14 — Wednesday, February 24, 2021 
Sports
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Michigan’s depth proves its value over course of season

Michigan’s Adaptive Sports and Fitness Program: An opportunity 

to be a part of history

Michigan searches for consistency as 

postseason looms

There is a reason collegiate and 

professional basketball leagues give 

out a sixth player of the year award 

at the end of every season: Depth 

matters.

And the Michigan women’s 

basketball team has proven it has no 

shortage of depth. Rotation players 

have combined to score 16% of the 

team’s overall points this season. 

In moments when the starting five 

have required rest or missed games 

because of COVID-19 protocols, 

the bench has stepped up for the 

Wolverines. Michigan’s 13-2 record 

is in large parts a product of its depth. 

Sophomore guard Maddie Nolan 

is arguably the team’s best player off 

the bench, even earning her way into 

the starting lineup four times, first 

being thrust into the lineup when 

Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico 

put her in while junior wing Leigha 

Brown was absent with COVID-19 

complications. One of the team’s best 

3-point shooters, Nolan frequently 

reignites the Wolverines’ offensive 

momentum. In Michigan’s win 

over Wisconsin, where she scored 

a career-high 21 points, Nolan was 

a consistent outside threat that the 

team leaned on. In the early moments 

of the game, graduate student guard 

Akienreh Johnson got tangled up 

with some defenders and managed 

to find Nolan on the outside. Nolan 

fired a shot from behind the arc and 

got the team, which had bungled the 

last few possessions, back on track. 

“She’s big, a strong guard, she 

defends exceptionally well, she 

rebounds well,” Michigan coach Kim 

Barnes Arico said. “She can shoot 

the ball and that really (gives) us an 

option from the outside.”

Junior guard Danielle Rauch 

is another player that has played 

considerable time for the Wolverines, 

averaging 15.2 minutes per game and 

starting twice when Brown was out. 

Rauch’s impact can’t be quantified by 

a mere box score. 

Rauch has only scored 21 points 

in the 200 minutes she’s played 

for Michigan, but her role isn’t 

necessarily to come off the bench 

and score basket after basket. Usually 

subbing in for junior guard Amy Dilk, 

Rauch becomes a de facto manager 

of the offense, spreading the ball 

around to players for open shots. 

Rauch has 19 assists on the season, 

the fifth-most on the team even 

besting some of the starters who’ve 

gotten much more time on the court. 

“I’d give Danielle Rauch a lot of 

credit. She’s really grown into her 

role outside and on the court,” Dilk 

said when asked about leadership 

within the team. “All of us, with 

everything going on, have really had 

to step up and have a leadership role.” 

Junior forward Emily Kiser 

missed the first five games of the 

season due to an ankle injury, but 

she’s emerged as a consistently 

solid defender since her return. 

Specifically, Kiser has demonstrated 

her ability to play strong defense in 

the post with senior forward Hailey 

Brown and junior forward Naz 

Hillmon. 

Sophomore guard Michelle Sidor 

is another rotation player that hasn’t 

seen a lot of playing time but has 

been efficient with the minutes she 

gets. Appearing in 10 games off of the 

bench, Sidor is most effective from 

behind the arc, shooting 34.8% from 

deep so far this season. She knocked 

down three triples against Oakland 

and tied her career-high 16 points 

against Butler, a performance fueled 

by 4-for-8 shooting behind the arc. 

The four-player freshman class 

has also shown flashes of talent for 

the Wolverines, revealing a bright 

future where Michigan has roster 

depth in the long term. 

Depth matters, and Michigan is 

lucky to have such consistent players 

to back up its starters. 

In an unorthodox season, you 

never know when a player will have 

to take up the mantle of the team’s 

mantra: “Next man up.” 

Come March, it might make all 

the difference. 

When Chris Kelley arrived in New York for 

a wheelchair tennis tournament, continuing 

his athletic career at Michigan was already on 

his radar. 

As the 2019 United States Tennis 

Association champion with a No. 2 ranking in 

the Men’s A division, Kelley was highly sought 

after and Dr. Feranmi Okanlami, the Director 

of Michigan’s Adaptive Sports and Fitness 

program, had made it clear that he wanted 

Kelley as a Wolverine. 

About to return home, Kelley crossed 

paths with “the tipping point” — Okanlami 

was coincidentally at the same New York 

airport as him at the same time. 

“It felt like I was supposed to be here (at 

Michigan),” Kelley said. 

While Okanlami may not be able to 

stumble upon every prospective athlete 

across the nation, Michigan must find a way 

to separate itself from colleges like Alabama, 

which has a multi-million dollar facility 

dedicated to adaptive sports, or Illinois and its 

rich adaptive sports history.

