Why is our best 3 point shooter not starting?
On a team that is so starved for shooting, I’m surprised they don’t start Livers and bring Matthews or (better) Poole off the bench. I’m not asking because I think JB is an idiot or something, I am honestly curious. Is he worried about lacking ball handlers and turnovers (bc Livers isn’t great in that regard)? Will that mess up the defense? Livers is a worse defender than Matthews, but not Poole, so I’m not sure about that.
UNC a 1 seed without winning their conference or their conference tourney when we blew them out is a head scratcher.
Had we beat MSU twice, perhaps we would be on a 1 seed instead of them?
We would have been a 1 seed if we won today....
Not a chance. That was obvious before the tourney even started.
Clearly you didn't know that they also lost to Texas, and got blown at home by Louisville. Wait, why ARE they a one seed?
Wrong thread, though I agree with you.
UNC won the regular season acc
Pretty sure Virginia gets to claim that...
Pretty sure Virginia and UNC were both 16-2 in conference, therefore splitting the regular season title.
They beat Duke twice. Probably just being rewarded for that.
Bench Poole and start Livers. Matthews defense is worth keeping him as a starter. Rebounds well and doesn't forget where his man is or hop off the hardwood in crucial minutes.
You know that they play totally different positions right?
Livers has been playing out of position all season. Might as well keep it going in the other direction.
What position do you want him to play? He's a natural 4.
Nudge Iggy to the 3, Matthews to the 2 and Livers at the 4. Might be a bit oversized, but they can guard anyone.
Offensively, Livers brings more right now than Poole. Will need Matthews to drive more tho.
There wouldn't be a lot of ballhandling in that lineup beyond Simpson.
If I had to bet that’s why I’d say JB doesn’t do it. I’m not sure it’s justified, but part of that is just from not having seen it fall apart.
Beilein values taking care of the ball very, very highly - and he's right to do so.
Well, it’s not working all that well right now. We have a low to percentage and a mediocre offense.
They didn’t lose against Sparty because of three point shooting. They were up by 13, fer godsakes. They lost because they stopped their motion offense and refs stopped calling fouls on those poor Spartans, down an injured man.
March 17th, 2019 at 11:14 PM ^
Our offense looked pretty good Friday and Saturday, and even today we had a 5-point with 2 minutes left. If we'd closed this game out, we aren't even having this discussion, most likely.
March 18th, 2019 at 11:13 AM ^
It’s true I wouldn’t have posted if we won, but that’s besides the point. We’d still have the team’s worse offensive efficiency since 2014 (currently 73rd in the country), the Levert injury season when we missed the tournament.
Poole isn't that much better at handling the ball to be fair...
I dont see poole ball handling much. Ball handling (juvenile hee hee).
Matthews is 6-6” and 205, so I wouldn’t say he’s oversized for a two. The most famous two of all time was about that size. He only seems oversized bc JB often plays undersized front courts.
I think that it's a position issue, since Livers plays the 4/5, and he won't start ahead of Brazdeikis or Teske.
Not worried so much about why he's not starting but I do hope they can start finding more shots for Livers as he's have a fantastic 3pt shooting season overall (45%).
I think a lot of this probably has to do with the fact Simpson struggles to draw help defenders which in turn would get more open looks for Livers (who struggles to create his own shot) because in reality a 45% long-range shooter is who this team needs shooting more IMHO.
Well, which of Iggy, Teske or Matthews would you sit to start him?
Anyway, he comes off the bench but basically plays starter's minutes. Duncan Robinson did likewise last year.
Pretty sure I said Matthews out of those three in the OP. But Iggy is almost always undersized at the four. He should be a three and you could put Matthews at the two for Poole if you wanted. I think the bigger line up would help against teams that rebound well. Iggy is going to have a hell of a time rebounding and banging against fours like MSU plays, so it might be good to help him out.
The 4 is Iggy's spot. If he's undersized against his man, that just means a big, lumbering dude has to guard him on the perimeter. We like that tradeoff.
The 3 is Matthews's spot. He's too valuable as a defender and rebounder not to start but isn't enough of a ballhandler to play the 2.
