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THE ESSENTIALS

WHAT	#3 Michigan (14-1, 9-1 B1G) vs #26 Rutgers (12-7, 8-7)	rutgers
WHERE	Crisler Arena Ann Arbor, MI
WHEN	9 PM Eastern Thursday, February 18th
THE LINE	Kenpom: M -8 Torvik: M -9 Draft Kings: M -8.5 (odds and lines are subject to change)
TELEVISION	FS1 PBP: Brandon Gaudin Analyst: Nick Bahe

THE OVERVIEW

Michigan's COVID break hangover lasted one half against Wisconsin; unfortunately for the Badgers, basketball games have two halves. Michigan put up a 40-20 run over the last 20 minutes to pick up a win at the Trohl Center and maintain a two-game gap over Illinois in the loss column.

Now: Rutgers. The Cable Subscribers have had a rollercoaster of a season, losing six of seven after a win over the Illini in late December and winning five of their last six. Opponent quality had a lot to do with that. Only a now-inexplicable hammering at the hands of MSU stands out as an unexpected result during the losing stretch. The wins in the positive run have come against Indiana, MSU, Northwestern, Minnesota, and Northwestern again.

Add it up and Rutgers is about what they were last year, a feisty opponent in the upper middle of the best conference in college basketball. They're on course for a bid in the 5-7 seed range. And this year they'll get to play in the tourney. Probably.

THE US

Seth's graphic [click to embiggen]:

faq for these graphics

Dickinson got his crown back after popping back into the KPOY race.

THE LINEUP CARD

Seth's graphic [click for big]:

Both Mathis and Young have started for big chunks of the year; Young is still playing more than half of Rutgers minutes. Omoruyi missed a couple of games, thus spurring that deep bench section. Ohio State outscored the Deep Bench At C lineup by one billion points. A reminder that the brick just means the guy puts up a bunch of tough, usually unassisted, shots. Baker is making shots at an OK clip. McConnell not so much.

[Hit THE JUMP for the rest of the preview.]

THE THEM

leeeeroy jenkins [Campredon]

Rutgers has a bonafide brand under Steve Pikiell. They're bricklayers who play maniacally hard, and this year's edition is no different.

We're going to go a little off-script here since Rutgers's starting lineup has wobbled significantly over the course of the year and start with a nominal bench player. That would be 2019-20 Disaster Factory player of the year Jacob Young, who was more or less a co-alpha for much of the year. This is the most Rutgers thing possible. Young has improved significantly, increasing his assist rate by 50% and shooting 49/39 from the field. (Last year: 44/25). He retains a sky-high steal rate Michigan fans will no doubt remember from last year's pick-six frustrations, and he's able to do that without exposing himself to too much foul trouble. However, his gambling looks like it comes with some stiff costs on the defensive end:

high major comp only

That's a nine-point 2P% gap and Rutgers actually generates fewer turnovers when he's on the court. Young has also failed to rein in his turnovers—his 22 TO rate is identical to last year—and that's a significant drag on the Rutgers offense. His efficient this year is largely offset by 3P% that's probably just noise since it's ~50 attempts.

Young is one of the fastest guys in the conference and has a whopping 89 transition attempts this year, 39 more than his nearest teammate. He's not especially efficient in transition but an eFG of 56% is solid considering how many marginal transition attempts are being forced. This will be a test for Michigan's excellent transition D (47% eFG, 24th nationally).

Other than that, though… Young looks like he's going through some Flowers For Algernon stuff right now. His last seven games have seen five sub-100 ORTG performances and five games in which he had 3+ turnovers. This almost exactly coincides with his return to the bench after a stinker versus PSU. We've talked him up a bit on the site this year; if I had to bet we're going to see something closer to last year's Young than the new player we've mentioned.

these were good until they really weren't [Campredon]

The other alpha is burlywing Ron Harper Jr, whose usage is five points lower than Young's entirely because of turnovers. Young has a bunch. Harper is one of the least turnover-prone players in college basketball. They get up virtually the same number of shots. These shots were going really really well, and now they are going terribly.

Michigan hosts Rutgers tonight in a tricky lookahead spot with Ohio State coming up on Sunday.

Scarlet Knights have bounced back from an awful January but I can't explain Ron Harper Jr.'s shooting struggles. He has missed 19 threes in a row. https://t.co/dFYzmlw3Cq pic.twitter.com/zgIWlf3zM1

— Dylan Burkhardt (@umhoops) February 18, 2021

I don't know what to make of that. Harper's three point shooting on the season (33%) is more or less what it was last year (35%), it's just that almost all of the makes came in  a six game run in November and December.

Inside the arc Harper is a solid midrange shooter who thrives off cuts to the basket; he'll post up a bit but isn't especially proficient there. His lack of quickness means he's likely to take a tough pull-up if he gets stuck in an iso situation. The near-total lack of turnovers means Harper is having a relatively efficient season despite not shooting that well.

