Beilein tinkering with rotation (w/video)

As Michigan prepared for its first true road test at Bradley this afternoon at 4 pm EST (ESPNU), Head Coach John Beilein continued to look at his lineup options.

Despite Michigan Head Coach John Beilein’s impulse to avoid a change in the starting five in the midst of a 6-0 start to the 2012-13 season, the play of freshman wing Nik Stauskas, averaging 13 points per game, may just force that superstition to be broken.

“We’re looking at all of that,” said Beilein. “We’ll wait and see, but we’re drawing up some minute things to see how we can make it work.”

“Nik and Matt (Vogrich) is what we’re looking at right now. How we can divvy up these minutes … and how we can get Tim (Hardaway) and Trey (Burke) to get them usable minutes that will serve them more through the marathon of a season instead of a particular game.”

As far as the big men are concerned, Beilein continues to interchange Jordan Morgan, Jon Horford and Mitch McGary in hopes of eventually freeing up freshman forward Glenn Robinson III as the season moves along.

“We’re still toying with some different ways we can do that,” said Beilein. “We worked extensively the past couple days on some big man packages cause we have to do that. We’d like to have Glenn play a couple different positions but right now keep it simple for him. And there’s sometimes he’s going to be in foul trouble or the matchup isn’t working in our favor and we just go bigger.”

Redshirt freshman forward Max Bielfeldt is battling to crack the rotation after averaging just five minutes per contest to this point. With a trip to his hometown of Peoria, Illinois Saturday to Bradley University, it could be a chance to slide him in in front of friends and family in attendance.

“Max Bielfeldts playing really well,” said Beilein. “… trying to get him in there somewhere but he’s got some pretty good guys in front of him—but he’s right there, at least in practice.”

To watch video of Beilein’s Friday presser, press play below.