Last week, Associate Head Coach Phil Martelli shared his thoughts on each incoming freshman for Michigan men's basketball.

And here's the ending of his comments on today's guest, Isaiah Barnes.

What I've seen grow with him is his pace.

There's a college pace to practicing.

There's a college pace to working out.

Isaiah didn't have that on day one.

He has that after six weeks in the gym.

On this week's episode, you'll understand the backdrop to that from Isaiah's perspective.

You see, for a while, Isaiah was not on many big-time programs' radars.

His big push came as a junior in high school.

Then, team started to call and call a lot.

Ultimately, though, the decision to come to Michigan wasn't based around basketball.

Barnes made this jump as a junior, and tons of schools started knocking at his door,

blowing up his phone, wanting to talk basketball. Yet, Barnes came to Michigan because of

the relationships, the family nature. As you'll hear

from him, he didn't really talk too in depth about the basketball side with Michigan staff

until after he had committed. Now, we've talked in recent weeks about the different puzzle pieces

of recruiting in college athletics. What's important differs from player to player. What's most important

differs from player to player. For Isaiah, he originally wanted to get himself out there from a

basketball standpoint. Once he did that, he wanted to feel like he was getting the total package,

both on the floor and off. And that's how he became the first puzzle piece of Michigan's top-ranked

20-21 class. And that's why you can't blame him for being amped up, for being psyched to

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