The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Sports
Wednesday, April 3, 2019 — 7A

Michigan’s leading goal scorer Will 
Lockwood returning for senior year

Michigan’s 
leading 
goal 
scorer from the 2018-19 season 
will return for his senior year, 
a team spokesperson confirmed 
on Tuesday morning.
Junior 
forward 
Will 
Lockwood was in discussion 
with the Vancouver Canucks 
to forego his senior year and 
join the professional ranks, 
but he elected to return to the 
Wolverines for a final year.
The 
Canucks 
drafted 
Lockwood in the third round 
of the 2016 entry draft with the 
64th overall pick.
In his first two years at 
Michigan, Lockwood battled 
shoulder 
injuries 
that 
left 
him 
unable 
to 
reach 
his 
full 
potential. 
A 
dislocated 
shoulder his freshman season 
caused him trouble for most 

of the second half of that 
year. In his sophomore year, 
Lockwood suffered a season-
ending shoulder injury while 
competing 
for 
the 
United 
States at the World Junior 
Championships in January of 
2018.
But in his third season, 
Lockwood 
worked 
his 
way 
back to full health and was a 
valuable offensive threat for 
the Wolverines. He played in all 
36 games and tallied 31 points, 
good for second on the team 
and just two points behind 
Quinn Hughes, who signed with 
Vancouver on March 10.
Lockwood’s 16 goals — five 
more than junior forwards Nick 
Pastujov and Jake Slaker, who 
tied for second in goal scoring — 
led the team. Six of those tallies 
came on the power play, which 
made Lockwood the team’s 
leader in man-advantage goals. 

His 
goal-scoring 
acumen 
also left him ranked second on 
the team in plus-minus with a 
plus-eight rating, just behind 
freshman 
defenseman 
Nick 
Blankenburg at plus-11.
After the Wolverines’ season 
ended in the first round of the 
Big Ten Tournament, attention 
turned to Michigan’s group of 
underclassmen NHL draft picks 
and their imminent decisions. 
Hughes chose to depart after 
his sophomore season for the 
NHL, but Lockwood returning 
gives the Wolverines one of 
their top offensive threats back 
for next season.
If junior defenseman Luke 
Martin and sophomore forward 
Josh Norris also choose to 
return, Michigan could be in 
position to return to its form 
from the 2017-18 season — 
when the Wolverines made the 
Frozen Four.

BAILEY JOHNSON
Daily Sports Writer

ALEXANDRIA POMPEI/Daily
Junior forward Will Lockwood led the Wolverines in 2018-19 with 16 goals, and will return for his senior season.

Deja Church to leave U-M program

In a stunning turn of events, 
sophomore guard Deja Church 
announced via Twitter that 
she will not be returning to the 
Michigan women’s basketball 
team for next 
season.
“Thank you to 
The University 
Of 
Michigan!” 
Church said on 
a tweet shared 
on her official 
account. 
“I 
appreciate 
all 
your support and 
for accepting me 
with open arms! 
However I will not be returning 
to UM next season. Forever will 
love UM, but I know God has 
something else special planned 
for me! Go blue forever”
Church was the Wolverines’ 

starting shooting guard this 
season after spending much of 
her freshman campaign serving 
as the team’s backup point 
guard to Katelynn Flaherty. 
Playing off the ball allowed 
her to attack the rim more 
frequently and emphasize her 
skill as a driver.
The position 
switch 
helped 
Church average 
career bests of 
8.9 points and 
4.0 
rebounds 
per 
game, 
in 
addition 
to 
routinely 
dominating 
on 
the 
defensive 
end, 
averaging 
just over one steal per game.
Most 
recently, 
Church 
displayed 
her 
value 
to 
a 
relatively 
young 
Wolverines 
squad 
in 
the 
NCAA 
Tournament, when she posted 

12 points, 7 rebounds, and 7 
assists in a 84-54 first-round 
win over Kansas State. Even 
as the seconds dwindled down 
to zero in the final moments 
of Michigan’s season-ending 
defeat to Louisville, the future 
for next season’s campaign 
appeared bright, and Church 
was expected to be among the 
team’s key pieces.
Now, the Wolverines will 
march into 2019 without one 
of its starters and biggest 
personalities both on and off 
the court. While the loss will 
be a tough one, senior guard 
Akienreh Johnson will likely 
be more than ready to step into 
Church’s shoes as the team’s 
starting shooting guard after an 
impressive run to close out the 
season’s second half.
When asked for comment, 
a U-M spokesperson directed 
The 
Daily 
to 
Church’s 
aforementioned tweet. 

TEDDY GUTKIN
Daily Sports Writer

I know God 
has something 
special planned 
for me!

WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

Putting things in perspective

W

hat will we remember 
about the 2018-19 
Michigan men’s bas-
ketball team?
Like, really 
remember?
I only ask 
because .... 
in terms of 
memories, 
Wolverines 
fans have had 
it pretty darn 
good lately.
You’re 
going to be 
telling your 
grandchildren about 2013 and 
Trey Burke toppling mighty 
Kansas. Your heart’s probably 
still racing from that wild 2017 
run triggered by near-disaster. 
You’re never going to forget 
where you were last year when 
Jordan Poole ran laps around 
the arena in Wichita, Kan.
But when you look back on 
Michigan’s 2018-19 season, 
which ended with a 63-44 loss 
to Texas Tech in the Sweet 
Sixteen last week, there likely 
won’t be a specific game, 
moment or player that sticks 
under your eyelids above any 
other.
Maybe it’s Charles Matthews 
roaring as he hung on the rim at 
Villanova. Maybe it’s the Wol-
verines running North Carolina 
and Purdue out of the gym. 
That all happened by Decem-
ber. And sure, Michigan started 
out a program-record 17-0, but 
you can learn that in a book.
That torrid start was cer-
tainly impressive. In terms of 
banners, championships or 
indelible moments, though, it 
ultimately meant little.
It might sound like I’m 
about to imply that a lack of 
memorable moments makes a 
season disappointing. That’s 
hardly the case, and I’ll get to 
that later. But it can serve as 
something of a proxy for how 
we view the Wolverines’ most 

