Picture Pages and More: Michigan State

In lieu of the time-consuming and largely superfluous offensive UFRs, I'm going to start reviewing the offensive output of Michigan's basketball games by examining the available advanced metrics while also utilizing the UFR shot chart and picture pages. Think of it as an offensive UFR without all the unnecessary charting.

It's impossible to discuss the win over State and not start with Trey Burke's performance. I mean, goodness, Burke inspired this piece from Grantland's Shane Ryan...

I'm coming out with the big guns today: Trey Burke is the most exciting player in college basketball.

You want caveats? OK. Trey Burke is the most electric, dynamic, breathtaking human being wearing a Division I uniform, and Tuesday night he etched his name into Michigan lore with a 20-point virtuoso turn in a 60-59 home win over rival Michigan State. Also, he's the coolest customer on the court at any given time, and he's only a freshman.

...as well as this incredible video from mgodisney:

We'll get into why Burke was so successful later, but first, his numbers. By traditional stats, he was ruthlessly efficient with his shot, scoring 20 points while going 8-11 from the field (3-6 from three), and he also managed to hand out three assists, though those came along with three turnovers. Burke was lethal on the pick and roll, a welcome change from the last couple games, and his only major negatives came when he got caught in the air on the baseline, which happened a couple times and led to turnovers. His offensive rating was a stellar 135.5, well above his season average of 109.1 and by far the best mark he's put up against high-quality competition.

As far as rest of the team goes, things weren't quite so easy. Stu Douglass recorded the team's lone offensive rebound of the night, and if you take away Burke's numbers, the Wolverines shot just 15-34 from the field and hit only 3-15 from beyond the arc. Most of the squad actually shot the ball at least decently well, but Tim Hardaway Jr. forced up several long shots (3-9 FG, 0-4 3-pt), and Evan Smotrycz also had a quick trigger finger after hitting a couple layups early (2-6 FG, 0-2 3-pt). Now that I've given away large portions of it, I might as well go ahead and post the shooting chart.

SHOOTING

You have no idea how happy I am that those numbers matched the box score. Anyhow, you can see the root of Hardaway's struggles in the chart—he took twice as many heavily-contested shots as anyone else on the team, including three from long distance. Michigan as a whole didn't get many good looks against a strong Spartan defense, but when they did, those shots usually came from very close to the basket. You can also see how much Michigan emphasizes hollowing out the defense—creating open shots either at the basket or beyond the arc—when you look at the two-point shots. Burke had the team's only two uncontested attempts in that category, and when the team put up a contested two-pointer, it was usually because the play they ran didn't work effectively.

FOUR FACTORS

Looking at the four factors, which you'll likely recognize from UMHoops's game recaps, the key to Michigan staving off the Spartans was a decidedly-low turnover rate coupled with an uncharacteristic propensity for getting to the free-throw line:

The lack of offensive rebounds is disconcerting even when taking into account MSU's size, rebounding acumen, and the fact that Michigan went small for most of the game. It's going to be difficult to continue winning without hitting the offensive glass, as it essentially forces the team to play mistake-free (or, at least, mistake-very-limited) basketball while connecting on a solid percentage of their shots. The Wolverines got away with it here, but I don't foresee them winning many more games during this tough stretch of the schedule if they're hauling in just one offensive rebound.

PLAY BREAKDOWN

They key to the game was Michigan's ability to run the pick and roll, something they struggled with mightily when Iowa consistently brought a hard hedge against Burke. The Wolverines found success against the hard hedge early against MSU by having Jordan Morgan slip to the basket early, and this really set everything up for the offense, as State had to respect the roll and couldn't pressure Burke so heavily.

Here's the first instance of Morgan slipping the pick—he comes out to Burke, immediately dives to the hoop, gets the pass with space, and makes a great pass himself to Novak for a corner three:

That's a fantastic play by Morgan to recognize see the open man so soon after getting the ball—a lot of big men would commit a charge on that play, but he gets the pass off quickly.

I have two more videos that were supposed to go here that play off the above. Unfortunately, YouTube won't let me access my uploaded videos (which are unlisted, so I can't get to them from my user page) and keeps giving me an error message. As soon as I can access them, I'll either update this post or do a picture pages post. Sorry about that. In short, Michigan made great strides in running the pick and roll, and it led to baskets. Informative, I am.

