this season
doesn’t
end
in
anything
special, McCallum’s and Cole’s
early-learned
expertise
and
leadership should be beneficial
down the road.
“Now that we’re in March,
they’re finally in shape,” said
senior Nolan Novak. “They’re
getting the groove of things.
They’ve stepped up and kind
of fit the shoes of being an all-
arounder already, so that will
bode well for them when they’re
seniors.”
MEN’S GYMNASTICS
FILE PHOTO/Daily
The Michigan baseball team struck out 34 times in a three-game series against Oklahoma State over the weekend. The Wolverines won one of the three games.