Non-Conference Opponents

RPI Effect Only Teams

If you care, Michigan played the following teams: UMass-Lowell (10-18), Houston Baptist (6-23), South Carolina State (9-19), Coppin State (10-19), Long Beach State (13-15), and Charlotte (15-13). But while I don’t want to say these games didn’t MATTER, they didn’t, you know, matter. Except the Charlotte game, because blerg. Michigan’s fate will be determines by larger narratives. Not many people are going to hammer too hard on RPI when you’re talking the difference between a 2 seed and a 3 seed. So, let us move along.

Big Sorts of Teams

Iowa State (22-7, 10-7 Big 12)

This week: Lost @ Kansas State (80-73); Lost @ Baylor (74-61)

Michigan probably moved ahead of Iowa State for good by virtue of Iowa State’s rough week. Bracketmatrix has them as the last 3 seed, it’s unlikely a home win over bubble team Oklahoma State (side note: how did THAT happen?) would get them past Michigan.

Florida State (18-11, 9-8 ACC)

This week: Beat Georgia Tech (81-71); Won @ Boston College (74-70)

Florida State met two necessary conditions for an NCAA bid this week. Losing to either of those teams would’ve probably been the end of things for the Seminoles. The good news is that Syracuse also seems very beatable, so it’s possible for Florida State to close strong. The problem is that now a win over Syracuse wouldn’t bring the cache it would have two or three weeks ago, so they might still need to do some work in the conference tourney.

From a Michigan standpoint, though, FSU doesn’t really matter all that much anymore. No one cares about your 6^th best win, and pretty much Michigan's entire seeding case rests in its conference schedule. So if you’d really like to see some more #Nebrasketball, you might be hoping they drop their last couple of games to clear some room at the bubble.

#4 Dook (23-7, 12-5 ACC)

This week: Lost @ Wake Forest (YTWF) (82-72)

This was a gift on a number of fronts. Duke’s loss potentially leaves some wiggle room for Michigan to move up to a 2-seed. Also, Duke’s loss was a loss for Duke, which is a win for Not Duke. We are Not Duke. So, let’s compare the two teams right now:

I dunno, that’s close.

#3 Arizona (28-2, 15-2 PAC 12)

This week: Beat Stanford (79-66), Beat Arizona State (74-69)

It's hard to blame Arizona for a less-than-dominant performance against ASU. They'd clinched pretty much everything there was to clinch (PAC 12 title, #1 seed in the PAC 12 tourney, likely #1 seed, helped RichRod kill the 10 second rule), and sometimes it's hard to get up for games that don't much matter. 

One potential cause for concern is depth. Arizona is really only rolling about 6 guys deep, which is working fine for them now, but if they run up against a team that draws a lot of fouls, it could be an issue. But no, Michigan isn't one of those teams.

Stanford (18-11, 9-8 PAC 12)

This week: Lost to Arizona (79-66); Lost to Colorado (59-56)

According to Bill Walton (who called the Stanford/Colorado game), Stanford's loss is a lot like the Punic War if it was fought by Muppets; you're not sure where they got the weapons, but you can't expect them to be back in time for lunch.

I'm not sure exactly what he meant by that, but Stanford's bid is in real trouble. Bracketmatrix had them as a 10-seed before the loss to the Buffs, so they still have some work to do. And not that it matters, but it would be nice for Michigan to have at least ONE win over a tournament team from its non-conference schedule.

[AFTER THE JUMP: Michigan, and all the teams that finished behind Michigan because Michigan finished ahead of everyone who isn't Michigan]

Also dear yente if you could saddle Wisconsin in an impossible bracket that'd be great.

In two days it shall be March. We're already familiar with the Big Ten Tourney participants, so let us look beyond to this NCAA tournament thing.

What, my dear yentes, makes a good or bad matchup for this Michigan team, what are some of the teams out there we might hope to avoid, and who among expected high seeds would Michigan match up well against?

