Why scorn the Northwestern football win and celebrate the Nebraska basketball win?

She just needs to do Playboy already or release a sex tape. Just get it over with, Kate. The entire world wants to see you naked.

Absolutely, consider yourself forgiven and thanked profusely!

Skads and loads. Well done, old boy.

As it relates to strong individual defenders I submit Spike as an exception to your statement. However, I do agree at the relative lack of emphasis by the coaches as it relates to lockdown defense.  That's not to say they don't stress defense and coach it, just that the offensive system is higher priority.

I do agree that Beilein's reputation is built largely on his offensive schemes and not defense.  That said, to the extent he has defensive schemes, they are based on team defense concepts--including the 1-3-1 halfcourt trap (which he has hardly used at Michigan), and the high ball hedge (which he has used most always here). 

I disagree that we have crafty individual defenders.  There isn't a single lockdown defender on the team--starter or bench--certainly not Levert (who I name only because he is somehow perceived as such).  The past few teams compensated by playing good team defense.  This one hasn't figured that out yet.  Players get lost or are simply confused on simple ball screens.  Horford cannot hedge properly--doesn't stop the dribbler and then is slow to get back to his man--Morgan is excellent at it, on the other hand. 

Team D sometimes takes time to figure out--Douglas and Timmy are 2 players who did so.  I am cautiously optimistic that we will get better on the defensive end as the season evolves--getting more turnovers turned into easy baskets would certainly help.

As an aside, I also disagree with the premise of the OP.  Football and basketball expectations are different, particularly on the road, for a reason.  History says road losses to bad teams on the road occur more often in basketball than they do in football.  Further, we were awful in the Nw (football) game until the end (in fact, Nw gave the game away)--and more importantly, this followed 2 embarrassing losses to MSU and Nebraska.  If the Nw game had followed 2-3 wins, I suspect everyone would have reacted much like people are now after the Nebraska BB game.

I think almost all of the players on Michigan's team are good at defending their man, but are less versed in team defense, defensive communication and team adjustments on the whole.

I would say the opposite - we have very few good defenders (particularly on the ball) but we are halfway decent at team defense. Problem is, we're over-reliant on rotations because individually we're so bad, and the rotation isn't always going to get there - or if it does, it results in a mismatch, like Walton on a big guy or (as was true many times last night) a big guarding their point guard) .

My wife and I were talking about this last night and we decided there are several reasons:

1)  This was not a battle of two self-destructive teams competing to see who wanted to lose the least.  I don't watch a lot of Nebraska basketball, but to me it seemed like they are an improved team from last year.  Their defence seemed reasonably solid.  Plus a few things went their way--great stats from the freethrow & 3-point lines.  

2)  Expectations.  I think with the 4 non-con losses and Mitch being out for the season, my unreasonable expectations have been mercifully dashed relatively early in the season.  Not to the point of depression, but to the point where I can just realistically enjoy each game in isolation.  With each road win in the Big Ten, it gives me hope that we can in fact make the dance, and perhaps get into the later rounds.  Maybe not a Final Four, but a pretty solid showing nonetheless.

3)  I'm relatively new to watching basketball, but my understanding is that getting a road win in BB is significantly harder than getting one in football.  That, plus the quality Minnesota win boosts Michigan's prospects in the Big Ten for seeding purposes later this year.

4)  I saw some fire in the belly from GRIII and some more confidence in Walton Jr. out there.  Things we will definitely need in the absence of Mitch this season.  For what is still a very young team, it's always good to pull out a squeaker win to build that end-of-game exeprience in young players.  Even if it's against a Nebraska, the buzzer-beater butterflies is still something good for the freshmen to experiece so that when it is against an MSU or Wisconsin, it won't be such a surreal feeling.

5)  Because there are so many games in the season in BB, I think there is much less focus on "style points" for each individual game compared to football.  With only 12 or 13 games per season to compare records, each individual game will get scrutinized more.  Not so as much with basketball.  

6)  That epic 3 point half court shot by Walton.  I haven't seen the entire board today, but has somebody made a GIF of that yet?  The best part wasn't even the shot--it was the Nebraska crowd's universal hands-grabbing-head reaction to it.

I smell a diary...

Which in soccer I could see having a major effect where one call or missed call can be the one goal difference to win. Also, in basketball, where there are so many calls.

From my high school days of basketball though, I will say that I do think there is a difference when you play with different sight lines than you're used to. Now, the teams do get shoot around and likely practice even with the ball that will be used in the upcoming game (and the ball has much more uniformity at that level than in high school), but just a little different feel can have an affect too.

But, the referee behavior is probably more of it either way, especially in B1G basketball.

I've seen that claim several times but I've never found a study that actually verifies it. The SI article a few years back that popularized the claim did a good job of establishing the fact of referee bias but never actually compared the effect to the home advantage as a whole. (Which didn't keep them from claiming that it was the entire effect. That kind of ruined the article for me.)

I think we can be pretty confident that in football crowd noise creates a substantial advantage for the home team by disrupting the visitors' signals.

If you've got links to some studies please post them--I think you may have seen some articles I haven't.

Would this imply that teams like large full stadiums should have a better home field advantage than teams with small/emptier stadiums.  Have these studies looked at that?

There have been some refutations of that "referee bias" study as well.  For example, there is no observable differrence in ball/strike calls by the plate umpire between home & away (and now that Pitch F/X exists, we know to the millimeter where each pitch crosses the plate).  So if baseball HFA is due to officiating, wouldn't it show up in ball/strike calls?

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/a-quick-question-about-home-field-advantage/

Also, in football and basketball, HFA is much stronger in the first quarter of the game compared to the second, third and fourth quarters.  Why would that be the result of officiating?  Wouldn't that more likely be the result of environmental unfamiliarity issues or "travel weariness"?

Here is an interesting discussion of this subject:

http://www.advancednflstats.com/2009/09/hawks-doves-and-home-field-advantage.html

It's worth pointing out as well that HFA seems to be as strong, if not a little stronger, in Division III NCAA football compared to Division I FBS NCAA football.  This again makes me think that HFA is more due to travel weariness and other environmental factors (D3 players travel by bus, often on the morning of game days, while FBS players more frequently travel by plane, and/or travel the night before a game).

Actually what made people upset IMO was people seeing a team that was capable of much more handcuffed by coaching.  This was mostly offensively but was present in all facets of the team.  Even if the team performed below expectations I think the rage would be reduced if there were signs of improvement over the course of the year.  There wasn't.