There’s a strong case to be made that Tuesday is the biggest regular season game in Nebraska men’s basketball history.
After a 20-0 start to the season, the best start in school history, comes the biggest test yet for the No. 5 Huskers, on the road at No. 3 Michigan.
“This team is scary,” Coach Fred Hoiberg said of the Wolverines. “It looks like an NBA team out on the court with the size, with the speed, with the athleticism.”
The game will be available on Peacock, NBC Sports Network and the Huskers Radio Network.
Should the Huskers win over the Wolverines, it will be the first time the program has started 10-0 in conference play since the 1965-66 season.
Nebraska has won eight of its last 10 Big Ten road games dating back to last season, and the Huskers have also won their last 12 games away from Lincoln, since March 31, 2025.
The Wolverines are 8-1 in Big Ten play this season and 18-1 overall under Dusty May in his second season at Michigan.
The matchup will be the 29th meeting between the two programs, with Michigan leading the all-time series 23-5 after winning 12 of the last 13 matchups in Ann Arbor.
Scouting Michigan
May has retooled the Michigan roster in his second season at the helm of the Wolverines.
UAB transfer Yaxel Lendeborg leads four Wolverines averaging double figures in scoring with 14.4 points per game. The 6-foot-9 forward also leads the team in rebounding (7.2 per game) and steals (1.5 per game).
Illinois transfer Morez Johnson Jr. is second on the team in scoring (13.7 per game) and averages 6.9 rebounds per game.
UCLA transfer Aday Mara, 7-foot-3 center, averages 10.9 points and 7.1 rebounds and leads the Big Ten with 2.7 blocks per game.
North Carolina transfer Elliott Cadeau is the team leader in assists per game (5.2) and is averaging 10.3 points as well.
The Wolverines have the nation’s best 2-point field goal percentage (64.3%) and, according to KenPom, the country’s eighth-ranked adjusted offensive efficiency (126.0). Their adjusted defensive efficiency rating is even better at 90.1 (second).
And the staggering analytics don’t end there.
Michigan is second in effective defensive field goal percentage (42.9%), first in defensive 2-point field goal percentage (41.1%), fifth in blocked shot percentage (16.5%) and first in opponents’ average 2-point shot attempt distance (7.7).
But wait, there is more. Lendeborg, Mara, Johnson and backup freshman Trey McKenney all are in the top 100 nationally in 2-point field goal percentage.
The Wolverines can get kill shots, double-digit scoring runs, and have done so with ease this season.
“This team averages one and a half 10-point runs a game,” Hoiberg said. “That’s an insane stat, with the ability to go on crazy runs. So if that happens, you can’t drop your head. You can’t lose your competitive juice. They’re more than capable of putting these enormous runs together, and how are you going to respond to it? That’s the biggest thing for us, which will allow us to have a chance or not, is how you’re going to respond to their runs, and they’re the best in the county at that.”
Keys To the Game
There are four keys for Nebraska: dictating pace, forcing turnovers, clearing the break-even 33.3% mark from 3 and hanging in on the glass.
You could see a similar pace to what Nebraska played against Michigan State, particularly in two areas. The first is stopping transition fast break points. Nebraska can’t win a run-and-gun game against the Wolverines. Limiting fast break points to eight or fewer will be key.
“They are top three in the country in transition rate and they’re top five in efficiency in transition,” Hoiberg said.
How you do that is exactly what the Huskers did against Michigan State. They didn’t crash the offensive glass but focused more on getting back to set up their defense on missed shots. There will be times to push the pace for Nebraska off a Michigan miss, but a focus will need to be on getting back defensively as the Wolverines get shots up in a hurry. They are fourth in the nation in average length of possession (14.6 seconds) offensively and 11th in adjusted tempo (72.5).
In the Huskers’ win against Michigan State, that strategy worked, only giving up six fast break points.
“It’s going to take a very disciplined approach,” Hoiberg said. “I know it’s going to be rocking in the Crisler Center tomorrow, and we’ve done a pretty darn solid job to this point of fighting adversity, facing adversity on the road and find a way to compete at a high level.”
The Huskers 35.5% from 3-point range ranks 94th in the country. Michigan defensively allows 30.2% from deep, good for 38th nationally. If there is one weakness for Michigan, it is that the Wolverines can get sloppy with offensive execution. Their non-steal turnover percentage is 8.2, 264th in the country. If Nebraska can use its hand activity, as Hoiberg likes to call it, to disrupt Michigan’s offense or reach its goal of 25 deflections per game, that will certainly help the Huskers’ cause.
On the other hand, Nebraska has been elite in the turnover battle category in Big Ten play, ranking second both offensively (only giving it away at a 12.1% rate) and defensively (forcing turnovers on 18.8% of opponents’ possessions).
“If we can have hand activity, that helps, if we can get deflections,” Hoiberg said. “We have to take care of the ball. It’s something we’ve been good at, but they’re really good at forcing turnovers. We have to try to do everything we can to try to get some of our own.”
With Michigan’s size in the front court — starting 6-foot-9, 6-foot-9, 7-foot-3 — the odds of out-rebounding them are small. The Wolverines average a Big Ten-best 42.3 rebounds per game. Their offensive rebounding percentage of 35.6% is good for 47th nationally.
Against a much more athletic and taller Michigan State team, Nebraska lost the rebounding battle 45-31, including offensive rebounding 11-8. The Huskers don’t have to win the rebounding battle, but getting crushed on the glass could make an upset tough to pull off.
