Death From Above: At Penn State

THE ESSENTIALS

NO REASON WOO

THE THEM

Penn State is in a race to be the Big Ten's worst team with Nebraska. Nebraska is winning that race according to Kenpom, but the Nittany Lions aren't far off. As is often the case with bad teams, they have one decent-to-good player who they massively over-rely on.

Hi. You may remember me from such players as Dion Harris.

He's Tim Frazier and across the 345 teams playing D-I basketball this year he's 12th in time on the court, 9th in percentage of possessions used, 95th in shot percentage, and 2nd in assist rate. Given all that it's a credit to his game that he's shooting 46% from two and getting to the line a lot. He can't shoot threes (28% on just a couple per game) and I'm guessing his conference numbers are uglier than the overall ones, but Penn State has no choice but to have him launch a ton of shots.

There's a massive dropoff to the second banana, 6'4" sophomore Jermaine Marshall. Marshall launches enough shots to crack the top 400 players nationally but shoots 44% from two and 31% from three with few assists and few free throws  drawn.

Senior Cammeron Woodyard is a pretty amazing statistical package. For one, he's shooting better from three (37%) than he is from two (34%!). For two he's got a tiny turnover rate and this is enough to see his ORtg creep near Frazier's on decent usage. Sophomore Matt Glover is the other nominal starter; he's shooting 30% from two, 18% from three, and 52% from the line. He's 6'4".  He's got a really high turnover rate for a low usage player. I'll be amazed to see him on the floor. Any time he shoots and it goes in you should throw a little fit.

Penn State's center is a three-headed one; no head edges above a 100 ORtg. Sophomore Sasa Borovnjak is the guy who's gotten the most time. He's a tiny usage player that does shoot efficiently on his rare opportunities but produces very little other than that. Freshmen Ross Travis and Jonathan Graham are basically the same player with a little more usage and a little less shooting. As rebounders, they're meh. And free throw-shooters, they're all terrible.

THE RESUME

Penn State is 4-13 in the league with home wins over Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, and Purdue. That Purdue win was by 20 and stands out as the most inexplicable game in the league this year. The nonconference schedule was probably worse what with losses to Kentucky (by 38), St Joe's, Ole Miss, Lafayette, and Duquense. They did pick up a win over bubble team South Florida.

In the first meeting Michigan won 71-53 in both teams' first conference game of the year. Tim Hardaway ripped off 26 points on 10-11 shooting from two (he was 1 of 7 from three) and Penn State shot 39% percent with no one other than Frazier cracking double digits. To get there he had to take 18 shots and commit five turnovers.

THE TEMPO-FREE

Conference four factors:

Penn State can't shoot at all. They're last in the conference from both three and two, get more shots blocked than anyone else in the conference, and launch a low number of threes.

On defense, they give up a massive number of quality three-point looks. Opponents are shooting 40% from deep on 42% of their shots! Penn State is not good at basketball! At all at all at all! They're also allowing conference opponents to hit exactly 50% from two.

THE PROTIPS

Feed Timmah. Given Hardaway's last game and his last outing against these dudes, Michigan should try to turn his status from "not as bad as he's been" to ON FIAH. Hopefully that does not mean contested three pointers. Given the numbers above it probably doesn't; Penn State probably hasn't contested a three all year.

Anyway, put him in a position to go to the basket and see what happens.

Get Douglass to slow Frazier with help from friends.  Beating Penn State is making Tim Frazier score inefficiently, full stop. Michigan did an eh job of that in the first game and still came away with an easy win but if Frazier's points:shots ratio is over 1 in a road game there could be some uncomfortable moments if threes aren't falling.

Obligatory bit about threes falling. Seems like everyone else's do; Michigan hit 8 of 25 in the first go-round.

The Colton Christian show. With both Jordan Morgan and Evan Smotrycz suffering stingers against Illinois their availability is questionable. Beilein:

"We'll know more after (Saturday's) practice," Beilein said Friday. "All the guys who played heavy minutes (Thursday) are going to do very little (Friday).

"(Morgan and Smotrycz) have seen the trainers, and they've had rehab and we'll see how they feel."

It seems like they'll go. How effective they'll be is still in question.

If they're limited it seems like it's 6'6" bench magnet Colton Christian in line to get the spare playing time. Michigan threw him out there against Meyers Leonard and survived. Christian had a nice roll to the basket for a layup in the first half and had another in the second half wiped out by a dodgy-seeming charging call. As a bonus, he didn't get owned by Leonard, though that had more to do with Leonard's disinterest in the first half and exhaustion in the second.

If he's the third guy at the five against Illinois there's no way he's not against Penn State. All he has to do is not give up easy buckets and provide some rebounding/"energy". Given his opponents that seems doable.

Don't inexplicably reprise the Iowa game. If Michigan loses this it's going to be on them.

THE SECTION WHERE I PREDICT THE SAME THING KENPOM DOES

Michigan by six.