Now that's more like it.

With Isaiah Livers back in the starting lineup, Michigan made all the necessary adjustments from their January loss at Michigan State. The Wolverines bottled up Cassius Winston, won the rebounding battle, kept the Spartans out of transition, stayed out of foul trouble, spaced the floor, and—most importantly—made some dang threes. In a game where both teams ferociously defended the paint, Michigan shot 11-for-28 from beyond the arc, while MSU only made 6-of-23.

Having your best player available is, as it turns out, rather important.

A Livers three-pointer got the game going in earnest after neither team could do anything for the first six minutes; the game went into the first media timeout tied at three with the teams a combined 2-for-17 with eight turnovers. Even though Livers subsequently took a breather, his shot kickstarted a 9-0 Michigan run when Brandon Johns and David DeJulius added triples of their own.

nice to have you back [Campredon]

While MSU would cut the margin to one point a couple times in the second half, the Wolverines never ceded the lead. After Winston scored a career-high 32 points in the first matchup, Juwan Howard made sure State's star wouldn't do that again in his team's building, employing a trap-heavy defensive scheme that forced the ball out of Winston's hands unless he tried to go one-on-one without help. While some late shots in desperation time got Winston up to 20 points, he went 5-for-18 from the field with six assists and three turnovers.

Meanwhile, Winston's counterpart played a great game despite a week full of off-court distractions. Zavier Simpson led the Wolverines with 16 points and eight assists; he punished State's plan to duck under screens by shooting 4-for-7 on threes and helped make life difficult for Winston on the other end. While Winston's pick-and-roll buddy, Xavier Tillman, scored 17 points, he needed 17 shot equivalents to get there and did a lot of his damage out of offensive rebounds—absent were the ferocious finishes of the first game after slipping a screen.

There were a couple hairy moments. Livers lost his head at the end of the first half, inexplicably fouling Kyle Ahrens in the backcourt with 1.9 seconds left with the Spartans in the bonus, which allowed him to cut what had been as much as a ten-point deficit to six. Livers tossed the ensuing inbounds pass directly to Tillman, who thankfully didn't connect at the buzzer to make matters worse.

SLEEP TIME [Campredon]

After MSU didn't make a three-pointer in the opening stanza, Winston and Aaron Henry each drilled triples before the first media timeout of the second half, with both shots slicing M's lead down to one point. Eli Brooks answered with a corner three out of the break, however, and not long thereafter threw a lob to Jon Teske for a momentum-swinging one-handed slam in transition and a six-point lead.

Tom Izzo tried to slow Michigan's roll with a timeout but his squad couldn't get any closer the rest of the way. The Wolverines were steady at the line down the stretch, going 18-for-23 on free throws on the afternoon to ensure the lead wouldn't slip away.

bottled up [Campredon]

After a protracted period of chucking-and-fouling, State's final shot was an airball was Winston. Fittingly, Simpson caught the rebound and dribbled out the clock.

This was a complete team effort. Livers (14 points, 2 blocks), Brooks (11 points, 9 rebounds), and DeJulius (10 points) each hit a pair of threes to augment Simpson's big shooting day. Franz Wagner added eight points and played disruptive defense, coming up with two blocks, a steal, and a couple tie-ups. While Teske didn't get much going offensively outside of the dunk, his ability to hedge and recover was important in limiting Winston and Tillman. Johns steadied the power forward position, mitigating Michigan's need to play Austin Davis or Colin Castleton alongside Teske. Davis had four points on 2-for-3 shooting and two rebounds in 12 steady minutes.

Michigan is now 14-9 and 5-7 in the Big Ten. They have a couple winnable games forthcoming in a trip to Northwestern before returning to Crisler to face Indiana. Livers's return stuck this time, with great effect. This could be the start of a run that gets Michigan off the NCAA bubble. Meanwhile, Howard has his first win over Izzo, and it looks like it'll be far from the last.

[Hit THE JUMP for the box score and a couple more photos from MG]