Dusty May talks history with Michigan, wearing the block ‘M’

Michigan head basketball coach Dusty May couldn’t help but grin when asked during a recent interview what it felt like to wear his team-issued Jordan shirt while visiting Florida. He was back in Boca Raton to support his graduating Florida Atlantic players, but wherever he goes now, he’s representing Michigan.

“It’s awesome,” May said, acknowledging again he felt the program simply fit him better than others that were pursuing him. He’s a Big Ten guy, after all — a former Indiana manager from 1996-2000 who also coached at Eastern Michigan in the early 2000s, just down the road from Ann Arbor.

But even growing up in Hoosier country, he had his eye on the other Big Ten schools. Like many, he was enamored by what happened in Ann Arbor during the Fab Five years.

“People don’t know this … I grew up just outside of Bloomington, Ind., and our AAU team one year was Bloomington Blue,” May shared. “We modeled our uniforms after Michigan. It was Bloomington Red program, and we changed that age group to Bloomington Blue and changed it to the block ‘B’ instead of the block ‘M.’

‘We had the long shorts and whatnot … so, yeah.”

Yeah, as in, “yes, I’m familiar with the Michigan basketball tradition.”

So far, he’s fit in perfectly, an outstanding representative of the university and an absolute workhorse while putting his roster together. May said even before he landed 8 new additions that he expected to be competitive in year one. He doubled down after filling the roster … and then some.

“Without a doubt (we expect to win),” he said. “If we stay healthy and get all these guys to the court in November and December, then we have a very competitive roster.

“I’m not going to hide and downplay expectations, because I think this team really, really has a high, high ceiling, and a pretty high floor, as well. I think we have a lot of pieces, a lot of interchangeable parts that have won at a high level. They care about winning.”

They landed most of their first choices from the portal, he noted, including former Auburn point guard Tre Donaldson, FAU big man Vlad Goldin, Ohio State wing Roddy Gayle, and many others. All will have an opportunity to play and can play, but May was more impressed with them as people.

All of them fit the image he has for his program.

“I don’t think up to this point It could have gone much better, to be honest,” he said. “I think we’ve had 8 official visits, and we have 8 commitments. We’ve done a nice job as a staff at identifying guys that fit us, that were looking for the same things we were.

“We use the word ‘fit’ probably too much, but we found guys that fit us, and hopefully we fit them the same way. But we love the group that is coming into form.”

And can’t wait to see them together for the first time this summer, and then beyond.

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