recent campaign, and it’s espe-
cially key in understanding the 
ending.
On Jan. 13, when Michigan 
rolled Northwestern behind a 
barrage of Zavier Simpson and 
Jon Teske 3-pointers, it looked 
almost invincible. That was 
its 17th win, and at the time, 
everything was seemingly in 
play — promised, even. John 
Beilein’s teams don’t start out 
like this team did. There were 
blemishes like always, but fix-
ing them is exactly what the 
Wolverines do under Beilein. 
Who could even imagine how 
good they would be in March — 
and maybe April?
The games, players and plays 
that are a part of recent Michi-
gan lore were accompanied 
by triumphs both expected or 
improbable. The Wolverines 
played for a national champion-
ship in 2013. They hung Big Ten 
banners in 2014, 2017 and 2018. 
The symbols of those successes 
are easily brought to memory, 
and they happened when it 
mattered most.
This season had none of that.
That historic start was the 
high point, and while it wasn’t 
all downhill from there, Michi-
gan never made it back. Its 
depth issues were never fully 
resolved. The question of who 
would score when the Wolver-
ines needed a bucket was never 
litigated to satisfaction. In the 
Sweet Sixteen, they were beat-
en by the Red Raiders and their 
top-ranked defense with almost 
eerie ease.
The season’s first three 
months set up the potential for 
a supernova. Instead, Michi-
gan, on that court in Anaheim, 
Calif., more closely resembled a 
candle being blown out swiftly 
and simply.
Is that a disappointment?
Thirty wins? A school-record 
start? A Sweet Sixteen run?
The answer to that question 
depends a lot on the person 

being asked. But the fact that 
it’s even being asked is a bell-
wether for where the Wolver-
ines are right now. And your 
answer says a lot about the 
memories you’ve made over the 
last few years and before then.
I’ve only lived in Michigan 
since I’ve been in college, so 
I’m not going to pretend to 
totally understand this part. 
But when Beilein was hired in 
2007, Michigan hadn’t made 
an NCAA Tournament in nine 
years. It won 10 games his first 
season. Even in 2012, Beilein’s 
future with the Wolverines 
wasn’t entirely certain. Now 
he’s headed for the Hall of 
Fame and he’ll be Michigan’s 
coach until he doesn’t want 
to be anymore. It’s easy to 
overlook how this reality was 
hardly fathomable less than a 
decade ago.
This next part, though, is 
much easier for me to under-
stand: 2019 was supposed to be 
something of a rebuilding year.
The Wolverines lost Moritz 
Wagner, Muhammad-Ali 
Abdur-Rahkman and Duncan 
Robinson from what already 
wasn’t the most talented Michi-
gan team in history. Even with 
the addition of Ignas Brazdekis, 
a brash freshman from Ontario, 
this was still a limited roster, as 
every key player suffered from 
some glaring deficiency.
But somehow — despite 
Simpson and Matthews’ come-
and-go shooting, Brazdeikis’ 
inability to pass, Teske’s still-
developing offensive game, 
Jordan Poole’s wildness, Isaiah 
Livers’ passiveness — that ros-
ter came together to the point 
where a third-place finish in 
the Big Ten feels lacking.
The Wolverines were greater 
than the sum of their parts, 
but their deficiencies were still 
present. And when Michigan 
lost, it was easy to see why. 
Everything went wrong against 
Texas Tech, yes, but in ways 

that weren’t hard to see coming 
— only one 3-pointer in 19 tries, 
for instance — even if it was to 
a much greater extent than pre-
dicted. It was simply a loss to a 
better team.
“How many wins, 28 wins, 
right?” Beilein asked after the 
Wolverines lost to Michigan 
State in the Big Ten Tourna-
ment championship game on 
March 14. “We lost four pretty 
good players from last year, 
that took us to the Final Four 
and now all of a sudden, we’re 
not a new team, but we’re not 
an experienced team in playing 
games like this.”
Beilein expressed that senti-
ment more frequently as the 

season drew to a close. Through 
all of Michigan’s shakiness in 
Big Ten play, dwelling too much 
on that could feel like nitpick-
ing. This was still a top-10 team 
that few people outside of the 
program saw coming.
Taken by itself, there’s no 
reason to regard the 2018-19 
season as a disappointment. 
But with the way it began — 
and the years that preceded 
it — it’s easy to be left wanting 
more. It’s natural to be yearn-
ing for the indelible memories 
and unforgettable successes 
of years past that didn’t come 
this season but often felt like 
they should have.
So if we don’t remember 

the 2018-19 Wolverines in the 
same way we remember other 
great Wolverine teams of 
recent years, we’ll still remem-
ber them. Not as a moment, 
necessarily, but as a group of 
the greatest era of Michigan 
basketball history.
Even without the titles. 
Even without the single 
enduring image. Even without 
NCAA Tournament glory.
This was a damn good 
Michigan basketball team. It 
deserves to be remembered 
that way.

Shames can be reached at 

jacosham@umich.edu or on 

Twitter @Jacob_Shames.

JACOB 
SHAMES

NATALIE STEPHENS/Daily
Michigan coach John Beilein led the Wolverines to a 30-7 record and a Sweet Sixteen appearance this season.

