Michigan men’s basketball coach John Beilein walked out of the locker room after the Wolverines' 69-64 loss to Minnesota on Saturday earlier than normal.

Assistant coach LaVall Jordan stayed with the players, holding his own team meeting — one that didn’t involve Beilein.

Media waited outside the locker room longer than usual for this meeting to end, and when the doors finally opened every Michigan player was stone-faced.

“He didn’t go negative,” junior guard Stu Douglass said of Jordan’s locker room speech. “He did not go overboard. Coaches are telling it how it is. They are not going to sugarcoat anything. They said we really have to take pride in the jersey and come together as a team … He said were just not playing together.”

The Wolverine offense has most recently struggled to play consistently. Missing shots and making mistakes in transition have haunted them.

“I don’t think we’re playing entirely selfish, but I do think sometimes we are not playing for the team,” Douglass said. “That’s what we talked about.”

With the loss to the Golden Gophers, Michigan (1-6 Big Ten, 11-9 overall) has dropped its last six games. Its next contest will come against Michigan State on Thursday in East Lansing.

BIG MEN BLUNDERS: Despite the fact that at least one of the Wolverines' four post players — redshirt freshmen Jordan Morgan and Blake McLimans and freshmen Jon Horford and Colton Christian — was on the floor at all times, each of them failed to collect a single rebound.

“(The Gophers are) just a big, physical team, and they just asserted themselves,” Morgan said. “It’s a whole team effort. It’s not just down low. That’s a large part of it, but we need everyone trying their best to just clean up on rebounds.”

Minnesota outrebounded Michigan, 38-13, which marked the first time all season that none of the Wolverine forwards had a single rebound. Freshman Evan Smotrycz — who is found much more on the perimeter than in the paint — had one rebound.

After the Wolverines shot 12-for-35 from beyond the arc, it wasn't as though they had nothing to rebound. Michigan shot a measly 34 percent from 3-point range and 43 percent from the field.

“We had some kids that stepped up and rallied for the team and did some good things,” Minnesota coach Tubby Smith said. “The good things — rebounding the ball. I thought we dominated the boards.”

LINEUP LIMBO: As the season has progressed and as Michigan has continued to lose games, Beilein has been experimenting with his rotations more often.

Regardless of whether the reason for the lineup changes is foul trouble or experimentation, in Michigan’s contest against Minnesota, the Wolverines fiddled with some new looks.

At one point during the first half, Michigan had just one starter — freshman Tim Hardaway Jr. — on the floor. Hardaway Jr. was accompanied by Douglass, McLimans, Christian and sophomore Matt Vogrich, who had only seen the floor as Hardaway Jr.’s substitute.

“We see everything in practice,” Vogrich said. “At practice we mess around with all types of lineups, it doesn’t matter. You never know what we’ll have to do if we get in foul trouble, or maybe just something else is working against what they’re doing.”

But seeing Vogrich and Hardaway Jr. on the floor simultaneously was not the only oddity. Against the Golden Gophers, McLimans and Christian were in the paint together, also.

“We had foul trouble,” Beilein said after the game. “Blake (McLimans) had played pretty well in practice, so we wanted to give him a shot in there. We had some guys in foul trouble and Zack (Novak) needed a rest at that time. We couldn’t go with Evan (Smotrycz) because Evan (Smotrycz) was already in foul trouble, so Colton (Christian) played. (I) thought he did a good job. What he could do, only three or four minutes, couldn’t really have a big impact.”