Really excited and really nervous about Saturday. Hoping for at least a competitive showing led by solid defense.

...and end up 5/8?

Has to be the emphasis for the next 11 days, especially by the guards and especially defending off the dribble.  Walton looks to be weak on technique, and he'll no doubt improve, but we need him and Nik on the accelerated learing curve if we are to hang over the next three.  Offense seems to have it going on; be great if we can continue to get the kidn of efficiency from Morgan/Horford we've been enjoying.

I was disappointed not to see McGary in a suit. I hope his recovery is going well. Live, it looked like there were some really terrible blocking calls. I have to wonder how long you have to be standing there before the refs will call a charge. Probably longer than the 35 second clock will allow. Maybe we should just lower our heads and drive to the basket all crazy like too. That PSU team is scrappy. Michigan might have lost this game in the valley. Horford flashed some athleticism I didn't know he had. Morgan seemed a little tentative(not the monster we've seen as of late). Wonder what gives there. I miss seeing big Al at all the home games(ducks). I'll get over it if the new guy can convince Devin to throw it to the good guys more exclusively. Quick Change is still freaking amazing.

Who does KenPom see winning the Championship!? Sheesh, some how some way every game is within a point of his prediction.

It was a fun game, but I share the general sense of dread for the next couple of games.  1-2 would be fine with me, and 2-1 would be considered a minor miracle.  The defense still has trouble closing out on shooters, but I'm not sure if that is because of rotation issues or player deficiencies.  Still, 4-0 is as good as it can be at this juncture, and the team probably just needs to go .500 in conference to make the tourney, so they are almost halfway there.  Morgan's return to form has been refreshing given all of the worries with McGary out, though I suspect him and Horford are going to struggle mightily this weekend.  At least this team can seemingly score with anyone, and nobody seems invincible in this conference.

That would mean beating everyone not presnetly ranked ahead of us, but no one else.  Hopefully, we can get 2-3 wins against the ranked teams, and only lose 1-2 to the others.  That would get us to 11-12 B10 wins, and with a tourney win, probably somewhere on the 5-7 lines.

But often for the wrong reasons. A good win, but I hate our defensive play.

This might not be entirely the fault of the players; they play as if they're afraid to foul. Given the wild inconsistency of the refs (I was shouting at the TV regularly tonight), I can't blame them too much. Down the stretch, they have to shake it off and just live with the fouls.

We have no rim protector and no quick on-the-ball defender. It's an open invitation to drive to the lane. The length of Nik, GR3, and Caris makes me think a zone is the only way to turn it around. We'd have to get much better at crashing the boards though. I just don't see any other method to improve the defense. Our guards and forwards are simply not quick enough, JMo & GR3 are undersized, and Horford gets into foul trouble when he gets aggressive on D.

This was my first ever MBB game.  Absolutley loved the atmosphere

I am not near as worried about the defense as others appear to be.  This game recap sounds awfully similar to ones from last year when we had a "poor defense".  Good offense will always beat good defense and particularly in the college game, I feel defense is overrated.  Don't get me wrong, UM definitely needs to improve their defense if they want to achieve all of their goals.  Much like last year, I expect UM to get better on the defensive side of the ball as the year goes on.  Every team in the Big Ten has flaws.  Wisconsin was exposed last night as IU was able to get to the basket any time they wanted.  Yes, UM needs to get better on defense but there is not one remaining game on the schedule that is unwinnable.  I think UM goes 2-1 over the next 3 games and firmly plant themselves as a legit Big Ten title contender.  

It was more like Michigan ignored the press.  By that I mean, it wasn't like the VCU game where they beat the press and then quickly scored.  Michigan methodically moved the ball up and then ran their offense, and I believe that none of the paltry 6 turnovers were press related.  I think Michigan did exactly what they would have done with or without the press.  In that way, it was "ignored."

 

else think that having spike and walton on the floor at the same time is completely useless? I mean, spike is having a hard time creating a shot for himself as of late...so walton dishing it to him does absolutely jack shit and basically makes Michigan's offense run with one less scoring threat...also LeVert's defense has gotten worse as the season has gone on, i really hope he picks it up or lese Michigan is really going to struggle

One of those games where you enjoy a pummelling of a weaker opponent, zone out and do something else and realize from the tone of the announcer's voices that they're no longer just trying to make small talk and it's actually a game again. Except it happened twice. We really need to learn to play a complete game without slow starts or let ups. Hopefully we'll rise to the occasion at Wisconsin.

The last two games against Nebraska and Penn State have been interesting for Michigan's KenPom ranking. They've basically held steady in the rankings at around 20-21, but their offense has risen from about 15th to 5th best in the country while their defense has dropped from a peak of 48th to 77th. With the way their offense appears to be improving, they can definitely move up if they can just figure out how to get that defense back down towards last year's level.

While Michigan's defense wasn't as bad last year, they depend and always have depended on high efficiency offense with few turnovers.  I don't think they need to do that much defensively to win some big games, but it's looking like this might be a mid-tier Big 10 team regardless.  Win at Wisconsin and expectations will definitely go up for me, but no matter what happens this is a brutal conference. 

The game started with eight unanswered points by Derrick Walton

That's not how unanswered works.