Brian: Bracketology consensus has us a three or four right now; I'll go under the assumption they're a three just to simplify things. That means Michigan is looking at the top eight teams on S-curves trying to suss out a good matchup. Wisconsin is in that group for some lucky 7-seed but won't end up in Michigan's region. The others: Wichita State, Florida, Syracuse, Arizona, Kansas, and some combination of Cincinnati/Villanova/Creighton.

No one in that group seems hugely appealing, but I like the Syracuse matchup best of the current one-seeds. They've only got one shooter, they're 11th on Kenpom, they've had a lot of close calls against not particularly good teams, Michigan played their zone last year, and they've got shooting from everywhere. 'Cuse's current backcourt is much smaller and less athletic than last year's version and Michigan's shot generation is a lot bigger, so going over the zone is much more of an option. Also, undefeated or not, Wichita State is short, largely untested, and not laden with NBA superstars future. I will take either of those one seeds.

Conversely, I want nothing to do with Arizona. Michigan damn near beat them earlier in the year, yeah, but that was thanks in large part to an avalanche of missed putbacks. Teams that can just implode Michigan on the boards are my biggest fear. Kansas and Florida are also teams I'd like to avoid.

[jump]

Surprise. You're probably not surprised.

"MICHIGAN HAMPERED BY STARS' NBA CONTRACTS"

They did show McGary with like two minutes left, so I guess we're even?

Kind of good. Tim Hardaway's assertion about a week-long break is just true.

With yesterday's win, John Beilein now is 14-2 in games for which he has a week to prep since 2008. 10 of those vs. high-major teams.

— Drew Hallett (@DrewCHallett) February 24, 2014

Seeding and location things. Seems like Michigan has a decent shot at Milwaukee. Lunardi's got them there and has for a while; Palm has them relegated to Orlando, but he's got them a #4 seed, not a 3. Lunardi has Creighton in San Antonio instead, which is a bit farther away for them but not immensely so. I'm hoping the committee realizes that Buffalo is just as close for Michigan. Syracuse is locked into one spot there; the other one is up for grabs.

Unfortunately, there's no slam dunk site this year that would be an obvious spot to put Michigan, so they may figure Milwaukee or Orlando is a who cares kind of situation.

Compare and contrast. I might have known this but I forgot it and now spring practice is starting immediately and I am reminded, so here is some possibly-old news. this week's Athletic Department Outrage Of The Century: undeterred by the miserable weather at the last 100 spring games, Michigan has actually moved it up, so that it's on April 5th. Which is also the date of the national semifinals in the NCAA tournament. Is Michigan actively trying to suppress turnout?

Not quite the worst scouting report ever. That is still Aaron Schatz on Mike Martin, but whoever's putting up the anonymous scouting reports for NFL.com is… well… he's definitely not Heiko. Jeremy Gallon's weaknesses:

WEAKNESSES

Short with a limited catching radius.

Okay.

Lacks top-end speed to separate vertically or run away from a crowd (consistently tracked down from behind).

Maybe on an NFL level?

Not a natural hands catcher and will often body the ball.

Okay now you're just making things up.

Lacks dynamic run skills for an undersized receiver.

Much of his production results from schemed bubble screens and lateral tosses.

OH COME ON

Underpowered blocker.

/dies

Hide yo kids. Both Michigan and Michigan State are being investigated by the Feds for not doing enough to deal with sexual assault on campus, with your favorite online and offline crank spearheading the charge:

[Doug] Smith filed a complaint last year with the Office of Civil Rights, saying that U-M refused to investigate the case and that the university’s grievance procedure does not fully comply with Title IX, the federal law that prohibits discrimination based on gender.

Funny how the suddenly-legitimized Smith is now getting profiled by the News and used as a primary source when everyone was perfectly happy to ignore him this summer. It's terrible that this guy actually has a point about the insular, opaque, CYA way the university does everything. When you are going up against Doug Smith and losing, you are so bad at PR Dave Brandon is interested in hiring you.

