John Beilein had been waiting for this, waiting for his best player to speak up, waiting for Derrick Walton Jr. to grab hold of the huddle, then grab hold of the team, then grab hold of a must-win game.
Finally, on Tuesday night at the Crisler Center, against a team it hadn’t beaten in three years, Beilein got it.
From Walton, the senior guard who’s played at an MVP level the few weeks, from Moe Wagner, the German import whose become a matchup problem in the Big Ten, and from just about everyone who wore a Michigan uniform and was tired of losing to Michigan State.