There’s a lot to cover today. Let’s start with Saturday’s 87-69 Senior Day win over Maryland, which featured another superlative performance from Olivia Olson.

Olson opened the game 8-for-8 from the field and would’ve finished the first half that way if not for an audacious heat check three-point attempt. She finished with 29 points, scoring in whatever fashion — and from whatever distance — was required. It’s not a surprise to see Olson hit 8 of 14 two-pointers on a combination of driving layups, post fadeaways, and midrange pull-ups.

Olson drilling 3 of 4 three-point attempts, including a diabolical stop-and-pop in transition?

That’s scary. It’s also a trend.

Olson spent most of this season a three-point funk, shooting 20/74 (27.0%) from beyond the arc through January 25th. She’s 15/34 (44.1%) in the nine games since, much more in line with the 38.3% she shot as a freshman last season — when she also took a while to find her accuracy from distance.

If she continues scoring from all three levels, Michigan is going to be a really tough out in the postseason.

Olson’s scoring outburst all but put away Maryland by halftime. The team defensive effort kept the game from ever being in doubt thereafter. Despite Michigan’s 19 turnovers, the Terps couldn’t get anything going in transition, finishing with only two fast break points. They converted nine offensive rebounds into only four second-chance points and committed 21 turnovers against only 12 assists.

Five different Wolverines recorded steals, including three apiece by Olson and Brooke Quarles Daniels. Four blocked at least one shot, including BQD — generously listed at 5’7” — rejecting 6’3” center Isi Ozzy-Momodou.

That play received one of the biggest crowd pops of the day, as it well deserved.

The regular season finale was full of promising signs. Syla Swords dropped 17 points, scoring some tough buckets at the rim. Mila Holloway overcame a couple early fouls to finish with 12 points and a team-high six assists. Te’Yala Delfossa went 2-for-3 on three-pointers on her way to ten points off the bench. Macy Brown followed up her overtime heroics against Ohio State with seven points on perfect 3-or-3 shooting.

Kim Barnes Arico emptied the bench in the waning minutes, getting Ally VanTimmeren a much-celebrated Senior Day bucket. While memories of the Iowa debacle still linger, it’d be tough for this team to enter the postseason on a higher note.

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The Big Ten released their postseason honors from both the media and coaches on Tuesday. To little surprise, undefeated UCLA cleaned up the major awards; Lauren Betts won both Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year, Angela Dugalić took Sixth Player of the Year, and Cori Close was voted Coach of the Year. Freshman of the Year also went to Los Angeles, awarded to USC’s Jazzy Davidson.

Michigan’s honorees were as follows:

I don’t have many gripes; after all, the Bruins dominated the conference. If anything, I was pleasantly surprised to see Swords get first-team honors when players on lesser teams had better numbers. I think the media overlooked Holloway. All-defense voting is such a crapshoot that I can’t get too worked up over BQD not being a unanimous selection — even though she should’ve merited DPOY consideration.

For more postseason award takes, check out the lists compiled by Wyatt Crosher at Hoopla, Drew Hamm at Badgers Ball Knower, and Ari Levin at Dream B1G, the last of which also includes a full conference tournament preview.

Michigan ended up with the three-seed in the Big Ten Tournament after Iowa narrowly held off an Illinois upset bid and then crushed Wisconsin to close the regular season. Given how the Wolverines just played against Maryland, I don’t mind their placement at all. The full bracket:

Barring an upset by the winner of Purdue-Oregon, Michigan will face Maryland on Friday at around 9 pm ET on the Big Ten Network. The game plan for that would be pretty simple: keep feeding Olson in the post and continue to swarm Oluchi Okananwa on defense.

If seeding holds, Iowa would await in a potential semifinal matchup. I’m sure U-M is motivated to prove their blowout loss at Carver-Hawkeye isn’t representative of the gap between the two teams. They have to figure out how to limit Ava Heiden down low and prevent Hannah Stuelke from picking the defense apart from the high post. On the other end, they need a plan to free up Olson, and ideally they won’t have their worst shooting and turnover performance of the season again.

Should Michigan advance to the final, UCLA is almost certain to be the opponent. They gave the Bruins their toughest Big Ten test despite a poor shooting day from beyond the arc. They’d need a near-flawless defensive performance and better shooting — perhaps from a rejuvenated Olson — to pull off the upset.

The NCAA released their second top-16 tournament projection of the season on Sunday. While the Iowa leaped past Michigan, the Wolverines are still holding onto a two-seed as the #8 team. I wouldn’t mind this regional assignment:

I do not want to see UConn or UCLA as the one-seed in Michigan’s region. Texas would be the preferred option but the Wolverines may have to advance past Iowa in the conference tournament to get that draw. Exiting in the BTT quarterfinals, on the other hand, would leave U-M susceptible to dropping to a three-seed.