It has been such a weird game. If you had told me that Yaxel Lindeborg would get 2 quick fouls, come back in for a few minutes, twist his ankle and knee and get taken to the locker room, I would have expected that Arizona would be winning. I certainly would not have expected that Michigan would be winning 48-32 at half.

The Wolverines jumped out to a 10-1 lead as Nimari Barnett hit a three-pointer and Morez Johnson Jr made a layup and got fouled for his own three-point play.

They would extend that lead to 16 points with 10 minutes to play when Aday Mara got a rebound off a missed shot by Lindeborg and made a shot in the lane.

After Yaxel got hurt, Arizona made their own run. Ivan Kharchenkov hit a three-pointer and Motejus Krivas started dominating the lane with a couple baskets and free-throws to cut the lead to 28-23 with a little under 7 minutes left.

But then Arizona went ice cold. Roddy Gayle got a dunk of a nice pass from Nimari Burnett, Burnett hit a layup, Trey McKinney hit a three-pointer, Roddy Gayle hit a three-pointer as the Wolverines went on a 10-2 run. And then Aday Mara scored 5 points inside as Michigan kept lobbing the ball into the big man and letting him work.

Aday Mara has 15 points and Morez Johnson Jr added 8 points as Michigan is tied with Arizona’s dominant front line with 23 rebounds, but more importantly, their defense has forced 9 turnovers by the Wildcats.

Arizona looks rattled, and Michigan looks like they can score at will. And they are doing it all with their star player on the bench.

But as we all know, no lead is safe in March – there is 20 more minutes to play that stand in the way of the Wolverines and a date with UConn on Monday night.