{"id":4267,"date":"2026-01-08T19:49:06","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T19:49:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2026\/01\/08\/win-over-penn-state-illuminates-michigans-road-struggles\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T19:49:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T19:49:08","slug":"win-over-penn-state-illuminates-michigans-road-struggles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2026\/01\/08\/win-over-penn-state-illuminates-michigans-road-struggles\/","title":{"rendered":"Win over Penn State illuminates Michigan&#8217;s road struggles"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>The No. 2 Michigan men\u2019s basketball team doesn\u2019t have many weaknesses. Still undefeated two months into the season, though, one negative trend is becoming clear.<\/p>\n<p>The Wolverines\u2019 four worst performances of the season have all come away from home. An overtime win against <a href=\"https:\/\/www.michigandaily.com\/sports\/michigan-paint-power-just-enough-to-move-past-wake-forest-85-84\/\">Wake Forest<\/a> in Detroit, a 4-point victory at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.michigandaily.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/free-throws-and-paint-points-keep-michigan-alive-against-tcu-in-67-63-win\/\">TCU<\/a> and a shaky first half that turned into an 18-point road win over <a href=\"https:\/\/www.michigandaily.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/no-2-michigan-pulls-away-late-101-83-in-fiery-shotmaking-battle-with-maryland\/\">Maryland<\/a> make up the first three of those. Then Tuesday, back on the road for the first time in three weeks, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.michigandaily.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/no-2-michigan-narrowly-escapes-penn-state-74-72\/\">Penn State<\/a> took Michigan to the brink without its leading scorer.<\/p>\n<p>Outside of the Wolverines\u2019 dominant <a href=\"https:\/\/www.michigandaily.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/michigan-rides-hot-start-to-dominant-win-over-san-diego-state-94-54\/\">three<\/a>\u2013<a href=\"https:\/\/www.michigandaily.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/no-7-michigan-outhustles-no-21-auburn-from-first-whistle-cruises-to-102-72-victory\/\">day<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.michigandaily.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/michigan-secures-title-at-players-era-championship-with-win-over-gonzaga-101-61\/\">run<\/a> at the Players Era Championship in Las Vegas, they\u2019ve underperformed every time they\u2019ve left Ann Arbor. And for a team with 11 wins by 25-plus compared to three by single digits, that seems like the easiest place to poke holes.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou see teams go on the road and look like different teams,\u201d Michigan coach Dusty May said Dec. 6. \u201cUndefeated teams go on the road to a team they\u2019re supposed to beat by double digits and they lose because it\u2019s difficult to win on the road, especially in the Big Ten.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-1    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>May is no stranger to difficulties away from Crisler Center, even in his short time with the Wolverines. Last season, Michigan\u2019s first five losses were either away games or played at neutral sites. But the Wolverines cleaned things up, finishing 4-1 on the road in Big Ten play and finding success in the postseason.<\/p>\n<p>A similar trend could be unfolding this year. The narrow wins over the Demon Deacons and the Horned Frogs in November came very early in the season, and Michigan decreased its turnovers and found a more consistent rhythm on offense since then. Even against the Terrapins, the Wolverines figured things out in the second half.<\/p>\n<p>But Tuesday\u2019s game against Penn State can\u2019t be as easily explained away. Michigan was virtually healthy and coming off one of its most impressive <a href=\"https:\/\/www.michigandaily.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/morez-johnson-jr-s-career-high-leads-no-2-michigan-to-96-66-win-over-no-24-usc\/\">wins<\/a> of the season, and yet a team with zero Big Ten wins still took the Wolverines the distance.<\/p>\n<p>While there aren\u2019t any obvious trends across all four underperformances, both Maryland and the Nittany Lions seemed to expose a potential defensive flaw for Michigan. Neither opponent mustered more than 10 assists in their matchup, instead successfully utilizing more isolation offense.<\/p>\n<p>With Michigan\u2019s tendency to switch constantly on defense, opposing offenses can be left with advantageous matchups. For the Terrapins, that was guard David Coit using his speed to create space from bigger defenders on the perimeter. For Penn State, forward Ivan Juri\u0107 similarly capitalized on mismatches, and the Nittany Lions also took advantage of several open 3-pointers from defensive lapses due to switching.\u00a0<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-2    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cWe know that you have to be incredibly disciplined and prepared when you go on the road,\u201d May said Monday. \u201cBecause every team is much, much different at home for obvious reasons.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Maryland and Penn State hold the two highest-scoring performances against the Wolverines in their last eight games. Ultimately, though, May hasn\u2019t seem too worried about his team\u2019s disappointments on the road. There haven\u2019t been any overarching themes through those games, and there was no trouble at all in Las Vegas. But the trend is becoming harder to ignore.<\/p>\n<p>After a home matchup with Wisconsin on Saturday, Michigan hits the road again to play Washington and Oregon next week. As the Big Ten season ramps up, the Wolverines will have less time to iron out any kinks. They\u2019ve only played three of their 11 true road games on this year\u2019s schedule, and four of the remaining eight are against current top-20 teams.<\/p>\n<p>As May said, every team is different at home, and that\u2019s been especially true of Michigan. Its average margin of victory at Crisler Center is over 37 points per game. The Wolverines have shown how good they can be, but to achieve their goals, they\u2019ll need to prove they can be just as consistent away from home.<\/p>\n<aside>\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p><h3 class=\"jp-relatedposts-headline\"><em>Related articles<\/em><\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The No. 2 Michigan men\u2019s basketball team doesn\u2019t have many weaknesses. Still undefeated two months into the season, though, one negative trend is becoming clear. The Wolverines\u2019 four worst performances of the season have all come away from home. An overtime win against Wake Forest in Detroit, a 4-point victory at TCU and a shaky [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4268,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[3265,726,607,2147,361,1167,248],"class_list":["post-4267","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-illuminates","tag-michigans","tag-penn","tag-road","tag-state","tag-struggles","tag-win"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4267","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4267"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4267\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4269,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4267\/revisions\/4269"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}