Brunson turned into a Potato
Simpson again crushed a top point guard- this time the NPOY- Brunson. Here was Brunson's stat line
26 minutes, 4-13 shooting, 1-5 3PT, 2 AT, 2 TO, 9PTS, 80 ORTG
If DiVincenzo hadn't been on fire or if we would have had an answer for him the game would have been much more winnable.
Villanova| STARTERS | MIN | FG | 3PT | FT | OREB | DREB | REB | AST | STL | BLK | TO | PF | PTS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| E. PaschallF | 27 | 2-5 | 1-3 | 1-2 | 1 | 7 | 8 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 6 |
| O. SpellmanF | 29 | 3-8 | 0-2 | 2-2 | 4 | 7 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 8 |
| M. BridgesG | 36 | 7-12 | 3-7 | 2-2 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 19 |
| J. BrunsonG | 28 | 4-13 | 1-5 | 0-0 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 4 | 9 |
| P. BoothG | 23 | 1-4 | 0-3 | 0-0 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 2 |
| BENCH | MIN | FG | 3PT | FT | OREB | DREB | REB | AST | STL | BLK | TO | PF | PTS |
| D. Cosby-RoundtreeF | 4 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| T. DelaneyF | 0 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| J. SamuelsF | 0 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| C. GillespieG | 16 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 4-4 | 0 | 5 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 |
| D. DiVincenzoG | 37 | 10-15 | 5-7 | 6-10 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 3 | 0 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 31 |
| TEAM | 27-57 | 10-27 | 15-20 | 12 | 26 | 38 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 12 | 18 | 79 | |
| 47.4% | 37.0% | 75.0% |
I'm not sure there is a better defensive plan for a good team with a guy having a career night. Beilein even addressed it in his presser. His basic comment was, maybe we could have doubled DeVincizio but that would have left one of their other shooters open or opened up even more slip screens to the hoop which they were also executing on.
Sometimes the other team (or player) is just better that game.
Every time you give someone the ball doesn't mean it's an assist. The point is they gave him the ball and let him do his thing.
Simpson has been great on the defensive side of the ball...
he will need to work on his shooting however... if he becomes a good shooter from outside, that would really compliment and open up additional opportunity for his driving abilities
Brunson won a national championship
a few more 3PTs...
This was the frustrating thing for me. It wasn't that DiVincenzo had a great game, because someone is bound to go off in every national championship game (maybe not 31 points, but still a good game).
My annoyance was the 3/23 shooting from 3 point range. If Michigan makes 33% of their threes, that's an additional 12-15 points. And we lost by 17. Even an average shooting night from deep makes that a very tight game.
It makes more sense for those who spent time in the thread(s) looking at next year's lineup, seeing several people totally dismiss Zavier Simpson as a player because he didn't have a great Final Four.
And he didn't, but his defense was still terrific. And he was a key (maybe THE key) in the 14-win stretch run when PG after PG was annihilated by X antiprotons.
did his part on D.
Cold 3 point shooting by Michigan + Divincenzo going off was the difference.
When Divinvenzo entered the game the tide really turned. Up until that point M had the edge.
I really hadn't seen him play before that, but the dude was flopping right there with the worst of the soccer world. Can't make a basket himself so he had to act like he got shot anytime someone touched him
Also a little sad to see that we really handled Nova fairly well except for DD. Everything was there for us, but we couldn't hit anything and DD was just lights out
and he initiated the contact with subtle shoulders, hips, and elbows, too.
They list him at 6'3" but my recollection from his recruitment is that he is more like 6'-6'1".
Not sure if he has a place in the NBA -- my guess is he'll be back at Nova next year.
he has already graduated. So whatever ... first time I saw an entire game with him and wasn't impressed - those flops won't work in the NBA ... until you match LeBron or Kobie level.
Go Blue!
but is on track to do so this semester.
Yeah that's what frustrated me too. He was the one initiating the contact most of the time and was actually driving Z back a lot of the time, but anytime someone tried to stop him they got called for a foul. Brunson should've gotten 2-3 charges in the first half
Brunson abused Z in the post early and UM rotated other players on him such as MAAR and Livers.
And Brunson didn't play a lot in the last ten minutes as the game was well in hand.
He made a couple long 2's that had high arcs to get over the defense early, and that's about it. He was shut down for the game. Michigan got beat by other Nova players and missing wide open shots they usually make.
and he easily backed him into the post and scored.
UM soon starting throwing different looks at him and, indeed, covered him with MAAR and Livers at times.
You did actually watch the game, didn't you?
is innaccurate or gives you the impression I did not watch the game. He backed him down and made a long two. Not the best shot, and I mentioned they sent help in another post at times. Z still was the main gaurd on him. If you thought Z really didn't do a great job on him after "watching" the game and looking at the stats afterwards, then I don't know what to say. But yea, let's focus on the two early tough baskets he made.
To use the word “crush” about an opposing player to me means the same as dominate. And I don’t see it. That means leading pretty much every statistical category and drain your opponent mentally and physically. Can’t do that when Brunson played like 8 minutes,if that, in the second half and the rest of the time on the bench cheering on his team and soaking in a national player of the year and national championship with 10 minutes left in the game.
they were the better team and made shots from, everywhere. We had no answer for #10. Beilein said as much.
