MBB Postgame Thoughts and Celebration Thread

Submitted by San Diego Mick on

Okay, a nice win today after a slow start, good job by the team to get going. Hopefully this will spur us into a hot streak, especially with Morgan getting back to normal, we need him.

Do you guys think we should start 2 bigs and bring Nik off the bench for offense, he might be better off right now. 

We've swept Illinois, a team that beat Gonzaga on the road and has 20 wins, Gonzaga should not be a 1 seed.

Go Blue! Great win, let's keep it going!

GotBlueOnMyMind

February 24th, 2013 at 3:15 PM ^

Defense was played!!! So exciting to see defense again. Cautious props go out to Beilien for getting the team back to playing D.

Also, was I the only one who thought we were using the bigs a lot more on offense and not taking so many threes? Unlike the last few game where it seemed like our entire offense was spotting up from outside the arc on every possession, the attack today seemed much more balanced.

HarBooYa

February 24th, 2013 at 3:28 PM ^

Morgan can almost pull off the double at he top and recover, which was maddeningly ineffective and disastrous without him. And levers looked solid. I think his offense gave his overall game a boost. Looked like serious contributor today.



Coach b has to find a way to get Stauskas more meaningful play in the offense. He was a statute. I am generally a Stauskas soapy but this game I thought it was noticeable.

Mr. Yost

February 24th, 2013 at 3:27 PM ^

Regarding the game:

Burke, Morgan and LeVert...lights out. LeVert locked up one of the better scorers in the entire conference. #clamps

Regarding the season:

Still need to improve, but we showed spurts of our "old self." Particularly when Morgan was on the floor. I'd play J-Mo limited minutes vs. PSU and Purdue because we're going to need him as close to 100% as we can get him for MSU and IU.

Glad LeVert has found his niche...he and Stauskas make a nice pair like Morgan and McGary. When one is off, usually the other is on. We need both players in both of those pairings.

Offensively I still don't think we have enough movement. We still don't seem to run an offense. We run plays (like the ball screen Dakich loved today), but not an offense. This is why on offense we are so choppy. Because plays can be stopped, but when you run an offense you run it until you get an open look, it's endless. We really have to get some type of motion offense going and run our plays out of it.

We need more easy baskets!

Defensively, we cut it on at the 12 minute media timeout in the first half. Someone called Coach Mattison because that was impressive. Hell that was like what Mattison did @ Illinois a couple years ago. It looked like we had 6 guys on the floor at times.

I think defensively if we play like that for the rest of the year, we're fine. Offensively I worry about us if we're not creating turnover and getting transition points. We've got to be able to score consistently out of the halfcourt.

 

rederik

February 24th, 2013 at 3:18 PM ^

Admittedly unrelated postgame thought*:



Now that we've taken care of business today and appear to have some of our mojo back, my question turns to rooting interests in Ohio-MSU is this afternoon. Obviously a loss for MSU is good for us for the Big Ten standings... But can we really root for the Buckeyes?



*But not worthy of its own thread.

Mr. Yost

February 24th, 2013 at 3:30 PM ^

Root for MSU to lose.

To me, in my mind, there's a difference.

But even if I had to root for one of them, it would be Ohio. I have no problem with Matta and his guys like Craft, Thomas, Sullinger, Oden, etc. They seem to be good players. Izzo sucks at life and his team (minus Green) usually follows.

With that, I'll never root for either...unless I root for them to lose. Today, I don't root for Ohio to do anything, but I root for MSU to lose and lose bad.

Mr. Yost

February 24th, 2013 at 3:46 PM ^

Stalking and negging all of my posts I see. I feel like Jordan Morgan with all the Dakich attention!

Nonetheless, the majority of posters have the board on the "show all" setting so it's not doing anything.

Carry on, most times people reverse your immaturity and/or drunkeness with the click of a button anyway. The MGoBoard typically takes care of itself, that's what makes it so great. Trolls never win.

urbanachiever

February 24th, 2013 at 3:27 PM ^

Can't pick the MVP of that game to be anyone other than Burke. 26 points on 11 shot attempts, 8 assists, 1 turonver. That is a stat line that no one else in the country produces, and Burke does it consistently.

