Emily Kiser returning to Michigan

On Wednesday night, ahead Emily Kiser introduced through Instagram that she’s going to make the most of her yr of COVID-19 eligibility and return to the Michigan girls’s basketball workforce for the 2022-23 season.

Final season, Kiser discovered her spot within the beginning lineup for the primary time and was considered one of solely two gamers to begin each recreation for the Wolverines, alongside fellow-senior Danielle Rauch. Kiser averaged 9.3 factors, 8.1 rebounds and 1.8 assists in 31.2 minutes per recreation. Her breakout senior season earned her recognition on the All-Large Ten honorable point out workforce by the media as she quadrupled her scoring and rebounding manufacturing from her junior yr.

Her return will probably be key to retaining rebounding manufacturing for a Michigan workforce that misplaced first-team All-American Naz Hillmon — who owns the Michigan basketball rebounding report — to the WNBA.

At 6-foot-3, Kiser is a power within the paint. Her 16 rebounds towards then-No. 5 Indiana propelled Michigan to a program-best No. 4 rating in February, and her 4 double-doubles all year long are a testomony to her rebounding and scoring potential within the paint. Kiser’s 258 rebounds ranked sixth amongst Large Ten gamers.

“She’s labored extraordinarily laborious on her back-to-the-basket stuff. I believe we noticed that within the third quarter (towards Akron) when (senior ahead) Naz (Hillmon) got here out of the sport and Emily scored 10 straight factors,” Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico mentioned on Dec. 5. “She’s only a child who’s labored extraordinarily laborious in her profession. So for her to be having her senior season the best way she is, I’m actually happy with her.”

Offensive rebounding affords alternatives for second-chance factors and free throws, which Kiser regularly capitalized on all through the season with 2.25 offensive rebounds per recreation.

Kiser’s glorious passing and courtroom imaginative and prescient from the paint performed an important function in opening up the skin for Michigan’s high-low offense. Her passing imaginative and prescient allows 3-point shooters like rising-senior Maddie Nolan and senior Leigha Brown to get open appears. She is also able to scoring from the three level line herself, and when she did, it was most regularly from the highest of the important thing.

Kiser usually took on the duty of guarding the opposing workforce’s hardest submit participant, and her defensive presence was essential for the Wolverines. Her 30 blocks and 23 steals all through the course of the season have been an announcement to her laborious work and hustle that always fails to translate to the stat sheet. Kiser received the workforce’s Coronary heart and Hustle award for accumulating probably the most hustle performs throughout video games.

“She’s such an unimaginable defender,” Barnes Arico mentioned on Feb. 1. “She does so many nice issues for a workforce that doesn’t present up within the field rating. I used to be comfortable for her presence again on the market as a result of she does so many intangible issues to assist our workforce achieve success. She’s having a profession yr.”

Kiser usually contributed by drawing prices in key moments — a stat wherein she led the workforce — and her defensive presence within the paint was essential for a Michigan workforce that ran all the best way to the Elite Eight.

Kiser’s veteran management and defensive hustle will probably be essential to a Michigan workforce that appears to construct upon a program-best season within the upcoming yr. With Kiser staying, Michigan appears to copy final yr’s success and work in direction of its first Large Ten Championship.