Michigan Basketball Snowflakes Thread

Does anyone else think we'd benefit greatly from getting away from the pick and roll a little bit? It's wonderful to have in our arsenal but we become too reliant on it in the half court and the result is Trey dribbling too much with no movement from others. It was great when DMo was running it because he could throw passes over defenders. Trey doesn't have that luxury. We need more movement (how about an occasional backcut) and less reliance on the pick and roll.

The second chance shots also hurt us. When they miss, you have to get the rebound. It was hard enough to guard the first shot but to not get the rebound hurt us even more.

I don't know what the hell this has to do with anything, but I'm angry and have photoshop.

2 things hurt us the most:

1) Most of the team seemed not as intense as Ohio. I like the opening stuff w/ BA every game and the nutcracker thing was funny, but you have prepare that team for the intensity you know Ohio will bring in the 1st 5.

2) Burke and THJ (in the 2H) tried to do too much. I think you have to hype up the team, while taking Trey and THJ aside and tell them, a) not to do too much and play within the offense- b) trust your teamates to make shots, it's not all on them.

Also, that last play where Trey had the 3 rim out, I thought they'd draw up something different than Trey 1 on 1. Some kind of double screen that leaves an option for a drive/dish. disappointing coming out of a timeout.

Tough to win on the road. Combination of Ohio playing great defense and us getting off to a horrible start. If we don't get down 28-8, we may win. We will probably lose road games vs. MSU, Minnesota, and Indiana too. A long season. Hate losing to Ohio again, but we are better than them at home and a neutral site IMO.

Craft has owned Burke. Period. Burke can't go off offensively against that kind of quality D. That's the difference in the game. That and the whole damn team being asleep the first half.

for some reason we have a curse or something against us playing in Columbus idk why either and I'm getting fucking sick of it. Bottom like is you can't be down as the #2 team in the nation by double digits and fight back at 75% and hope to win. That first half was appaling. No excuse at all for losing the way we did. Complete bull shit from the start to the finish. Have to sink your shots from the field. if Burke and THJ hit those buckets then its a whole different ball game but we simply like in football laid a fucking egg. Seeing that fucker Meyer pissed me the fuck off. Can't wait till we shut him up this year. We need to start getting back to fucking despising Ohio St again. I was sitting at EMUs eatery watching the game and this tweaker in front of me is wearing an Ohio St shirt 8 miles away from the University of Michigan and nobody said a thing. I was STUNNED. I thought we hated these fuckers?! Now we're accepting them?! I know this sounds like a dick move but I couldn't stand for it and started being annoying till he finally moved and walked away. I'm sick of these assholes. Fuck class and fuck being a good sport these fuckers are our rivals. Its time to start treating them like shit again. They do it to us for fuck sake we should do it right back. It's like a persom at work who takes shit from somebody he hates and doesn't stick up for himself. I'm tired of this "be the bigger man than them." When I'm at the game in a few weeks I'm going to treat any OSU fan the same way they treat us. With no respect. It's time to be the bully again.

I saw four things today.
1) a very young team playing their first true tough road test was clearly overwhelmed (not much a coach can do until you find out, well he found out)
2) I love Beilein, but he has some ownership on this too. That team was not prepared. He made some very good adjustments, but some of his defensive schemes were very questionable.
3) this has been going on all year, but Burke is consistently late rotating on his defensive assignments and it is hurting this team. Stauskas is not helping on D either, but it is not due to lack of effort he's still learning. The Burke thing really bugs me though because it is purely an effort thing.
4) the personality of this team seems to think their efficiency on offense will overcome every other team so they don't worry too much if they give up a score. In a game like this, you have to be pissed when you give up a layup or open jumper. I didn't see that today. I can't believe both LeVert and Hardway didn't even run down OSU after a turnover.

Pretty much every one on the team played poorly and we still almost won. Hopefully they all learn from this experience and play better at Minny.

My only complaint was that I thought JB should have replaced Stauskus with McGary for most of the 2nd half. Nick was out of control on offense and a liability on D.

If we use the game last January in Columbus as a random point of comparison, we should remember that we put together only a slightly worse statistical performance in that game (not just the score, but effective FG%, 3-point %, etc...) and lost the game by 13 instead of just 3 as we did today.

It isn't a whole lot to go on necessarily, but what it tells me is that, in that space of nearly a year, and despite appearances today, you still have a team that is ridiculously talented and considerably better in other areas (things like blocks, steals and rebounding are generally up, though perhaps not necessarily today). There is vast improvement overall, in other words. 

The Big Ten schedule is going to be tough, and this is a ridiculously front-loaded conference, right down to having, if I recall, seven teams with 12 or more wins right now. Someone above me touched on it, but from here on out, they have five or six teams on the schedule with better defensive efficiency (one of them is Ohio State), so they'll definitely need to adjust their game  - but watching the second half today, I don't have any doubt that they can do this and still do well in a tough conference schedule. 

Did anyone else notice the announcers kept saying Michigan didn't have depth? We played 8 players (9 if you count Horford's 2 min) and they played 7 (8 if you count Laquinin ross' 3 min). so whats the big deal???

The Ohio trolls on the ESPN boards right now are so pathetic it's hilarious.

I blame myself. They've won every game I've seen. I was working today and missed it. QED.

Blame me.

FUCK. That's my snowflake.

Now that the adrenaline has faded some, I feel like this: it's great news that we can spot a decent team 20 points and still come within a basket of winning on their court. I'm not even remotely worried about the rest of the season; I (and everyone else who isn't an Ohio homer) would be shocked to see us lose to that team when they come to Ann Arbor in a few weeks.

Losing to Ohio boils my blood in any sport, though. My sports-conscious lifetime didn't begin until 2006, and those God damned bastards haven't lost much since then.

If you look at the last 5 games football and basketball in either Columbus or Ann Arbor, all the home teams have won. It just so happens the last three have been played in Columbus. Michigan is now holding serve at home and coming very close in Columbus. This is new and refreshing as we have gotten beaten soundly in Columbus both football and basketball a number of times over the last ten years. Beilein is transforming a program and that takes time. He is bringing in big time talent and for the first time in many years we have the same kind of roster as Ohio.

Burke's three with 20 seconds left was halfway down, we were a fraction of an inch from pulling this out! But you have to like where this program is going! Incredible job by Beilein!

It was tough start. But I give alot credit to guys and coaches for the heart to have a chance under 20 seconds to steal a game on the road against a top 15 team.  A lot teams down 20 early would have folded and got smoked on the road.  This tells me that team has the heart and will to fight at any point just have to learn to finish on the road in hostile environments over time.  This team will be ready to play thursday night at Barn for sure.  Since it's the first loss of the year, I think I may quit the predictions thread day before every game unless people want me to still do the threads? 

Minnesota is actually a more important game in the sense that if we win we get the tiebraker against them. If I had to choose between winning today and winning Thursday I would pick Thursday since I'd rather get that tiebreaker and have a better shot at a Big Ten championship. I do think this could be a very good learning experience for the team.

It inspired me to unfollow burgeoning wolverine star, so I think I'm better for that.

We blow them out when they visit A^2!  We'll probably lose a few more games on the road. Stay tough at home!