Niyo: Dreadful exit isn't how Wolverines want to frame 30-win season

Michigan guard Charles Matthews, left, and guard Jordan Poole leave the court after the team's 63-44 loss to Texas Tech.Anaheim, Calif. — They looked dazed. They seemed dumbfounded. And without a doubt, they were defeated.

But after Michigan’s players filed off the court at the Honda Center, some of them with towels over their heads and others with tears in their eyes, including senior Charles Matthews making a somber final exit, the postgame message from their coach was more of a plea than anything else.

“This game,” John Beilein said, “shouldn’t define who you are.”

And yet it will for a while. Maybe a long while for some, like Matthews, who was sobbing at times as teammates came over to him…