nik stauskas troll god

Welcome to Let's Remember Some Games (RIP Deadspin), a series in which we remember some games. It's self-explanatory. There's no criteria for the order, sport, date, or anything else; if a game strikes our fancy, we're gonna look back on it. Today's choice: Michigan basketball at Illinois, March 4th, 2014.

The Backstory

the backcourt was as good as the shorts were bad [Fuller]

In the final week of the regular season, Michigan traveled to Champaign with a chance to clinch the outright Big Ten championship for the first time since 1986. Despite their run to the national championship game the previous year, John Beilein's team wasn't a lock to get here—they'd lost Trey Burke and Tim Hardaway Jr. to the NBA, then injury cut short an expected breakout season from Mitch McGary in mid-December.

Nik Stauskas and Caris LeVert proved a formidable lead duo, however, bolstered by a strong supporting cast featuring Glenn Robinson III, Jordan Morgan, a freshman Derrick Walton, Spike Albrecht, Jon Horford, and freshman gunner Zak Irvin. Stauskas was in the running for Big Ten Player of the Year.

Illinois, meanwhile, bounced back from a 2-8 start to Big Ten play after second-year coach John Groce—two years removed from knocking off Michigan in the NCAA Tournament as Ohio's head man—settled on a rotation that worked, particularly on defense. The Illini had moved into fringe tourney contention with three straight victories, most recently upsetting Michigan State at the Breslin Center, and they'd held their previous four opponents below 50 points. To add to their motivation, this game was their Senior Day, and it drew a national television slot on ESPN.

It'd be a shame if they got embarrassed in front of a national audience. A real, real shame.

[Hit THE JUMP for, well, you understand foreshadowing.]

The Sponsors

This show is presented by UGP & The Bo Store, and if it wasn’t for Rishi and Ryan, MGoBlog would be like if the basketball program stuck it out with Amaker all these years.

Our other sponsors are also key to all of this: the Residence Inn Ann Arbor Downtown hosted us (and the Wagners last week), the University of Michigan Alumni Association might know a guy, Ann Arbor Elder Law might've come up with a better retirement plan than Cleveland, Michigan Law Grad will get you out of a ticket if you're racing to lock up a star assistant, Human Element is about to unleash the greatest posbang in the site's history, the Phil Klein Insurance Group is about to be contacted about a very bad policy, Peak Wealth Management is about to have a new client, and HomeSure Lending was probably like Alonzo Mourning dot gif when he heard who just stole Beilein.

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1. Now What?

starts at 1:00

We review the candidates who've come and gone. Ace warms to Yaklich after hearing the names after Juwan Howard. Speaking of Juwan Howard: about the best resume for an assistant you can possibly have. Porter Moser is not on this list.

2. Best of Beilein: Honorable Mentions

starts at 29:31

We all made lists of our top Beilein-era moments, and those lists did not fit into a Top 10, nor a Top 15, nor a Top 20, so here's all of the things that didn't make the list—it's a long non-list.

3. Best of Beilein: 11th-20th

starts at 1:07:07

Now we give our lists. Except we need to talk about our top moments for so long that we're going to need another segment before we even get to the top ten. Sorry not sorry.

4. Best of Beilein: 1st-10th

Starts at 1:39:30

Some you know. Some you're just going to get mad about. A few are obvious, but not in the obvious spot. This is really hard. There's probably a Smiths song in the Music.

MUSIC

• "Cemetery Gates"—Leah Blevins
• "Holding On"—The War on Drugs
• "End of the Road"—Boyz II Men
• “Across 110th Street”

THE USUAL LINKS

• Helpful iTunes subscribe link
• General podcast feed link
• Direct download link (right click/save as)
• What's with the theme music?

It's very on brand that we fit Denard onto this list

Yes, this still somehow went in. [JD Scott]

Another tournament week, another multi-part mailbag. This one contains the questions about/inspired by Jordan Poole's buzzer-beater. Yes, I'm as shocked as you are that I sorted them this way. Jump in!

A Free Pass

Hey Ace - Are there any statistics showing whether teams should guard the inbounder in late game situations like against Houston? On the surface, it seems like a huge mistake to let Livers inbound the ball to halfcourt so easily.

-Pat

While I don't remember seeing such a study and can't find stats on it, I agree that Kelvin Sampson erred in allowing Isaiah Livers to get a clean look on the final play. An opposing staff can only scout so many games, but I'm guessing Houston's coaches didn't get to the Maryland tape.

Even though the outcome of the plays were wildly different, Michigan's game-winners against the Terps and Cougars came on nearly identical setups: Livers hitting Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman with a baseball pass from his own baseline out of a timeout. Neither opponent elected to guard the inbounder even though Livers wasn't allowed to run the baseline.

Maryland's Mark Turgeon explicitly tried to set up his defense to prevent anyone from catching a pass while running towards the Terps basket. Here's how that went:

If you forgot, MAAR nearly got all the way to the hoop, drew a foul, and drained both free throws with the ruthless calm of a serial killer.

Here was Houston's setup:

While the Cougars were more successful in preventing a long pass to a guy on a dead run, they still allowed MAAR to catch the ball a fair distance up the court without any immediate pressure, which let him get upcourt in a hurry even though they had two defenders waiting.

Houston forced a tough shot, but it was still a catch-and-shoot look from a not-entirely-unreasonable distance by a shooter who had the time and space to square up to the basket. That's not a prayer, at least if you're Jordan Poole; ideally, the defense is forcing teams into prayers in that situation.

I don't think having the extra defender back is worth whatever added coverage it provides. Again, Livers can't run the baseline in either of these cases, and he's being asked to throw accurate passes far downcourt. Stick a big man on him and that becomes a great deal more difficult to execute. A tougher pass for Livers means either MAAR has to run farther back to the ball—losing precious time and momentum—or risk never completing the pass at all on a deeper attempt. Beilein's now gushed twice this season about Livers being able to throw pinpoint baseball passes; that's a lot harder to do with a basketball when you're not getting the same amount of space as an actual baseball pitcher.

Recency and confirmation biases may be playing a factor, but I rarely find the fifth defender that stays back even comes into play that often. For the offense, the downside of having the entire court to cover can also be an upside—your players can sprint full-out, which never happens for more than a couple steps in a halfcourt situation. Even with the extra man back, it's hard to keep a team from hitting the player they want—usually after running him through a couple screens—and that can lead, as in Maryland's case, to getting a bunch of players uselessly stuck behind the play while a fast man runs past them.

Houston more productively spent their extra player on MAAR and he still had an easy pass to make because of the amount of space he had on the catch. They did a much better job on the back end than Maryland by preventing MAAR from either driving or pulling up. They still got burned. I thought everyone learned this lesson in 1992: guard the dang inbounder. 

Or don't, actually. Coaches not doing that is working out pretty nicely for my life.

[Hit THE JUMP for my top-five last-shot-makers of the Beilein era, an evil question that was also the most popular, and MAAR's overlooked move.]