Lucas-Perry's career performance lifts Michigan to mammoth win at Minnesota

 
If you had told Michigan coach John Beilein before Saturday's season-defining game at Minnesota that his Wolverines would snatch just 11 rebounds and allow the Golden Gophers to hit 55 percent of their shots, the man who has led a hoops renaissance in Ann Arbor would have been very pessimistic about the Maize and Blue's chances. Something special needed to happen if Michigan was to snag a crucial road victory and climb to .500 at the end of the Big Ten season.
 
Up against a Barn wall in Minneapolis, the Beilein Bunch found an unlikely savior, a transfer from Arizona who just might have lifted Michigan to the NCAA Tournament. Laval-Lucas Perry scored a career-high 19 points off the bench to give the Wolverines a 67-64 victory in Williams Arena, and a probable NCAA Tournament berth.
 
While star performers Manny Harris and DeShawn Sims did their thing down the stretch, scoring from all spots on the floor and devastating Minnesota's usually stout defense, it was Lucas-Perry who dug his dark-shirted teammates out of a 12-point ditch midway through the second half. By hitting clutch threes precisely when the Gophers were on the verge of landing a knockout punch, Lucas-Perry changed the emotional tenor of this massive encounter, enabling the Harris-Sims combo to surge with confidence in the game's final moments.

With Minnesota leading 53-43 at the 11:20 mark of the second half, Lucas-Perry hit three consecutive treys within a two-minute span to bring the visitors within four at 56-52. By scoring 11 straight points when his teammates were flagging, Lucas-Perry carried Michigan through its roughest patch and set up his superstars for a fabulous finish. Harris and Sims scored all of the Wolverines' points in the final eight minutes of play, Sims scoring 8 and Harris going for 5. Reliable late-game production from his two meal-ticket scorers enabled Beilein to keep his offense conceptually simple, a godsend on the road in a supremely rugged conference. But Michigan's successful race to the finish line would not have been possible had Lucas-Perry not done a lot of middle-distance running earlier in the second half. 
 
Just how amazing was Lucas-Perry's epic performance? When all the numbers were tallied and totaled, Lucas-Perry hit 6-of-7 field goals, 3-of-4 from 3-point range, along with four free throws on as many attempts. Beyond the stats, it's worth noting that Lucas-Perry hadn't scored more than 10 points in a game since Jan. 7 against Indiana. His ability to come out of the shadows, two months after his last noteworthy offensive effort, will always make March 7, 2009, an unforgettable day in the life of Laval Lucas-Perry... not to mention the life of the Michigan basketball program.

This victory will be remembered for a long time in Ann Arbor because a 9-9 record in the Big Ten should get Michigan into the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 1998. Michigan would have been in huge trouble with a loss in this contest, since an 8-10 league mark would have meant, at best, an eighth-place finish in the league (assuming Northwestern loses tomorrow at Ohio State). The Wolverines' huge non-conference wins against UCLA and Duke are superior to those of any other Big Ten team, but a sub-.500 mark in a deep and competitive league would have put Michigan at the back of the line come Selection Sunday. This game offered Michigan a chance to likely punch its ticket into the tournament, but a loss would have been extremely damaging; "high-risk, high-reward" characterized the backdrop to this titanic tilt, and so the ability to come out on the sunshine side of the scoreboard should go a long way toward getting Beilein and Co. into the field of 65. Just one win in the upcoming Big Ten Tournament will make Michigan a mortal lock, but even with an early exit in Indianapolis, the Wolverines should still get in.
 
Manny Harris and DeShawn Sims closed The Barn door on the Gophers, who probably need to win once in Indy to feel safe about their own NCAA chances. But before Michigan's proven performers answered the call under pressure, Laval Lucas-Perry emerged from obscurity to transform the nature of his team's long and arduous season.

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