Meanwhile in East Lansing, other suits in charge of things are caught lying to make themselves look good:

Near the bottom of the letter was a single sentence stating that the university is “collaborating” with the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, or OCR, to “give members of the campus community an opportunity” to meet with representatives from the department.

But on Monday, Department of Education spokesman Jim Bradshaw told The State News the planned visit to campus is directly related to an official investigation into sexual harassment and violence complaints pending against the university.

Doug Smith might be behind this as well, as Michigan State seniors Keith Appling and Adriean Payne would be on the Island Of Expelled Athletes if MSU was operating with the same standards Michigan is. Seems like a short leap of logic there.

Elsewhere in legal procedures. Suffice it to say that the preliminary hearing in the O'Bannon case did not go well for the NCAA.

One of the NCAA's other justifications is protecting amateurism. Wilken largely skipped past the topic with a dismissive line: "I don't think amateurism is going to be a useful word here."

Dagger. One thing to love about the legal system is cock-eyed judges who blow through decades of smoke and mirrors with one withering sentence.

Nobody knows about soccer. That rumored Manchester United/Real Madrid game slated for Michigan Stadium in one URL:

http://www.mlive.com/sports/ann-arbor/index.ssf/2014/02/prewrite_dont_publish_michigan.html

The organizers were set to announce their final two sites recently and did announce one: Gopher Stadium in Minneapolis. It would make sense if another Midwestern football venue was the other thing they were waiting on, but still no announcement. A spokesperson for the group organizing this preseason tourney thing confirms that they are in "serious discussions" but can't announce anything.

The hold up may be about the playing field. When Michigan Stadium was being considered for the USA's most recent World Cup bid it became clear that any soccer match at the stadium would have to be on a temporary elevated platform.

Oh good. Michigan and Michigan State will have two games about one-third of the time going forward as the Big Ten adopts the least creative way to jam a 14-team conference into 18 games they can come up with: play five teams twice and eight once. Boooooo.

What they should have done: first 13 games are a round robin. Top seven and bottom seven are then grouped, final 6 games are round-robin within groups. Big Ten title: amazingly important. Conference stretch run: amazing. Downsides: schedule uncertainty and tough on bubble teams. But, man, just think of those three weeks at the end of the year. Would be must see.

Etc.: Five key plays. Zach Helfand on the differences between Izzo and Beilein. Tweeting at players is A FELONY. 300 pound man runs 40 yard dash twice as fast as you would. Then he talks to people about it. He will likely go in the top ten.

Kill 'em with kindness. Lawrence Marshall overcomes tragedy. Not sure if serious dot jpg.

Pretty much. Midnight Maize returns with MS Paint sidearm:

I do not know why Petway is riding a dolphin.

Brackets. Surveying the panoply of brackets at the Bracket Matrix gives the impression that to most Michigan is currently a three seed. Michigan's currently the last one overall, but the Matrix generally lags as brackets are up to a week old. They're on the cusp of a 2, especially with Oklahoma State losing last night.

That's where Jerry Palm has them, in a rather unpleasant region with potential rematches against Stanford (the 11), Iowa State(the 2) and Arizona(the 1) plus winged-helmet-on-winged-helmet crime in the opener against Delaware. There is  exactly no reason to get exercised about team placement in a random January bracket, I know. I just am not feeling positive about that business.

More on Aneurysm Two. Beilein has not and apparently will not disclose what set him off, but when MLive is getting screenshots from youtube of the LeVert layup attempt that was (officially) blocked by Appling, it seems that everyone agrees. Beilein, for his part, on Stauskas getting him away from the spittle exchange:

“Yeah, that was a good assist by him,” Beilein said of Stauskas in the postgame press conference. “He was a little rough with me, too. I was in control, though, believe it or not.”

