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Michigan’s Mitch McGary enters 2014 NBA Draft under less than ideal circumstances

Mitch McGary

With Nik Stauskas and Glenn Robinson III having already decided to enter the 2014 NBA Draft, the Michigan basketball program was still waiting to find out what sophomore forward Mitch McGary would do. Friday morning the school announced that McGary, who played in just eight games this past season due to a lower back injury, would forego his final two seasons of eligibility to enter the NBA Draft.

However, what is normally seen as a joyous occasion for an athlete may not exactly be the case for McGary. Why? Because in the announcement, McGary also disclosed that he was facing a year-long suspension after failing an NCAA-administered drug test during the NCAA tournament.

“My family and I want to thank everyone for giving us privacy and the time to make this decision,” McGary said in the release. “As you know, it was important for us to weigh all the factors that go into something like this. With that being said, I am ready to move on to the next stage in my life and enter the NBA Draft.

“Being a part of a program that values integrity, it is important to let everyone know of a poor decision I recently made. I tested positive for marijuana during the NCAA Tournament. We were notified of that result after the Final Four. I regret thoroughly disappointing my family, coaches and administration. Despite all of this they have been understanding and helpful over the last couple of weeks.

“I take full responsibility for this poor choice and want to apologize to everyone, especially those I have grown close to during my fabulous two years at the University of Michigan.”


Following every NCAA tournament game the governing body randomly selects a couple players to undergo a drug test, and the penalty for failing are quite severe. Failing an NCAA-administered drug test carries a one-year suspension, even for a drug such as marijuana.

As for drug tests administered by schools throughout the season, the consequences for a first-time positive are generally far less severe since they’re allowed to set their own policies. Michigan’s policy is that an athlete would spend a week away from the team miss 10% of the team’s games for a first-time positive.

The NCAA in mid-April announced that one of the changes being considered was the lessening of penalties for testing positive for marijuana, with the governing body ruling that it is not a performance-enhancing drug. However with that change not going into effect until August 1, that clearly wasn’t going to help McGary’s case. Under that new policy, a positive test would cost an athlete half their season as opposed to all of it.

But even with that being the case many will wonder how (or why) a player who wasn’t playing due to injury would be drawn for a random drug test. Unfortunately for Michigan, they’ll be without a key interior component as a result.

The Wolverines have now lost McGary, Jordan Morgan (graduation) and Jon Horford (transfer) from its front court, meaning that young players such as redshirt freshman Mark Donnal, redshirt junior Max Bielfeldt and newcomers Ricky Doyle and D.J. Wilson will have a lot on their collective shoulders in 2014-15.

Follow @raphiellej