As Nebraska prepares to host No. 12 Michigan on Monday night inside Pinnacle Bank Arena, Husker forward Berke Büyüktuncel continues to rehab his sprained left ankle that's kept him off the court the past three games.

On Saturday following practice inside PBA, head coach Fred Hoiberg touched on how Büyüktuncel's recovery has been going and the impact his absence has made. On a small positive note, the 6-foot-10 UCLA transfer did go through a live portion of practice Saturday.

"He did an individual workout yesterday, did not do anything live," Hoiberg said. "Today, he got back in into one live drill, and a short portion of it. Hopefully tomorrow, if he responds well, he'll be able to do a little bit more."

Nebraska has badly missed Büyüktuncel's presence down this final stretch of the regular season. He's one of the team's best rebounders and post defenders. He would've been nice to have against Northwestern, which outrebounded Nebraska 46-27 and racked up a whopping 23 offensive boards.

Büyüktuncel is also one of the players who brings energy and enthusiasm to the lineup, something that was missing at the starts of the games at Northwestern and Penn State.

"Berke helps us all across the board, whether he's playing the four or the five, he's as good as we got out there. So he covers things up for us," Hoiberg said. "And I think you saw how much we missed him in those last couple games."

Büyüktuncel didn't travel with the team to Northwestern or Maryland and instead stayed in Lincoln to focus on his ankle and use Nebraska's rehab resources. The team didn't want Büyüktuncel getting on a plane and risking his ankle swelling up due to altitude, either.

Hoiberg said that, with five games remaining, four in the regular season and at least one in the Big Ten Conference Tournament, the team won't rush back Büyüktuncel and risk having a setback.

Michigan comes to Lincoln with one of the best frontcourts in the country in 7-1, 250-pound Vladislav Goldin and the 7-0, 250-pound Danny Wolf, a unique player with guard-like skills and someone Hoiberg gave the ultimate compliment to by calling him a basketball "unicorn."

Without Büyüktuncel, Nebraska certainly has a challenge headed its way Monday night.

"He's a unicorn, man. I mean, what he does on the court, throws lob passes and shoots it, shoots step-backs at that size, it's (Nikola) Jokic-type stuff that he's out there doing on the floor," Hoiberg said of Wolf. "And then you pair him with a 7-1 guy (Goldin) that's got an unbelievable touch, who's really good, they play well off each other. They're the best, I think, circle front-of-the-rim team that we will face all year."

If Büyüktuncel misses his fourth straight game or is on a minutes restriction on Monday, that will continue to add pressure to Nebraska's remaining bigs in its rotation, Andrew Morgan and Braxton Meah.

While Morgan was effective in the second half at Penn State, scoring 16 of his 18 points and going 8-of-8 from the field, he only played 2:27 of the first half because of foul trouble. At Northwestern, Morgan played just 17 minutes, though that game the Huskers got a strong outing from Meah.

With Büyüktuncel's status up in the air for Michigan, having Morgan consistently on the court will be crucial against players like Wolf and Goldin.

Hoiberg said he and Morgan went through the film and watched all 18 fouls he's had since the Illinois game.

"We watch them as a team a lot, but I just wanted to get up there and watch individual. And he wanted to do it, too," Hoiberg said. "We wanted to see what he can do to get on the court. Some of it is going with his arms down as opposed to staying vertical. We talk about keeping the back of your hands on the rim when you jump up — some of it is that. Some of it is coming over and shifting his body.

"Some of it are guards — they don't wait for him to set the screen, and they get him a moving screen. And as we said in the film session the other day, if I'm a big and that happened, I would be pissed off at the guard if they continue to put me in that position."

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