I do not entirely believe it, and if it was anyone other than John Beilein I would be snorting in derision. Also:

"(Stauskas) made a great move there because I was an innocent bystander at the time," Beilein said. "At any rate, we got through that. That would have been a shame if I would have gotten a technical at that time."

The implication there is that Beilein started barking at this Wymer guy and it was Wymer who got in his face. Imagine that happening to, say, Tom Izzo. It does not compute. No wonder he blew up.

Coach Mitch. Presented without context.

“I’m Coach Mitch,” McGary said to reporters after the game Saturday.

Also, another photo in the Horford/McGary odd couple bin:

Photographers, you have been notified that side by side shots of McGary and Horford are of bottomless joy and utility.

Aw man. I was just getting into the swing of calling the Huskers something like Increasingly Dangerous Nebrasketball™ and they had to go and kick Deverell Biggs off the team.

[checks kenpom]

Nevermind! Biggs was a unique combination of high volume and absolutely miserable efficiency: his usage rate was 35th nationally and his ORTG 92nd. I'm only thinking this is a major loss because Biggs had 14 points against Michigan. Now I am worried abut Michigan's defense. More worried.

Just another Alabama offseason. Alabama fans believe they will take 27 kids in this recruiting class, which means they'll have to eject eight guys from the program. Unless it's actually eleven, ie, the different between Michigan signing the 16 or 17 they expect to this year and a near-NCAA maximum class. At least Bama fans are no longer able to deny what's happening with sleight of hand, and have to admit they don't care:

Don't care.

Scholarship limits are designed to limit student-athlete opportunities in the name of competitive balance. Those who laud scholarship limits while suggesting that oversigning is harmful to student-athletes are hypocrites.

Next question.

I knew I shouldn't have worn my I LAUD SCHOLARSHIP LIMITS t-shirt today. The only thing more endangered by Alabama than backup offensive linemen are strawmen.

Injuries issues for Wisconsin hockey. Badger defenseman Tyler Barnes will be out for this weekend's series at Yost. Nick Kerdiles, a first round pick, is questionable after missing the Michigan series in Madison. Even if they get a weakened version of the Badgers, Michigan is going to have to significantly step up their game to compete with the #5 scoring offense in the country.

Wow, Yost. Remember that? It's January 28th and this is the first game at Yost since December 11th. Scheduling. I am not impressed with it. If they're going to have all these bye weeks because the conference tournament is one weekend instead of three, they should endeavor to fill breaks like last week with nonconference series. I very much want to go to hockey in January, because it's a star attraction. In the heart of football season it's not.

Well now. There's been a kind-of-bonkers rumor floating around the past few years that when Red retires, one of the primary candidates to replace him will be Mike Babcock. Here is the first circumstantial evidence this is not something a twelve year old posted on a message board:

“He always mentions that -- (coaching college hockey) at some point -- when we talk,” Berenson said. “When he's done (in the NHL), he could see himself doing that. He's a student of the game and understands academics and sports and life after hockey."

IIRC, Red's tentative plan is to serve out the next two years of his contract and then hang it up. If Babcock wants the job I think we might let him have it.

Etc.: Obituary of the year. Venric Mark will return for Northwestern. Hockey moves up its recruiting calendar by six months so coaches can talk to guys before the CHL drafts. Nebraska's new ice rink will not support D-I hockey. Oh man I forgot to put the fact that MSU was favored by five by Vegas in the 30 for 30 pitch.

NEW BLACK HEART GOLD PODCAST THEME SONG

!!!

Site Notice: This Thursday we're planning a basketballgasm liveblog, culminating in the Michigan-South Dakota State game. Probably getting started with the afternoon games, so you've got from now until then to get your brackets filled out and get your work done before productivity goes to Bolivia. Viva March!

My new tradition. I'm not really the basketball guy around here, however I do seem to perform really well when it comes to March Madness brackets, getting back more than my pay-in every year since 2000 (won twice). The first six years of that was luck—since then I've just been working really hard at it so I don't lose the streak.

