INDIANAPOLIS — This Michigan team is so good it practiced missing shots on purpose. Really.
In the lead-up to Saturday’s showdown with fellow No. 1 seed Arizona in the Final Four, Michigan coach Dusty May and his staff were concerned about throwing their usual lob passes against the Wildcats’ length. So they cooked up something new, 39 games into the season.
Wolverines point guard Elliot Cadeau shot 5 for 17 for 13 points with 10 assists, but May revealed those numbers were misleading.
“A couple of those were passes off the backboard,” said May.
It was a fitting twist for what already felt like a disorienting result, with Michigan winning 91-73 over Arizona to advance to Monday’s national championship against UConn.
Styles make fights, and this matchup had all the makings of a heavyweight bout. The two best teams in college basketball. Two of the tallest, toughest and most physical rosters, embodying the sport’s big-ball takeover this season.
Instead, Michigan put Arizona on the ropes from the opening tip. The Wolverines turned what was supposed to be the game of March Madness — a de facto championship — into a runaway blowout. The 18-point margin was tied for the largest in an NCAA Tournament game between No. 1 seeds since seeding began in 1979, per ESPN research.
“They were outstanding tonight,” said Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd. “Really had us on our heels. We never could get in a rhythm. No one’s been able to do that to us all year.”
Michigan returns to the national title game for the first time since 2018, playing for the program’s second national championship against a Huskies squad trying to win its third in four years. With the members of the Fab Five in attendance, the Wolverines moved one step closer to snapping the Big Ten’s 26-year championship drought, and continued the 29-year streak of no title winners west of the Rockies — since Arizona last won in 1997.
The performance came with a dash of backboard creativity and a heaping scoop of blunt-force dominance, led by a career-high 26 points by 7-foot-3 center Aday Mara — the recipient of many of those Cadeau ricochets. Arizona was one of the best rim-protecting defenses all season, anchored by its own 7-foot-2 center, Motiejus Krivas. Rather than try to throw passes over Krivas, May thought they might have better luck going around him, with Cadeau using the glass for better angles.
“It’s the genius of Dusty, something he saw in film,” said assistant coach Mike Boynton Jr. “And Elliot is a wizard with the ball. He probably had four missed shots credited to him that were passes. We ran it the first play of the game today.”
It felt over soon after. In the wake of a 33-point win over Tennessee in the Elite Eight, Michigan muscled its way to a 48-32 halftime lead Saturday. More shocking still was the fact that the Wolverines did it largely without their best player, Yaxel Lendeborg, who was hobbled by a left knee and ankle injury he suffered in the first half when he accidentally stepped on Krivas’ foot. The Big Ten Player of the Year managed just five minutes and 5 points at the break before gritting his way to 11 points in 14 total minutes.
“To have the pain that I’m having right now, never experienced it before,” Lendeborg said afterward, smiling through it. “At worst, MCL sprain, and then obviously I rolled my ankle. I’m gonna push through it.”
They probably didn’t need him to. Michigan shot 48 percent from the field and 12 for 27 from 3-point range, while turning 14 Arizona turnovers into 26 points.
“It shows what we’re capable of,” Boynton told The Athletic in the locker room. “We probably played our B game today. Maybe B-plus? I mean, if you’re going to play your A game, you probably need your best player.
“This team is going to look at this as an opportunity to play a little better on Monday,” he added.
That’s a scary thought for a team that became the first to score 90-plus points in five NCAA Tournament games — with one left to spare.
Arizona had one of the best seasons in program history, posting a record 36 wins and entering the game as the best team in the country, according to KenPom’s analytics. Yet it had no answer for Michigan on either end of the floor. The Wildcats looked shell-shocked from the opening tip, with senior Jaden Bradley saddled with early foul trouble and the star freshman trio of Brayden Burries, Koa Peat and Ivan Kharchenkov showing their youth on the big stage.
Misleading stat line or not, Cadeau was the best player on the court for long stretches of the first half, playing talisman with six assists and three steals. The pick-and-roll with Mara was unstoppable; even when Cadeau opted for the traditional lobs, Mara found a way to slam them home, shooting 11 for 16 and protecting the paint on the other end.
Another Aday Mara SLAM 🔨#MarchMadness @umichbball pic.twitter.com/FHXKQ6eFiA
— NCAA March Madness (@MarchMadnessMBB) April 5, 2026
“Aday was sensational,” said May of his UCLA transfer big man. “He was a force down low. He was a pressure release up top. And obviously his rim protection — he did a great job forcing a lot of those misses around the basket because of his aggression.”
Freshman Trey McKenney added 11 of his 16 points in the second half, hitting 4-of-6 from 3-point range. May played his main rotation pieces deep into the second half, referencing UConn’s Elite Eight comeback against Duke as a reason he couldn’t just “put the kids to bed.” But a 30-point lead with 10 minutes left was insurmountable. Arizona had grown accustomed to being the bully, but it finally picked on someone its own size — and the clock couldn’t run out fast enough.
“This game was very indicative of how this group has played throughout the season,” said May, while acknowledging how stout the Big 12 champions have been to this point, entering the Final Four on a 13-game winning streak.
May referred to Arizona as the “steroid version of Gonzaga,” a nod to the program where Lloyd spent 20 seasons as an assistant under Mark Few, but also a team Michigan beat by 40 at the Players Era Championship in Las Vegas back in November. That game set the stage for this barnstorm toward a national title and also provided a blueprint for Saturday. Boynton handled the defensive scout duties, but he leaned on fellow assistant Justin Joyner, a former Saint Mary’s assistant and future Oregon State head coach who was extremely familiar with Lloyd’s style of play.
“We feel like we’ve played the system, so that gives us a little bit of an advantage,” said Boynton. “Tennessee plays a similar style too. The way we were able to take the things we learned from those games into this one, it’s pretty impressive.”
Now Michigan, at 36-3 and toying with the best opponents the sport has to offer, has a chance to cap the winningest season in school history with a second title against Dan Hurley and the Huskies.
Lendeborg’s health will be the biggest question mark entering Monday night’s championship, but he expects to play.
“There’s no way I’m missing the game,” he said.
If that’s the case, the Wolverines believe they can be better still.