Simpson in strong, but the first two possession of the game demonstrated that Brunson could get the ball in the post and get it over Simpson due to his lack of height... and then they mostly went away from it.
Yes, Michigan made some adjustments with help side, but the one weakness of Simpson's game defensively is simply the fact that he's short, and guys can shoot over top of him. When Villinova was struggling early, it seemed weird that they rarely went back to Brunson in the post. That was the one area it seemed like they had a very clear advantage they could work with high efficiency. Though they ended up finding another area in long, contested, pull-up 3s that I'm pretty sure never event hit the rim...
Like you, I was surprised that Nova didn't try to keep attacking Simpson down low with Brunson. After those first few successful post-ups, though, Z played much better defense on Brunson down low (much later in the game). Z is strong enough to body up on a Brunson-type player. And even though he's not tall, Z has long arms. He strongly contested and bothered most of Brunson's shots after those first two easy ones.
However, Z cannot be expected to bother a 6'5" rise up jump shooter like DiVincenzo. This happened on switches a few times.
Brunson looks like a goddamn potato. He's ugly as hell.
that U-M would hold Nova's starting 5 players to 48 points in total for the game, I would have said our chances of a win was 99%. Getting 31 points from your sxth-man (vs his season average of 12) is very fortunate for Nova, othewise it would have been a dog fight at the end.
We would have won
That run was fun as hell, proud of this team, but it's still too raw for this.
Touch that dude and he bobbles his head and falls to the floor.
Pussy.
Sorry in advance for language.
Get out of here with that shit.
Simpson can’t hit a free throw. He is a deer in the headlights when shooting a wide open 3. Simpson had 3 turnovers, 2 assists, 1 steal. Brunson had 2 turnovers, 2 assists, 2 steals. Show me the crushing stat???
Don’t get me wrong, I like Simpson as the point guard on this team. I like his scoop layups and defense. I like his attitude. He just needs to continue to work. I just think it’s hilarious how people on this cult site were fawning over Brunson during his recruitment and now they talk shit about the guy because he chose a different school. It
happens in football all the time.
Congrats Mr. Brunson and Villanova. Wish Michigan won but they didn’t. Talk about the refs all you want but they didn’t kill our chances. It was that kid taking whatever shot he wanted whenever he wanted it.
because you are right about Dechenzio or whatever the spelling, and us just having no answer. However, it should be known the young man averages 11 pts per game and it wasn't lack of defense - see your stats above on Brunson, but the young man just had an absolute great game exactly when great players have them. He may be the greatest player on their team. I don't know his academic standing as to grade or eligibility. He was the best player on the floor that evening.
Now I'm going to take a little away as well due to "they didn't kill our chances." We don't know that. We can look at everything around it, rebounds, the 6th man, foul shots, etc., and damn we're still pretty much tied with them if the youngster stays in his lane. Those early fouls could surely have given Nova an attitude they could do anything and get away with it and M better lay low because they aren't giving us a thing. i say this because that's exactly what happened and who knows how much that influenced the early part of the game where we were actually out playing them. Calls aren't made, or made one-sided as they were and we might have been up by 20 instead of what we were and the result could have been different. Seldom do I even suggest such a thing or play Devil's advocate but you said that as if it had absolutely no bearing on the outcome and I'm just not as sure as you seem to be. No big thing. Thank you.
I don’t think the game was officiated well. Duncan getting autobenched really hurt. I like Livers potential and I know why he’s getting time but he has yet to show much on offense. He’s a good enough shooter they just haven’t gone in for him.
This was a defensive team but in this offense guys need to knock down the open threes. With Livers and Simpson on the floor together for that period of time things just looked more stagnant than usual because neither wanted to shoot. Basically it was up to Wagner, MAAR, and Matthews.
Great season, great team, just didn’t happen for us in a game 90% of people they’re really being honest did not think they would make it to.I look forward to next season though. It’s hard to dwell on a game when the score differential ended up being 17.
That is the power of Villanova. All of their guys can carry the team if something isn't working; that's a luxury and that was their answer for Michigan.
Michigan got to the championship with a stellar defense and an average offense. We have nothing to be ashamed of.
Go Blue!
That's what's tough about Villanova. We held five of their seven rotation guys to subpar games but the other two went for 50 points.
I dont mean to take anything away from Simpson, but if you can’t shut down a hot shooting guard (Donte), then what’s the point?
We needed Simpson on Brunson. He's the national player of the year, not DiVincenzo.
Also, DiVincenzo is 6'5".
If ifs and buts were candy and nuts we'd all have a merry christmas.
Brunson didn't have a big night because he didn't have to. DiVincenzo or whatever his name is lit us up for 30 points. You absolutely go with the hot hand in a game like this. Like when Spike put up 17 in the first half of the title game. Trey was silent for the first half because he didn't have to do anything.
If it wasn't DiVincenzo, it would've been Brunson. Or Bridges. Or quite literally anyone else on their team. That entire team is lethal from downtown.
Trey wasn't so much "silent" as he was in foul trouble.
Brunson also led both teams in flops and whipping his head back as if he got punched.