For those filling out their brackets today here's some helpful stuff. My favorite tool for clearing the biases is the Wall Street Journal's blind comparison. Also never miss the annual GARGANTUBRACKET by Czabe.com, the blog Bracket Science and the gloriously cheap calculator at Poologic, which lets you program how many upsets you want and find inefficiencies to exploit. Use SCIENCE! to take money from your friends and co-workers!

The last tool is my own (<<<<<grab it here>>>>>). It turns KenPom's ratings into a confidence %, and then automatically pulls up which venue the game will be at and whether there's any injuries you need to know about for either team. Who likes drop-down menus?

What I do is normalize the closest 16-1 matchup (Kansas vs. WKU at 22.6% difference in KenPom's "Pyth") as 100% for the 1 seed to win, and use the KenPom ratings to percentile everyone else's games into a confidence number. Then I roll through anything under 70% and decide if my knowledge of those teams might justify taking the under.

Here's the first round, where "Confidence" is a measure of how likely the top seed might be to win. The venue is listed so you can identify things like don't take Boise over K-State in KC, or how 12-seed Cal (a team worse than Virginia, Iowa, Denver, Baylor, Kentucky, Stanford, UConn, Maryland, and Sothern Miss according to Kenpom) is basically playing at home in San Jose.

[UPDATE: I had some errors in the below chart. Now fixed. The tool was fine but I've added an option to set your own chaos factor.]

General tips:

If you're in a big pool, run multiple brackets, each with carefully selected upsets. There's no such thing as an NCAA tournament without lots of big upsets and at least one surprising run. The 1 seeds all made it to the Final Four just once. If you submit one milksop bracket you're up against every other milksop bracket and will get beat by the one crazy guy who had LSU going to the Elite 8 or something. Hitting on a carefully selected upset that rearranges a bracket and lets you ride a different high seed to the Final Four is the most typical route to a win.

If you're in a small pool, play conservative. One or two points won't usually make a difference in a small pool, but the likelihood of something crazy like that one guy's wife who picks based on the cuteness factor of mascots winning is cut down so you don't need to take risks to get ahead.

Pick the upsets the most carefully. I love picking 6-11 upsets because if you get it wrong they're bound to get wiped out by the 3 anyway. If you roll the dice on a 3-seed or lower losing early though, you'll feel like an idiot as the rest of your pool collects the easy points. A tournament without upsets never happens, but neither does a tournament with all the upsets. You can totally undo a great pick with a terrible one elsewhere.

Get value for your upsets. Know who's in your pool and the inefficiencies. Fans will generally take their favorite team to go two rounds later than they really belong and conference teams to go a round further. This is an inefficiency.

Be really really lucky. This is really the only rule.

Chaos in the old barn. Minnesota beat Indiana last night, turning the Big Ten title race from Definitely Indiana into a free-for-all between IU, MSU, Michigan, and—ugh—Wisconsin*. If you're betting that Trevor Mbakwe beasting on Cody Zeller was the key, yup: Krang had 12 rebounds, 6 offensive, and went 8/10 from the floor en route to 21 points. Zeller was 2/9.

As for that suddenly open Big Ten race, here are the contenders' closing stretches:

• INDIANA: Iowa, OSU, @ Michigan
• MICHIGAN STATE: @ Michigan, Wisconsin, Northwestern
• MICHIGAN: @ Penn State, MSU, @ Purdue, Indiana
• WISCONSIN: Purdue, @ Michigan State, @ Penn State

Michigan controls their own fate for a share; Indiana has the toughest schedule but also a one-game lead. The MSU game this weekend is probably an eliminator. Go Iowa Awesome.

Meanwhile, the Gophers also secured their place in the tournament with that win, not that many people had them anywhere near the bubble. With a closing stretch of Penn State, @ Nebraska, @ Purdue they should reach 9-9 easily, and with wins over Indiana, Wisconsin, and Michigan State they'll probably be in that 6-7 range.

