WEST LAFAYETTE — Current Michigan football player and former Michigan basketball player Kelvin Grady has met with coach John Beilein about the possibility of returning to basketball, Beilein said in a press conference after the team's 69-59 loss to Purdue on Saturday.

“Kelvin contacted us, asked if he could help us out,” Beilein said. “We’re having trouble on scout teams, guarding quickness. Kelvin’s volunteered to help us as a scout team guy. That’s probably all it will be.”

Beilein said Grady would remain on the football team, and that they would have to work around scheduling conflicts with spring football practices.

“He’s not giving up football,” Beilein said. “He knows our system. He’s asked us to do it. We talked with him. We love Kelvin, and we said, ‘You know what, we can use that.’ ”

A short bench and inexperience at point guard mean Grady's seeing playing time this season isn’t entirely out of the question, especially considering the Wolverines have had three recent departures.

Walk-on Eric Puls left the team in December to focus on his engineering degree while redshirt sophomore Ben Cronin's playing career is likely over — the 7-footer left the team due to complications from a surgery he had on his hip last season. And most recently, freshman guard Eso Akunne was ruled academically ineligible to play this semester.

Sure, those three players weren’t exactly seeing the majority of the team’s minutes, but their absence leaves the Michigan bench thin. In a handful of games this season, the five Wolverine starters logged over 35 minutes of play. Beilein has said he wants to go to his bench more, but he wants more production from his bench players if they're on the court.

Grady, who started 33 of 64 career games and averaged 4.9 points per game, could fit right in.

Two young and inexperienced guards, freshman Darius Morris and sophomore sharpshooter Stu Douglass, have been struggling in the role of Michigan’s point guard.

That’s another area where Grady can help. His knowledge of the position, Beilein’s offense and other Big Ten teams could be valuable. When Grady played the position for the Wolverines last year, he distributed the ball well and controlled the offense, but last year's seniors at the position, C.J. Lee and David Merritt took away a great deal of his playing time.

Grady would be quicker and tougher to guard than the current scout team guards, Beilein said, and more likely to prepare the Wolverines for the talented Big Ten point guards they will face.

If Grady does end up playing in games, he would have one year left of basketball eligibility. His two years of eligibility left for football would remain.

BENCH IMPACT: In last Wednesday’s loss to Wisconsin, Michigan’s bench didn’t attempt a single field goal. Morris made a free throw, and that was the only point the bench accounted for in the entire game.

On Saturday against Purdue, the reserves took plenty of shots, especially with junior guard Manny Harris suspended. But they had essentially the same effect, going a combined 5-for-13 for the game, with most of those made shots coming when the game’s outcome was all but decided. They also went 0-for-4 from beyond the arc.

Senior forward DeShawn Sims took all of Michigan’s shots for the first seven minutes of the game. He made most of them, but it meant a lot of standing around for the rest of the Wolverine offense, which struggled once called upon to shoot.

“I think that pressure that they put on us in the first half, we weren’t used to it and that’s hard to substitute in practice for the new guys like me and Matt,” Morris said. “But at halftime, we made adjustments. … I think we just learned a little too late.”

EARLY GLASS TROUBLES: It’s no secret that the Wolverines have struggled to grab rebounds all season. They’ve been outrebounded in nearly every game.

But during Saturday’s game against Purdue, it became painfully obvious how offensive rebounds can be game-changers.

In the first half, Michigan shot 55 percent from the field, comparable to Purdue’s 58 percent.

But the Boilermakers’ seven offensive rebounds gave Purdue a multitude of chances to build a 16-point lead by the half.