Zack Novak isn’t concerned. Neither is Michigan basketball coach John Beilein.

The question: Is there a danger that Michigan, coming off an upset victory at No. 25 Michigan State and an 87-73 win against Iowa on Sunday, will suffer a letdown when it plays at No. 1 Ohio State on Thursday?

Michigan junior guard Zack Novak on how the Wolverines played against Iowa: "We came ready to play."

Melanie Maxwell | AnnArbor.com

“Coaches fear everything,” Beilein said. “You fear a letdown, you fear those things but our thing was to build them up from it. If you can do that, you certainly can play with anybody because say what you want about Michigan State right now, they are a very, very good team.”

Iowa hung with Michigan (13-9, 3-6 Big Ten) for a half, mostly due to good offense from both teams combined with porous defense. Plus, the pace was much faster than against Michigan State as new Iowa coach Fran McCaffery pushed the tempo against Michigan.

Not that the Wolverines seemed to mind as they led by three by halftime. Sophomore guard Darius Morris took over in the second half and finished with the third triple-double (12 points, 10 rebounds, 11 assists) in Michigan history.

“With this group of guys, I wasn’t too worried about it,” said Novak, a junior guard who scored 19 against Michigan State and 13 against Iowa. “We knew what the deal was. You couldn’t afford to lose a home game right after (Michigan State). We came ready to play.”

Now, Michigan faces unbeaten Ohio State (22-0, 9-0 Big Ten) in a 7 p.m. game Thursday (ESPN).

Earlier this month, the Wolverines played Ohio State about as tough as any team in the country had before falling, 68-64. Michigan frustrated Ohio State star freshman Jared Sullinger into fouling out after scoring 12 points and grabbing seven rebounds in 35 minutes, both numbers under his averages.

The Michigan players said then they were going to build off of that game. But the Wolverines dropped their next two games by double digits and bottomed out with a 69-64 loss to Minnesota that resulted in a post-game team meeting.

Now Michigan is playing more like the team that won seven straight games in November and December. Morris came out of his funk for two strong performances.

And the Wolverines’ offense has been as fluid as it has been in the past two seasons. They had a season-high 71.4 percent effective field goal percentage and a season-high 1.36 points per possession.

“Especially the second half, we need to keep playing like that,” junior guard Stu Douglass said.

Now Michigan takes its confidence to Columbus to play No. 1 Ohio State, the fourth time this year Michigan will play a team ranked among the top 10.

“We’re a pretty confident group right now. With the game Thursday and today, we’ve put two games back-to-back where we’ve played pretty well,” Novak said. “That’s all you can ask for going into playing the No. 1 team in the country on the road.

“That’s the type of games you come to college for. It’s going to be fun. Add in that it is Michigan-Ohio State, that’s special.”

Michael Rothstein covers University of Michigan basketball for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at (734) 623-2558, by e-mail at michaelrothstein@annarbor.com or follow along on Twitter @mikerothstein