*[Ryan Evans is now shooting jump shots from the line:

This is why the Big Ten sucks at football?]

Turns out they SEC, too. Elsewhere in good news that went down last night, Florida got beat by Tennessee and will be off the one line everywhere once people get around to updating their brackets. Michigan will move back up to a #1 at Lunardi's bracket the next time he updates it, and the Gators are only a hair in front of Indiana on Kenpom now. This would be very good if Michigan could keep that spot.

Not that I put much credence in Lunardi's brackets. He's finally managed to keep Michigan away from teams they've already played in the first two rounds, but right now Michigan is slotted with Duke and #3 Louisville. Since Michigan is presumably #5, that's only S-curve order in his deranged brain. He's got Gonzaga with one of the top two seeds, which… I mean. Come on. Gonzaga does not have the schedule strength to be a one seed. They're 10th in RPI despite their record because their SOS is 66th—84th on Kenpom, but that's not what the committee will look at—and some school in a major conference is going to get hot and swoop past them.

LOLRUS. Michigan State went the somewhat shady route with their disposal of Dan Roushar, waiting until after Signing Day to deport the guy to the NFL position job that is apparently the birthright of any crappy college-level coordinator. (At least he's not assistant to the offensive line coach.) They are about to reap a whirlwind of karma, though:

Former Ohio State offensive coordinator Jim Bollman will be taking the same position with Michigan State, according to Football Scoop. Bollman worked as offensive line coach and run game coordinator at Boston College in 2012 after spending 11 seasons with the Buckeyes and was hired by Purdue as O-line coach for 2013.

And everyone who ever heard of Ramzy Nasrallah thought "I wonder what his twitter feed looked like in the immediate aftermath of this?"

Jfiekslemddkskwmemmfrmdkkwkdkdmdmdkoeoedmdmle RT @footballscoop: Sources tell us Jim Bollman is expected to accept the Michigan State OC job

— Ramzy Nasrallah (@ramzy) February 27, 2013

Bollman's not even a retread—he was OSU's OL coach until Tressel got canned and had one year as the head guy. He thought Joe Bauserman was basically on the same level as Braxton Miller. And OSU fans had been bitching about him for years for various OL issues from recruiting to performance. The only way in which this makes sense is if this was designed as a social media stunt.

If it's that, great job Mark Hollis. If it is Mark Dantonio's inner Oscar the Grouch overwhelming all reason, great job Mark Dantonio. Either way the forecast for Michigan State football in the near future is lots more years like this one, except with more mustache.

BONUS: Ohio State bros yukking it up about the Borges/Bollman matchup betray their Michigan obsession by not immediately going to Bollman/Greg Davis. Borges may have tried to use Denard Robinson as a dump truck, but one of the main complaints so far in his tenure is that everything is a deep ball. These guys aren't on the same plane.

BONUS II: Big Ten football programs have hired John Shoop, Jim Bollman, and Greg Davis over the last two years. To coordinate offenses, not pick out bagel toppings. I will not be breaking new rhetorical ground here by asserting this is why the Big Ten sucks. Northwestern is good at offense every year despite having no recruiting base. Take that, add draftable athletes on defense, and then find out what happens. In the worst case it looks like your offense is coordinated by… Greg Davis.

BONUS III: from an Eleven Warriors reader:

Very Big Ten move. I mean seriously SI, what?

Spring football '13 is the Jim Bollman OC of SI covers.

Etc.: Columbus wins "team I'd least like to go to" and "worst road trip" in Grant Wahl's survey of MLS players. Michigan won't wear the short-sleeved basketball jerseys the only incompetent Germans dreamed up. I've heard they will be wearing something. Here's this guy. Bacon on hockey's history. You like basketball graphs, right? Michigan has an abnormally low transition rate off of makes for how frequently they go on rebounds.