THE ESSENTIALS

[After THE JUMP: More early jumps.]

THE OVERVIEW

Game the third in three days will be their last of this year's Bahama Ballroom Battle. Both of these teams lost their first round matchups—Texas Tech in an 85-69 blowout to Villanova, and Michigan in a squeaker to Memphis. They got to this game by taking out far weaker second round opponents UNI and Stanford, respectively. While technically the winner of this one finishes fifth in the eight-team pseudo-tourney, as far as Tourney resumes, the winner leaves the Caribbean with two Q1 victories, same as the loser of this afternoon's championship.

This bubbly Michigan team could use every W they can dig up, despite an offense producing above projections, because the defense has been coming in far below it. This is, like last year, a personnel problem: Michigan has no wing-like objects that are playable right now, and Tray Jackson has been less playable than Will Tschetter, who will always be a defensive liability. Turnovers have also become an issue, as the offense runs out of ideas when Dug McDaniel isn't on the court going Zoom-Zoom, and he, T-Will, Burnett, and Jackson have tried to create points with isolation against athletic long people.

Texas Tech is going to present exactly that. Though Chris Beard and his successor Mark Adams are no longer in Lubbock, TTU still runs out a bunch of athletic slashers who play defense first, second, and third. Former Red Raider Nimari Burnett will recognize the setup, if not many of the faces. They briefly hung in against an excellent Nova team earlier in the tournament by hitting a bunch of their contested threes. They only held off Northern Iowa by a bucket. Their other wins this season are buy games, though a 56-42 win over KP #122 San Jose State showed the Red Raiders are as ready to win the Raider way as ever.

THE BRACKET

THE US

My graphic [click to embiggen]:

faq for these graphics

THE LINEUP CARD

My graphic [click for big]:

THE THEM

Since this team doesn't really have a star lets lead with our old friend Joe Toussaint, the longtime Iowa guard who'd come off the bench whenever a Keegan Murray/Luka Garza run had build them enough a lead, and a few minutes of scoreless basketball was preferable to leaving Jordan Bohannon on the court. He spent a year at West Virginia in the interim, but Toussaint is the same quasi-point guard he's always been. His stats don't show it however because he's been getting to the line consistently against teams that don't have guards who can keep up with him. He's coming off an efficient 21-point game against NIU, a third of those at the charity stripe and all but six at the rim. He does look comfortable, though. After how many years as the one guy d'ing up in Iowa City, it's nice to see he's found his people at last.

Fellow point-like object Richard "Pop" Isaacs Jr. hasn't played enough good defenses to have a Geo Baker shot chart for this season, but he's going to end up with one I bet. Right now what that looks like is "Takes a Million Contested Threes." Via Synergy, all but 7 of his jumpers have been contested or so deep nobody bothered. This is the kind of profile that would drive past Michigan teams nuts, but Nimari Burnett should be up to the task in ways that Eli Brooks never was. Isaacs is an active defender, but not a particularly athletic one, and this comes out in his drives as well. Give him a lane and he's liable to enter it out of control, which gets him some friendly fouls but also explains his high turnover rate and low success as a finisher.

W Darrion Williams is the kind of player who's been giving the last two Michigan teams trouble for our lack of the same. He's an established defender who transferred from Nevada after a freshman year that highlighted his athleticism, offensive potential, and most of all his rebounding. He was a 25-percent defensive rebounder in-conference last year, and those numbers haven't gone down versus Tier A competition. He's also a gifted driver, and 34% career shooter from outside, and other than a weird streak early last year he almost never misses a free throw. Michigan doesn't really have a guy who can guard Williams other than Nkhamoua, unless Tray Jackson gets right. The book on Williams is you can bring help because he doesn't try to find his teammates; he started to break that tendency later last year, but since the transfer his assist rate has plummeted to 7 and his turnovers have shot up to 21.

C Warren Washington played with Williams in Nevada for a year then spent last season with Arizona State. Like his teammates, Washington's primary calling card is defense—he was an 89th percentile defender in 2022-'23 to Synergy and 85th percentile last year, when he more or less shut down Hunter Dickinson to key a blowout that we never recovered from. He blocks a lot of shots, is a plus rebounder, and alters a lot of shots. His offensive game is back-to-the-basket, and tends to sink below the mendoza line against better competition. He also has a weirdly high dribble that's rife for swipes.

SF Devan Cambridge also played on last year's Arizona State squad after transferring from Auburn to join his brother Desmond, who played at Nevada with Williams and Washington (try to keep up). Devan is a defensive wing who can't shoot well enough to be a three-and-D type, but he has the effect of one now that he's learned to use the odd open opportunity outside to drive. He's 29% for his career at the arc, but 60+ shooter inside, so forcing him to jack up a terrible three is preferable to letting him in the lane.

The bench:

• G Chance McMillian comes on the court as a pure 2-guard when one of the point-types needs a breather. The Grand Canyon University up-transfer is a Just-a-Shooter at this level, but puts them in at a 37% clip, which means TTU keeps him on the court over half the time, which makes them smaller defensively but creates much-needed space. He tried to be a JAS for GCU and it didn't go well.
• G Lamar Washington is supposed to be a combo guard but he's too willing to pass, with a 21/23 A/TO ratio this year following a 20/32 freshman year performance that ballooned to 17/42 against Tier A competition. His shooting suggests passing it is a good idea, but he's a useful defensive piece who can guard 1 through 4 and be particularly annoying to 1s.
• The rest of the bench are bit players. Eemeli Yalaho is the nearest thing Texas Tech has to a backup center, though the true freshman is nowhere close to playable yet.
• Last-year UNC transfer Kerwin Walton is a JAS but a career .400 shooter who doesn't need a lot of space to get one off. I mostly mention him because of his similar game to that of Ashton Hardaway, who scored 17 points on 9 shots against Michigan, and 4 points the rest of his career. Did I mention Michigan could use a wing?

THE TEMPO FREE

Overall numbers:

Because of their makeup, and their lack of shooting outside, Texas Tech is suffering more blocked shots than any team in the country this year. This is also due to a lack of size down low. Their starting five are two point guards, two wings, and a center who needs to stay on the court. As a recourse, they've taken to using their size to shoot low-percentage threes over other teams' guards.

THE KEYS

Shut down Toussaint and Isaacs with Dug and Nimari. Most teams don't have the speed to stay with two true guards AND defend Isaacs' long threes. Michigan seems to have a good matchup defensively.

Don't get winged. Washington, Williams, Cambridge, and McMillian are all, to one degree or another, a type of player Michigan doesn't have a true match for. I'd like to see Tray Jackson get his head in the game better since his length could be helpful here. Nkhamoua can shut the other down well enough.

Make Warren Work. The lack of any other centers puts a lot on Washington to stay out of foul trouble and support his defenders. Michigan has the players to go on a run when TTU is forced to play five-out.

Please oh please protect the basketball. Turnovers in a game with fewer opportunities to score are going to loom large.

Two-big your way out of their defense. The length and athleticism around the perimeter means little if Michigan can a Nkamhoua-Reed game going. This isn't the team to put it on Dug; use your sets and feel free to take some 10-footers if they're open.

THE SECTION WHERE I PREDICT THE SAME THING KENPOM DOES

Michigan by 2.