cp4three2

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:40 PM ^

We have struggled to get the ball in and make free throws to clinch all season. You foul there we're most likely up 1 with 7 seconds left. We'd already almost lost the game in regulation because of inbounding it. Letting them shoot is a 30% chance and worst case tie. Fouling has worst case as a loss.

DMThomasPRE

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:40 PM ^

So....

Those Tigers are lookin' pretty good....Cespedes should be an absolute monster....and I'm really looking forward to Gorzelanny as a great lefty arm in the bullpen. ;)

bronxblue

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:42 PM ^

This was an impossible game to watch coherently.  The team will be really good next year, but hopefully some of the overtime karma comes back in 2016 because this year has been terrible.

MH20

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:42 PM ^

Referees missed the blatant inbounding infraction on Northwestern in the first OT as well as a bear hug of Rahk by McIntosh on the inbounds that was ruled out on Zak. Two awful misses that most likely would have sealed the game for Michigan in each instance. That said, fuck you, Tre Demps. Fuck you.

umchicago

March 4th, 2015 at 4:42 AM ^

how about pressing when you are up by two possessions with under 30 sec.  at least surprise them every now and then.  trap the guy that gets the inbounds pass.  then what?  he has to pass back to the inbounds passer.  that uses up time.

JB never does this.  one play had their guard drive the distance, dish to olah for an easy layup - 5 sec.  another possession had their guard get the pass, drive the distance, step out of bounds; only 5 more sec.  then the bad TO, etc.

press the SOBs and burn some time.  JB is very stubborn in a few of his end-game strategies.  and it has burned him several times.  twice tonite alone.

freejs

March 4th, 2015 at 3:04 PM ^

and with that donkey's arm stuck on auto-point in favor of the home team, we were screwed. I really think that ball was off of Demps. I saw replay after replay and that's what I saw (although perhaps a blown up replay would show different, but I saw what I saw). 

Still made it no less unfathomable how we blew each successive opportunity to close out the game, although that one would have probably also done it. 

Brutal all around. Still in a foul mood because of that one. I'm sorry you had to be there to suffer through it in person. 

MichiganMan20

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:43 PM ^

My reaction was kinda what its been all year. Oh well, they played hard and it'll pay off for next year. If Caris comes back this team has a chance to be elite. Losing still sucks though, especially games like these.

JDriver15

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:44 PM ^

I give Beilein credit for fielding a competetive team with some players we wern't expecting much from.  He does deserve critisism for his late game management, his team's inability to inbound the ball, and his 2 foul rule in the first half.  I don't expect them to win every game, but when they play well enough to win I expect them to pull it out or at least not give it away.  

SDCran

March 4th, 2015 at 12:54 AM ^

NW hit 3 amazingly clutch 3s. UM played pretty well down the stretch, except for 1 turnover inbounding the ball ( which is all anyone on here appears to remember), and the refs had 2 terrible out of bound calls against UM immediately before 2 of the 3 big 3-pointers. (And a questionable one on the inbound turnover)

So more NW clutch and bad calls than anything UM did.

Shop Smart Sho…

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:47 PM ^

If Chatman is good enough to play in the 1st half, why does he so rarely play the 2nd?  I'm guessing 3 or 4 guys could have used a couple minutes of sitting down.

Also, we all love Spike, but for the love of Harbaugh, please teach someone over 6' how to inbound the damn ball.  This was an issue when Trey was still here, so in what warped world do you keep doing it when your PG is NOT the National Player of the Year?

mtlcarcajou

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:50 PM ^

Crazy throwing that away.

Inbounding is amazingly bad for this time of year. So is our clutch ft's. Offensive execution is very hit-and-miss.

But the defense is crazy bad. All zones leave the corner 3 open even without penetration and collapsing. And our man d is pathetic. Our bigs have terrible footwork on d. Rawk and Spike were absolutely brutal on those two 3's they hit to stay alive, absolutely brutal. They seem to fall into rote instead of understanding the context of each situation. All screens trail no matter where or when. Guys need 3's and we back away, trail slowly after them...

Would have given Chatman a bit more of a look in the second. Rawk has to look way more of a threat on o, like he was when he hit his late 3. 

Terrible to make that donation.

El Jeffe

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:51 PM ^

I don't know what to say. I watch college and pro basketball probably five nights a week and I have never seen a team that has that much trouble inbounding the ball. Beilein uber alles, but man...

blueball97

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:55 PM ^

Its a year when Beilein thought he would have a senior pt guard in Burke, a junior shooting guard in Stauskas, a junior forward in Levert, possibly Mitch with Irvin, Walton and Spike. How sick would that team be? Instead of losing one of those guys he basically has lost them all but Irvin this year



Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad

Bando Calrissian

March 4th, 2015 at 1:45 AM ^

Can we really say Beilein truly thought he'd have all those guys in 2015? I mean, honestly. 

This is not to say the attrition hasn't been important, but let's not pretend Beilein was ever buildling a program where he thought he'd have every guy to full eligibility until the end of time. That's not today's college basketball.

jmblue

March 4th, 2015 at 12:44 PM ^

Yeah, I'm pretty sure he never had an early departure before he came to Michigan.  Now he gets them every year.  He did come here in part because he thought he could recruit a higher caliber of player but still, I don't think he could have quite anticipated this.

 

michiganfanforlife

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:57 PM ^

We're forced to watch an entire game of an offense that has no idea how to defeat a basic zone. We just sit 4 players around the perimeter and one center underneath; pass the ball around until there's 8 seconds left on the shot clock, and then throw up a contested three. We had really great performance from Dawkins, Albrecht and Irvin, but nobody else really stepped up. I still don't get why they can't play Doyle and Donnal together to get some beef up inside. Uuugggghhh. Total kick in the nuts.

HollywoodHokeHogan

March 4th, 2015 at 12:41 AM ^

             I don't think this team zone problems are on offense.  The problem is that they cannot cover the corner 3 in either of the zones they run (2-3, 1-3-1).  They are bad in man-to-man, but I'd prefer they would just stay in man.  Once the novelty of the 1-3-1 wears off, as it does quickly in conference play, it takes a lot of practice to run it effectively (it's more aggressive than most zone defenses).  We don't have that experience with it.  Our 2-3 is clearly something we very rarely run and hence it isn't run very well.  The spacing looks like total shit, even to my untrained eye, and they always seem late in getting it set-up.

The injures have really hurt our man defense.  Spike's a very good college player, but Walton was a much better defender.  I saw Spike call for about 3 or 4 switches, with different players, during a single 20 second possession in man defense.  You have to fight through some of those off the ball screens, especially with a team this young-- freshman are doing all they can just to cover their man, they're going to get confused when you keep switching on the screens.  There was another possesion where Chatman looked pissed at Spike for calling for switch (though maybe that was on Chatman, it was tough to tell).   I think he's also worse than Walton in helping off on the big.  He often helps too late.  The bigs are poor defenders, but they're so young and/or undersized that there isn't much more you could reasonably expect.   They need good help defenders and there aren't any.

Jack Hammer

March 4th, 2015 at 12:11 AM ^

WTF?!? West coast. I turned it off with 25 seconds left in OT to put the kids to bed thinking we easily had it and then see this?!? This just ruined my week. Switching to drinking thread.