With that said, the biggest thing that happened today is that Morgan looked almost 100% helathy. He moved really well on defense and rebounded well. I didn't realize how much he meant to our defense until he went out.

mistersuits

February 24th, 2013 at 3:46 PM ^

Without Morgan's D, Michigan might lose this game. Zero offensive rebounds in the second half for Illinois and they had eight in the first. He was everywhere and yet never out of position on defense. He was the highest player +/- on either team by a wide margin (Morgan +18, Burke +5). Morgan's impact doesn't show up on the statsheet but he was just as important as Burke was today.

True Blue Grit

February 24th, 2013 at 3:34 PM ^

on the court.  Even less than 100%, it's critical to having him out there as much as possible.  He didn't score a lot, but he enabled a lot of other points for Michigan.  As much as Beilein would like to be cautious on bringing him back, without Morgan out there, we don't have a realistic chance at the B10 title.  

jcouz

February 24th, 2013 at 3:36 PM ^

Jordan Morgan and Caris LeVert make us much better defensively.  The great thing about our defense being better is that it makes our offense much better since it allows more opportunities to score in transition.  The half court offense is still very much a work in progress with a lot of dribbling around until Burke is forced in to going one-on-one.  It worked a lot today but I don't think it will necessarily work going forward.  I think Morgan needs to be back in the starting line-up again.  He doesn't make all of the mistakes that McGary makes.  He doesn't take bad shots.  He doesn't get caught out of position on defense.  He doesn't throw the ball away.  McGary is super talented but he still plays too out-of-control to be playing lots of minutes.  Bring him in for 5 minute spurts here and there.  10-15 minutes a game.  Try to play Morgan as much as possible and throw a bit of Horford in there if we need it for matchups or foul trouble.  If Michigan can play solid defense and force turnovers like they did in the 2nd half today, they may just get back to playing like one of the top teams in the country like they did for the first 20 games of the season.  Go Blue!!!

Mr. Yost

February 24th, 2013 at 3:49 PM ^

It pushes GRIII to the SF spot.

I LOVE the lineup that you mentioned, but it's a "spot" lineup. I don't think it's a starting lineup.

I'd use it when you're facing bigger teams and/or getting out rebounded.

With Stauskas in or out of the game...I don't think we play 2 bigs NEARLY enough. Even if it's to give GRIII a rest and you play 2 bigs with Stauskas, THJ and Burke, that's fine.

We have 3 guys that are capable (Morgan, Horford, McGary), we don't always have to play them one at a time.

LSAClassOf2000

February 24th, 2013 at 4:03 PM ^

First off, that was a great overall effort even with the slow start, and indeed, a very good sign - the second game in a row that overall FG% has increased at least 5% since the Wisconsin game. 

When Trey Burke scored his 1,000th career point, it made me wonder how huge the contribution of what is, in my opinion, the best backcourt in basketball has contributed to the team's offense in the past two seasons. 

Of the 4,306 points Michigan has scored since the beginning of the 2011-2012 campaign, 1,013 of them, or 23.5%, belong to Trey Burke. Hardaway can claim 887 points, or 20.6% of that same total. That's pretty amazing, I would say, as is the fact that in the same time period, Jordan Morgan accounts for 20.1% of all offensive rebounds. 

A nice, decisive win, and let's take down the Nittany Lions again on Wednesday!

bo_lives

February 24th, 2013 at 4:26 PM ^

with that steal and 3-pointer. As much as I hate to say it, I think we're going to have to accept that Stauskus just doesn't have it right now, and I expect hs minutes to go way down. In Big Ten play, he's a liability on defense and an average shooter at best. The good news is that LaVert looks to be a pretty good defender, and keeps improving every game. I think we'll see a lot more of the Burke-THJ-LaVert-GRIII-Morgan lineup in the near future.

Wolverine41

February 24th, 2013 at 5:49 PM ^

Since at OSU, we have been out scored by 7 points in the 1st half of games. In the 2nd half we have out scored opponents by 49 points.



Slow starts, killing us

SF Wolverine

February 24th, 2013 at 9:36 PM ^

But also a number of good things happening. Morgan getting healthy leads the latter list, but LaVert's play is a damn close second. Trey is pulling less of the "pound and step back" possessions than he had. But, until this team's energy/hustle level amps up to what you see with MSU/OSU, we will be fourth in this conference. Here's hoping that the Morgan/LaVert/McGary energy starts to take hold of the rest of the team.

MGoBender

February 24th, 2013 at 11:14 PM ^

I kinda hate myself for doing this, but...

Possible that Stauskas won't be starting next game? Based on his most recent tweet I would guess it's either that or he got dumped.