Young's running buddy in the back court is Geo Baker, who has reached D'Mitrik Trice levels of "that guy is still in college?" Baker has long been Rutgers's default answer on offense, carrying the burden of the conference's highest shot degree of difficulty. This hasn't changed much. Rutgers doesn't need to rely on him to bail them out as much. The shot quality hasn't gone up a ton.

Baker still takes a ton of unassisted twos and cans an improbable number of them. His midrange game has gone from great (considering the circumstances), as Baker hit 45% in the midrange last year, to literally unbelievable (considering the circumstances) now that he's hitting 55%. That's on 49 attempts, which is well within the sample size realm where regression to the mean is coming.

What has changed is the number of late clock threes Baker is jacking up. Rutgers's offense has developed to the point where those are not as frequent, but Baker's 3P% has remained stuck at 30%.

blocking Wagner is hard to do [David Wilcomes]

Center Myles Johnson is an old-school defensive center with a double-digit block rate and massive rebounding numbers. He is top 25 in block rate and OREB rate; he's the top defensive rebounder in league play. He also creates a lot of turnovers. The flip side of "old-school defensive center" is a lack of skill on offense. Per Synergy he is a 28th percentile post-up guy, and he is famously miserable from the free throw line—40% this year, 38% for his career. Outside of putbacks he has 4 unassisted makes at the rim this year.

He is still critical to the Rutgers offense because all other options at C are much worse. His OREB rate translates directly to the team level, where the Cable Subscribers get an 11 point boost(!) when he's on the floor. He's also effective in the dunker spot.

Johnson isn't going to create much himself so limiting his usage is about keeping him off the boards and staying in front of drivers so help defense doesn't have to show. This is advisable since he's shooting 67% on the season.

The final starter is Paul Mulcahy, AKA headband guy. Mulcahy's TO rate is way too high for a guy with his stand-in-the-corner usage. He takes a lot of contested shots at the rim which go down at a middling rate; he gets to the line a fair bit. He is an infrequent three-point shooter ho's hitting 37%.

The Rutgers bench is usually short:

• Top 50 center Cliff Omoruyi—who is not actually Eugene's brother, his last name isn't even pronounced the same way—provides all the backup 5 minutes. He does virtually nothing on offense other than dunk off assists but early returns on his defense are excellent. Like Johnson, Omoruyi is a disaster at the FT line.
• SG Montez Mathis started a big chunk of the year as Baker came off the bench. He's reasonably efficient behind the line but doesn't take a lot of shots there. Inside the line… yeesh. He's hit 37% of his conference twos over the last two years. He's also a bit of a black hole. Wall up and profit—he shoots a lot for a guy with his efficiency level.
• Wing Caleb McConnell has the same dismal shooting from two as Mathis; he's also scuffling from 3 (27% this year after 29% last year). He is another Rutgers guy with sticky fingers; he also sets up his teammates a bit.

Nobody else is getting 4 MPG. A couple of guys were forced into action when Omoruyi was sidelined; if Michigan sees Dean Reiber, Oskar Palmquist, or Mamadou Doucoure something has gone badly wrong for the Cable Subscribers.

THE TEMPO-FREE

Scrappy:

left: offense, right: defense

Rutgers plays good, intense defense that turns the opposition over a lot. They're tops in the conference in both block and steal rates. That aggression leads to a lot of FTs and OREBs for the opponent.

On offense, they're middling at most things but overly reliant on one-on-one play (12th in assist rate), and prone to drive into difficult situations for iffy shots. They're also one of the worst teams in the nation at the free throw line.

THE KEYS

Shot volume. If Michigan gets as many shots as Rutgers they win going away. This is a team that takes the second-fewest threes in the conference running up against the best two-point D in the country. Rutgers's defense is going to give Michigan some issues, especially if they're still running a little behind where they would normally be thanks to the layoff. It is really hard to see Rutgers getting to a point per possession.

The main way Rutgers wins is to turn Michigan over a bunch, particularly if they can get some easy transition buckets off of those turnovers. If they pair that with a bunch of OREBs of their inevitable misses this could be a nail-biter. Take care of the ball and box out and this will be a steadily expanding gap.

Kobe assist time. Drawing help and missing is going to be almost as good as an assist because Johnson tries to block everything and Hunter Dickinson is a very large person who may get to live in putback city. Even more relevant after Dickinson's OREBs were the driving force in Michigan's late run to pull away from Wisconsin.

Stay in front. The most efficient thing Rutgers does on offense is getting Myles Johnson usage either through dumpoffs or offensive rebounding. The less Michigan needs to help the less usage Johnson gets. I'd imagine Eli Brooks draws Jacob Young when he's since he's the biggest threat to get around someone, even as wild as he is.

Austin Davis time. This is a game for a foul-prone, defensively limited guy who can go to work in the post. Rutgers provides no stretch from the five spot and putting either C on the line is a win. Davis's footwork and ability to go reverse means he's relatively efficient even against good defensive Cs.

THE SECTION WHERE I PREDICT THE SAME THING KENPOM DOES

Michigan by 8.

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