Still in the early stages, it’s no secret that 

the Wolverines are playing catch up. But 

Michigan has all the makings of becoming a 

recruiting powerhouse in the Midwest.

“There is no program that exists in 

Michigan and the surrounding area,” 

Erik Robeznieks, the Project Manager of 

Michigan’s Adaptive Sports and Fitness 

program, said. “The closest program to us 

in the collegiate space is the University of 

Illinois.”

Kelley, a Michigan native, chose not to 

play adaptive sports as an undergrad because 

there simply wasn’t an in-state option. 

Now, there is. As a result, Michigan can tap 

into the in-state recruiting pool, as well as the 

remainder of the Midwest athletes looking 

for a program closer to home — a clear path 

to bolstering a program on the rise. With that 

said, it is far more than the most convenient 

option. 

“The academics (were) another thing that 

drew me to Michigan,” Kelley said. “When 

you’re looking at athletics, whether you’re 

on the adaptive or able-bodied side, we all 

know that eventually, we’re not going to be 

playing sports. Our bodies will get to a point 

where competitive play just isn’t in the cards 

anymore. When I started thinking about my 

future, the opportunities that the University 

has for me to further my education were more 

appealing to me.”

A blossoming relationship with Michigan 

Medicine offers Adaptive Sports a critical 

resource when it comes to sports medicine 

and prioritizing the health of its student-

athletes. 

“Having somebody who understands 

disabilities and the needs of the wheelchair 

population on a team overall is pretty 

important,” Kelley said. “Johan Latorre is one 

of the coaches that helps out, and he’s also a 

doctor.”

But physical health is not the only factor 

contributing to an athlete’s ability to perform 

at the highest level. A robust support team 

fortified by university resources assists 

student-athletes with all aspects of life.

“The fact that there is an integrated 

support team between academic support 

services, program staff, the coach, their peer 

student-athletes,” Robeznieks said. “We have 

all those different resources and connections 

within the University in place to support the 

all-around student-athlete.”

Yet programs like Michigan Medicine, 

MDisability and Services for Students with 

Disabilities are just the tip of the iceberg. A 

partnership with the Ann Arbor Center for 

Independent Living has provided a space that 

Adaptive Sports can call its own.

“Our 
athletes 
need 
strength 
and 

conditioning,” Robeznieks said. “They need 

fitness beyond their sport. We’ve painted 

the walls maize and blue. We put in rubber 

flooring to actually make a better tactile 

environment for people in day-chairs.”

Adaptive Sports has also partnered with 

the Varsity Tennis Center and the U-M 

Indoor Track Building, providing frequent 

access to high-level facilities. But “frequent” is 

not enough. Equitable access to the resources 

Michigan offers able-bodied student-athletes 

is the program’s ticket to appealing to the best 

adaptive student-athletes around the country. 

“We’re not asking for a 10-million dollar 

facility for ourselves,” Robeznieks said. “We’re 

just looking for that same level of access.”

As the program continues its efforts for 

equitable resources, notoriety remains an 

equally important area for improvement. A 

multitude of facilities are only worthwhile 

if prospective student-athletes are aware of 

them. Largely dependent on word of mouth as 

of now, Adaptive Sports has centered its focus 

on carving out its own recruiting pipeline by 

linking itself to the greater adaptive sports 

community. 

“A great end for us was establishing 

connections with the people who are now 

affiliated with the Midwest Adaptive Sports 

Committee,” Robzenieks said. “We are now 

in with a system of people and organizations 

that operate within adaptive sports at the 

junior level in Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana, 

Michigan and Ohio.”

Mary Free Bed Rehabilitation Hospital, 

the Turnstone Center for Children & 

Adult with Disabilities and the Great 

Lakes Adaptive Sports Association have 

generated a recruiting pool brimming with 

talented athletes looking for post-secondary 

education.

On the flip side of things, universities 

across the country need help from the NCAA 

to make information about prospective 

adaptive student-athletes more readily 

available. 

“In 
able-bodied 
tennis, 
there’s 
the 

Universal Tennis Ranking,” Kelley said. “You 

get star-rankings so you might be a one-star 

recruit or a two-star recruit or a three-star 

recruit. And in wheelchair tennis, we don’t 

have something like that right now.”

With 
the 
minimal 
recruiting 

infrastructure in place for adaptive sports, 

there needs to be a massive implementation of 

tools and platforms to help coaches and scouts 

evaluate the best athletes around the country.

When there are elite players like Kelley, 

decorated with accolades and looking to take 

their athletic career to the next level, the 

entirety of the adaptive sports realm needs to 

know about it.

