DJ Wilson is happening. [Marc-Gregor Campredon]

I was in a van traveling through Iowa and Illinois while the Michigan hoops squad defeated IUPUI 77-65. I just finished going over the game, which played out much like last Friday's defeat of Howard. The Wolverines got off to a slow start, trailing 32-30 with 4:18 left in the first half, before closing out the half with a 13-0 run—the margin never got below nine points in the second half.

It's time for some bullets, starting with the story of the season thus far.

wooooooooooooooooooooo

DJ Wilson is overtaking Duncan Robinson. We're only two games into the season, but it sure looks like Wilson is going to take Robinson's spot in the starting lineup, or at the very least end up playing more minutes in a super-sub role. The latter is what happened against IUPUI. Robinson started and scored seven points in only 12 minutes, but he's still not a great defender. Wilson played 30 minutes and packed the stat-sheet: seven points, 14(!) rebounds (four offensive), an assist, and five(!!!) blocks. He even hit one of his two three-point attempts and looked comfortable doing so.

[Hit THE JUMP for more DJ Wilson praise and the rest of my notes from IUPUI.]

If Wilson is even a passable three-point shooter, it's hard to find a reason why Robinson should play over him. Wilson's length is a huge asset on both ends of the floor and he's learned how to use it; he was snatching rebounds over players in better position to grab them and affecting a huge number of shots. This play elicited a visceral reaction from me—Wilson switches onto a guard off a high screen, stays with him on the drive, and blocks his hopeless layup attempt directly to Derrick Walton:

woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

There's also the eye-opening tip-slam prefacing this section; Wilson runs the floor well and has a knack for knowing where to position himself for rebounds. Robinson may be able to get down the floor and grab that ball; he's not immediately dunking it, which leaves him exposed to recovering defenders.

Robinson wasn't bad in this game. He started it off with a putback off his own miss on an aggressive drive, which was nice to see. Wilson is playing so well, though, and if he keeps it up, I'm guessing he'll overtake Robinson before Big Ten play.

We may have to stop hating long twos. Zak Irvin went 6/9 on two-pointers and five of those makes were of the midrange pull-up variety after curling off a high screen. He showed the ability to hit that shot last year—he won the Northwestern game with one—and it's becoming his favorite spot to shoot from on the floor. If he wasn't making them, the inefficient nature of that should would be an issue; he's making them at a high clip and it looks very repeatable.

That shot is great to have in the arsenal for end-of-clock situations, and as he continues to make them off high screens, it'll open up the rest of his game. Defenders trying to beat him to the spot may go under the pick and leave the three-pointer open; defenders trying to step up and contest the shot are susceptible to getting beat to the rim. Irvin blew by his man off a high screen in the second half when the latter scenario played out, and while he didn't convert the layup, it was a promising sign of things to come.

Irvin is also moving the ball around well—he had three assists to one turnover—and doing his part on the boards. He's yet to dial in his three-point shot, but the rest of his game is looking good right now.

The center situation looks... pretty good? Both Moe Wagner and Mark Donnal have their deficiencies. In this game, those were largely mitigated, and what we saw instead looked like two quality centers, though the opponent caveat applies here—IUPUI's starting center is 6'8", 225 pounds.

Donnal helped shore up Michigan's defense in the first half after Wagner had problems with his positioning, and he also had a decent day offensively, repeatedly drawing contact to earn five free-throw attempts. I still believe Wagner is the superior player, however. He went 5-for-7 from the field and scored in a variety of ways:

Wagner is the stronger finisher—Donnal had two attempts blocked at the rim—and he provides more rim protection on defense. He still has his frustrating moments with the ball in his hands—he narrowly avoided a turnover on a bad-idea drive to the hoop and committed a double-dribble later in the game—but those aren't as frequent as they were last year. He did a better job of rebounding in this game, too. If he improves his positioning on defense, which one would expect from a talented true sophomore, then he should eventually get a bigger share of the minutes than the 50/50 split that's been the case so far.

The freshmen still have a ways to go. Xavier Simpson played only six minutes and Ibi Watson nine. Simpson had a nice steal when he raked the ball out on a drive; that and a foul were the only things keeping him from a six-trillion. Watson had a high-flying slam on a fast break for his only two points on the day; he missed his other four attempts, all three-pointers, and had a few defensive lapses. It's probably going to be a little while before these two are consistently positive contributors.

Perimeter defense is better, but still not great. IUPUI guard Darrell Combs poured in 22 points on 18 shot equivalents, and while a handful of those buckets came on tough contested shots, Michigan's defense also played a role. MAAR alternated good defensive possessions with some glaring slip-ups in both halfcourt and transition defense. The team as a whole is still figuring out Billy Donlon's system; there were a few blown switches that led to wide open shots. Despite all that, the defense still looks better; IUPUI scored only 0.97 points per possession, and Michigan had seven blocks and four steals while generally doing a good job on the boards.