I can see the argument for keeping the ballhandling, but I don’t buy the argument that Iggy has to play four. You could just as easily get him to bully an opposing small forward, plus Livers forces the big lumbering dudes out to the perimeter too, so you don’t lose that—it’s not like you’d have two post players. You could also get Mathews in the mid post on guard rather than a forward.
i’d like to see simpson-matthews-iggy-livers-teske with poole coming off the bench. while i’m at it, i’d rather that brooks play no more than 1-2 mpg at the absolute most
Start Livers @ 4, move Iggy to 3, bench Poole.
I do not care if livers starts, but i have been saying for months that JB should be doing more offense/defense substitutions during dead balls and TOs. You could easily get livers 8-10 more offensive possesions in a game and get him closer to 30 min every game.
Livers didn't get into the game until 10 minutes were gone today
yep. no reason not to do those offense/defense substitutions right out of the gate.
We have one starter that consistantly makes a three, Iggy. The rest are hot once in a blue moon and cold most of the time. Livers is great off the bench hitting threes. Not developing one more shooter is a problem. Bench Poole the last 5 minutes and move Iggy to the 3 and Livers to the 4.
Matthews clearly isn’t right or has lost his confidence, insert Livers into the lineup.
Been wondering this myself. Why we never see a lineup with Matthews at the 2 and Livers in there. Especially today when Poole was such a net negative out there. Hopefully we'll see it in the tournament because I believe that's our best lineup.
Tactically this is the worst Beilein has been on the offensive end in a long long long time. UM knew MSU was going to switch 1-5 and all they did was play iso ball and pick and roll. Very little off ball action. His offensive acumen has taken a nosedive these past two years and that's sad. Izzo took him behind the shed and whipped him, three times. Just another pitiful effort on offense.
Venting here: I've been following Tom Brady's pro career closely ever since he graduated from
Michigan and was drafted by the Patriots. I see Bill Belichick make adjustments on top of adjustments.
Not just from game to game, but within the game.
I can't imagine him losing to the same team three times in a row, without making significant
adjustments. I know he is a tough one to compare to, but I expect more from Beilein. I guess that's
what makes this so frustrating.
Also, Izzo is not doing anything mind boggling. How can you have that much time to prepare and
not come up with better solutions?
There was a lot of adjustments compared to games 1 & 2. The biggest that I saw was that everything was switched. Teske wasn't hedging and never got caught 3 steps outside the 3pt line. Defensively there are problems but that is because 2 players just aren't very good at it and get caught out of position on help/recover frequently. One you can excuse, freshman, but the other shouldn't still be happening.
Some players just aren't good at defense either by choice or ability and it causes problems that can't be schemed away very easily.
Offensively, those same 2 players want to play hero ball and be volume shooters. One is a black hole and when the ball goes there it rarely comes back even at the expense of a bad shot. JB's offense is built on finding the best shot rather than a good shot. That's why when the ball & players don't move the wheels come off.
Poole is a great bench player. He shouldnt be starting on a top team. When Mcquaid drops 30 on you its over
Poole isn’t a great anything.
My only guess is that Livers coming off the bench allows him to play as a small-ball 5 and back up Teske.
But I want to add that this is wrong. Livers shot out of his mind yesterday and scored a career high. 2-2 from 3 today. HOW DOES HE SHOOT ONLY 2 THREES?!? Huge blunder by Beilein not getting him more looks, especially in the final two minutes.
I have a harder time trying to figure out why we take a huge split off of McQuaid. Makes zero sense.
I had a feeling McDork was going to go off on us before the game even started.
Of the 5 guys on the floor why would you ever choose to leave him 25 feet open at least 20 times during the game?
During the last 3 minutes of the game, think of the difference it would have made if Matthews had played him man to man.
Honestly, I think there is only one bad shooter in the starting lineup. The bigger problem is shot selection, it's just atrocious sometimes. Iggy and Poole are both knockdown shooters in rhythm but Poole in particular takes a ton of bad shots. Matthews is ok when in rhythm but again has a tendency to take contested shots. So you pretty much have 3 starters who take too many contested shots. Livers always seems to take his threes in rythm, never really see him force it.
Shot selection is bad because Beilein runs no off ball action. When teams switch 1-5 it leads to SIo ball and bad shots late in the shot clock. We're exclusively a pick and roll team. Beilein has been terrible this year his x and o's leave a lot to be desired and losing 3 times to MSU in the manner that he did is indefensible.