Tuesday Morning Brews: Winter is coming

Happy Tuesday, folks. Welcome to Morning Brews. We’re back in the swing of things, with several Michigan teams in action this past weekend. This morning we’re catching up on the weekend that was in Michigan sports, before finishing with a bit of football content.

Let’s get to it:

Volleyball earns spot in the Sweet Sixteen. Michigan volleyball played their first two NCAA matches this past weekend in Pittsburgh, where the Wolverines won both. Their first round match was against Navy, whom Michigan defeated 3-0. Their second round match was quite a bit closer, but the Wolverines prevailed over No. 11 Pitt, 3-2. The team has earned a spot in the Sweet Sixteen for just the sixth time in program history. They’ll face No. 5 Texas this Friday at 2:00 p.m. MT (4:00 p.m. ET).

Hockey struggles in weekend series against MSU. Another chance for points, another sub-optimal result for Wolverine hockey. On Friday, Michigan out-shot Michigan State 46-29 but found themselves on the wrong end of a 4-3 result. On Saturday, the Wolverines again out-shot the Spartans by a significant margin, 36-18, only to tie 1-1. Mel Pearson’s team is now 6-6-3 (2-3-3) on the season. They’ll be back in action for a weekend series against Minnesota starting this Friday.

Women’s basketball drops two games to ranked opponents. Kim Barnes Arico’s team went up against No. 13 NC State and No. 22 Marquette this past weekend, but lost both games by 11 points. On Thursday, the Wolverines faced the Wolf Pack in the ACC/B1G challenge. Michigan led by three at halftime, but a big second half propelled NC State to a 66-55 victory. Sunday’s game against Marquette wasn’t nearly as close, despite ending with the same margin. The Wolverines trailed by 20 at the half and never really threatened the result in the second, despite closing the margin. The team is now 5-3 on the year and next faces LIU Brooklyn on Thursday.

No, Michigan didn’t make the CFP field and yes that’s a disappointment. But at least the Michigan faithful didn’t have the roller coaster ride on Sunday that the Bucknuts and Dawgs had, right? Maybe? Either way, with both Ohio State and Georgia finding themselves on the outside looking in, recriminations were flying on Sunday. Check out some of the highlights (lowlights? conspiracy theories?) in the article above.

Are you going to be in Atlanta on December 29th at Noon? If you’re looking Peach Bowl tickets, they went on sale yesterday morning. They may be purchased, while they last (and they were still available as I wrote this), through the Michigan ticket office using the link above. Tickets in Michigan’s allotment are $160.