Of course a half-hour later it works again. Moving on, this play shows Morgan once again rolling hard to the basket, and while Nix initially hedges, he scrambles back quickly to Morgan. This opens up the drive for Burke, who crosses over and gets to the hoop for a layup:

That play was created thanks to Morgan's first early slip, causing MSU to adjust their defense and play less aggressively. Against Burke, that's a green light to drive into the paint, and he took advantage.

Finally, here you see another way to counter the hedge, as Burke identifies to double-team early, crosses over away from the pick, and gives it to Smotrycz in the corner. With the Spartan defense focused on the perimeter, the quick reversal creates space for Smotrycz to drive, and he catches a bit of a break when he misses the lay-in but State snatches the ball off the cylinder:

It's a simple adjustment, but one Michigan hadn't made prior to this game. As Burke is able to absorb Beilein's complicated offense and continue to learn how to properly read a defense, the hard hedge should become less and less effective against him. It certainly helps to have a great offensive mind in John Beilein as the head coach.

PLAYER BULLETS

Note: Offensive Ratings are for the game, courtesy of Statsheet. ORtg is measured by points produced/possessions used—the formula is quite complicated and comes from Dean Oliver's Basketball On Paper, but think of it as the number of points produced per 100 possessions.

Trey Burke (ORtg: 135.0): Has been covered extensively above. He's pretty good.

Stu Douglass (ORtg: 128.7): Douglass obviously had the game-winning points, which is always nice, and he also chipped in two assists while only turning the ball over once. Burke mostly ran the show, but Douglass was very capable running plays on occasion, and his four-point play in the first half was huge. He did force up a couple of long bombs, but for the most part Stu played within the offense and took advantage of his opportunities.

Tim Hardaway Jr. (ORtg: 108.2): Hardaway looked plain out of it for much of the game on both ends of the floor, but he did pick it up late in the game, creating an open two-point jumper for himself and then getting a critical layup when he drove baseline. He didn't turn the ball over, which helped out his offensive rating, but I'd be fine with a turnover or two per game if they were the result of more aggressive play. Hardaway is a very inconsistent spot-up shooter, and he needs to take the ball to the basket more often, as it not only creates more good shots for him, but for his teammates.

Zack Novak (ORtg: 106.0): Novak was relatively efficient from the floor, hitting half his shots, but he didn't attack the basket like we've seen him do with great effectiveness this season. Not only that, but he was blanked on the offensive glass, a rarity for Mr. GRIT. The offense mostly ran through Burke or Hardaway, for better or worse, relegating Novak mostly to taking shots at the tail end of the shot clock—that's when he hit his best shot of the game, a pull-up at the free-throw line over Draymond Green that barely touched net on its way down.

Jordan Morgan (ORtg: 81.2): Morgan's ORtg is awfully low due to a pair of turnovers despite very few touches—very small sample size applies here (as it does for all individual games, but low usage really exacerbates things). Morgan mostly functioned as the designated screener, and in that role he performed well, as you saw above. He does turn the ball over far more than what is ideal—Morgan has a 27.5% turnover rate this season, which is not good at all—and missing a pair of free throws hurts too, but Morgan isn't asked to do much in this offense and he did his job in freeing up Burke to create.

Evan Smotrycz (ORtg: 75.3): Oof. It looked early on like Smotrycz might be returning to form as he got a pair of baskets driving to the hoop, including a startling and-one after a glacial—but effective—crossover, but he began forcing perimeter shots and finished just 2-6 from the field in 10 minutes of play. Smotrycz shot the ball on 53.3% of his touches, a rate more than double any other Wolverine, and if you're going to be a black hole offensively, you'd better be an efficient black hole. Smotrycz wasn't, and therefore rode pine for most of the game.

Matt Vogrich (ORtg: 173.2): Hello, small sample size. Vogrich did have a pretty up-and-under layup that came out of nowhere, but his only other shot was a missed three on a relatively open look. Other than two defensive rebounds, he had no other impact on the box score. Nice drive, though.

Blake McLimans (ORtg: 0.0): Played five minutes. I'm not entirely sure he even touched the ball.