It’s called the Michigan difference for a reason and in 2024-25 that phenomenon was on full display.
Though none of the four major sports won a national championship this past season (although the men’s gymnastics team did in the spring), they did create some history of their own by combining to become the first school in NCAA history to have a first-round draft selection in all four of the major sports in the same season: football, basketball, hockey and baseball.
The nugget was unearthed by Greg Harvey of Stats Perform, a sports technology company.
The trend started in the spring, when the Wolverines’ football team had a pair of first rounders: the interior defensive lineman duo known as peanut butter and jelly when Mason Graham (No. 5, Cleveland Browns) and Kenneth Grant (No. 13, Miami Dolphins) both heard their names called in the first 90 minutes of the 2025 NFL Draft.
That was the fourth time in the past five years the Wolverines had at least one defensive linemen taken in the opening round, and was the third time in four years U-M had a top-10 selection. Graham and Grant both were named to the starting defense in the Free Press’ Michigan football all-quarter century team earlier this summer.
Graham was named a unanimous All-American in 2025 while Kenneth Grant was named to the third team by one publication and was second team All-Big Ten.
Exactly two months later to the day, Michigan basketball star Danny Wolf continued the trend, when he was selected No. 27 overall in the first round by the Brooklyn Nets. Just moments earlier, the cameras had been on a dejected Wolf, who looked somber his name hadn’t been called.
Wolf — who Wolverines coaches have implied was the gift that keeps on giving leaning on his example of how he was used in U-M’s system as a skilled big to land the No. 1 player in the transfer portal this season, Yaxel Lendeborg — was sensational in his lone season in Ann Arbor.
He played and started a career-high 37 games, averaged 13.2 points, 9.7 rebounds and shot 49.7% from the floor as well as 33.6% from 3-point range. He was named to the All Big Ten second team. He was the 12th Michigan player to get drafted in the past 13 seasons.
Just two days later, Will Horcoff made it three-for-three for the Wolverines in the major sports drafts, when he was selected No. 24 overall by the Pittsburgh Pirates in the 2025 NHL Draft.
His father, William, now the assistant general manager for the Detroit Red Wings, was a former captain for the Edmonton Oilers and the hockey bloodline continued in the form of this Wolverine, who became the first of a program-record seven players selected across the entire event.
Horcoff, a 6-foot-4, 181-pound forward out of Birmingham, played for the US Hockey National Development Program. He appeared in 18 games during his freshman year in Ann Arbor and finished with four goals and six assists, averaging better than a half-point per game. (He is returning for his sophomore season).
Last but not least, Michigan baseball infielder Mitch Voit was taken No. 38 overall in the Competitive Balance Round A by the New York Mets on Sunday, July 13. Selected as a two-way player, Voit became the highest drafted U-M baseball player in a quarter century, since catcher Dave Parrish, who was taken at No. 28 overall by the New York Yankees.
Voit, the seventh U-M baseball player to ever go in the first round, led the team in slugging percentage and OPS, as he slashed .346/.471/.668 to go with a team best 14 home runs and 40 walks.
Tony Garcia is the Michigan beat writer for the Detroit Free Press. Email him at apgarcia@freepress.com and follow him on X at @RealTonyGarcia.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan becomes first school with first-round pick in all 4 major sports in same year
Reporting by Tony Garcia, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
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