As the logistics of adaptive sports continue 

to be fluid at both the university and national 

level, one thing remains constant: Michigan’s 

program offers the opportunity to be a part of 

history. 

“It takes a very different kind of athlete to 

come to a new program because there is a bit 

of unknown rather than the tried and true 

history of some of these more established 

programs,” Robeznieks said. “But some of 

the feedback we’ve gotten from the athletes 

so far is that they feel a lot of value being part 

of the University of Michigan Adaptive Sports 

program because day after day we’re forging 

history. 

“We’re building a program from scratch 

and they get to be there from day one.”

A lack of focus. No energy. Not 

being mentally prepared.

These were the factors that 

contributed to the Michigan hockey 

team’s upset loss Friday night 

against Ohio State. Fortunately for 

the Wolverines, they were able to 

bounce back the next day with a 6-0 

throttling of the Buckeyes. 

Come tournament time, though, 

Michigan won’t be afforded the 

luxury of a second chance. 

“We’re gonna get into a situation, 

a big game where it’s just a one-off,” 

Michigan coach Mel Pearson said. 

“You don’t get a second opportunity. 

That’s your season, and how would 

you like to feel after you play like that 

and you’re done?”

Since the Wolverines returned 

from 
their 
COVID-19 
induced 

shutdown, they’ve split both their 

series. One game, they’ll look like 

an unstoppable force that can score 

at will. The next, they’ll be caught 

completely flat-footed and unable to 

make up an early deficit. 

“I asked our team what’s the 

difference from one night to the 

next,” Pearson said. “For some its 

mental preparation. You have to work 

through that. You have to find a way 

to persevere and work through that.”

Being plagued by inconsistent play 

is an issue many teams deal with, 

mainly in the early stages of a season. 

It’s not something Michigan wants to 

be working through now — especially 

with the Big Ten Tournament 

looming just over three weeks away. 

It 
appeared 
the 
Wolverines 

were hitting their stride prior to the 

shutdown. Following the long layoff 

for winter break, Michigan won five of 

its first six games and was building its 

rapport as a national title contender. 

As the Wolverines work back from 

the pause, the team is desperately 

trying to get its conditioning back to 

the level it needs to be. 

“(That 
two-week 
shutdown) 

happened at the most inopportune 

time,” Pearson said. “That’s our big 

challenge, is how much do we need 

physically. But at the same time, we’ve 

got to back off so mentally so they can 

recharge and refresh.”

It’s no mystery how good this 

team can be. Michigan has been 

ranked in the top-10 all season, 

and even after their loss to an 

Ohio State team with just six wins, 

it stayed planted at No. 7. The 

perception is that this team will 

be fighting it out with the nation’s 

elite come late March. And 

yet, the Wolverines aren’t even 

dominating their own conference. 

They are currently tied for third 

place in the standings, 11 points 

behind Wisconsin and 15 behind 

Minnesota. They’ll have to go 

through both to win the Big Ten 

Tournament, and they’ll have to 

come into each game mentally 

and physically prepared — with no 

wiggle room for off days.

“Maybe these guys are just waiting 

to turn it on or turn it off,” Pearson 

said. “I still think we’re probably 

another week, week and a half away 

from being where we need to be.”

Not every game is going to be an 

offensive shootout. In between, there 

will be slow-paced, war-of-attrition 

type battles. In single-elimination 

tournaments, the Wolverines can’t 

afford to quit if the game’s style of 

play doesn’t align with theirs. 

Michigan needs to approach these 

upcoming games with a consistent 

effort, and finding that consistency 

starts in practice. Pearson expressed 

his frustration with his players’ latest 

work ethic: 

“When I put them on the goal line 

and they skate down to the far end 

and touch the boards and come back 

as fast as they can; they go pretty fast. 

And then you say, ‘Okay, why don’t I 

put five million dollars down at the 

end of the rink and you got to go down 

there and there’s another five million 

when you come back.’ Are you gonna 

skate faster? They usually say every 

time, ‘Oh, absolutely.’ ” 

“Well, why? Why can’t you do it all 

the time? Why can’t you play all out all 

the time?”

So can Michigan flip the switch? 

That’s the five million dollar question. 

JOSH TAUBMAN
Daily Sports Writer

MAX WADLEY
Daily Sports Writer

ALEX WALKON
Daily Sports Writer

MADDIE FOX/Daily

With the post-season in sight, depth could be Michigan’s secret weapon.

MILES MACKLIN/Daily

After splitting the two series, concerns over consistancy still plague ‘M.’

Courtesy of Grayson Buning

Michigan is building its Adaptive Sports programs to compete with top schools like Illinois 
and Alabama for recruits and recognition

