March Madness: top seed Michigan power past Saint Louis into Sweet 16 | NCAA Tournament 2026
Yaxel Lendeborg punctuated his 25-point outing with a massive dunk in transition, and Michigan, the top seed in the Midwest Region, advanced to the Sweet 16 with a 95-72 victory over Saint Louis in the second round of the NCAA Tournament on Saturday.
Morez Johnson Jr. had 15 and eight rebounds for Michigan (33-3), which tied a program record for wins set in its seventh and most recent Final Four appearance in 2018.
The Wolverines’ 7-foot-3 center Aday Mara had 16 points, five rebounds and four blocks to raise his season block total to 96, one shy of the Michigan single-season record set by Roy Tarpley in 1985-86.
The Wolverines advanced to the round of 16 for the second straight year and seventh time since 2017. They will face the winner of Texas Tech and Alabama on Friday in Chicago.
Amari McCottry had 14 points and five rebounds for Saint Louis (29-6), which saw its season end after setting a single-season winning record with its 102-77 first-round victory over Georgia.
The Wolverines’ size and depth proved too much for the ninth-seeded Billikens, who fell to 0-6 in second-round matches.
Michigan particularly took away the Billikens’ main strength, their outside shooting game, limiting Saint Louis to 5 of 17 three-point attempts in the first half and 10 of 32 overall.
Billikens senior Robbie Avila, who entered third among NCAA centers with 211 career 3-pointers, struggled to find his range, finishing 3 of 13 — including 3 of 10 from three-point range.
After trading the lead six times in the first 10 minutes, Michigan took the lead for good on Trey McKenney’s three-pointer with 9:37 left in the first half. The basket sparked a 9-0 run. And the Wolverines put the game away midway through the second half with their transition game and pressure defense.
Lendeborg made a scoring dunk by weaving his way through two defenders and finishing his transition with a dunk to give Michigan a 66-57 lead. A little over a minute later, the Michigan press cashed in, with Nimari Burnett intercepting Brady Dunlap’s pass and taking it the other way for a layup to make it 73-58.
