2019 big ten tournament

1 hour and 13 minutes

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1. Michigan's Pod

(starts at 0:58)

The "last two seed" means Michigan doesn't have to play Duke. Montana is without their two bigs from last year. Good at preventing assists on made baskets—we think that means they force you into a lot of iso ball. Nevada was good but played nobody. Seth shares what vomitorium means (got it from the great youtubist CGP Grey). But Nevada's best player, Jordan Caroline, has an Achilles flare, and they just lost to San Diego State without him. Clear preference is Florida.

2. The Rest of Michigan's Region

(starts at 22:41)

How good is Gonzaga? We like that Syracuse is the and Florida State are with them because those two are talent-independent hoodoos. All Syracuse does is have Tyus Battle drive in the lane. Texas Tech is the three seed, and the other great defense. Who grad transfers from St. John's? Highly dependent on a Culver, a high-assist/usage guy Matthews will be checking. They're not a switching defense. They give up a lot of threes but we're guessing those are 24-foot step-backs. How do you shoot 211 threes at 26%? Marquette has Marcus Howard (36% usage!) who's just a jack-it-up shooter. FSU is a forest of arms.

3. MSU III

(starts at 45:44)

When Michigan faces a switching defense they just freeze and take bad shots because their answers don't work: X isn't a stepback shooter, they don't have any Iso guys, Matthews is not a good offensive player, and they can't feed the post. Izzo admits he "couldn't play Ward" but also auto-benched Tillman and Michigan immediately swung out to a double-digit lead. Hat tip to Cassius Winston. Grumbling about the slow development of Poole, and Michigan wings being so slow to recover to McQuaid. A 20-percent win percentage flip on a blown call at the end is especially galling because it will never change. Just once it would be nice to play a rival without the rival getting an assist from the officiating.

3. Iowa/Minnesota

(starts at 1:06:03)

Rote blowouts and flexing. Michigan fixed the Iowa problem as soon as they stopped putting Iggy on Garza and Teske on Cook—Cook is the Big Ten's biggest foul magnet, Iggy can't guard Garza. As soon as they stopped doing that it was over. Minnesota was just dog tired.

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MUSIC

• Space Cowboy"—Jonzun Crew
• "Anthems for a Seventeen-Year-Old Girl"—Broken Social Scene
• "Can't Get There from Here"—REM
• “Across 110th Street”

THE USUAL LINKS

• Helpful iTunes subscribe link
• General podcast feed link
• Direct download link (right-click/save-as)
• What's with the theme music?

The people are what spews forth from the vomitoria, not the contents of the people

THE ESSENTIALS

THE US

Michigan has taken a flamethrower to Iowa and Minnesota to set a record for consecutive Big Ten Tourney wins at 10. Michigan State is the last roadblock between an unprecedented third consecutive conference tourney championship—and unfortunately it's a roadblock Michigan is 0-2 against this season.

But it's not like I'm not going to embed this.

THE LINEUP CARD

Click for big.

Projected starters are in bold. Hover over headers for stat explanations. The "Should I Be Mad If He Hits A Three" methodology: we're mad if a guy who's not good at shooting somehow hits one. Yes, you're still allowed to be unhappy if a proven shooter is left open. It's a free country.

[Hit THE JUMP for the rest of the preview.]

THE ESSENTIALS

THE US

The version of Michigan that shoots threes like a Beilein team usually does is a beast to be reckoned with. Iowa found this out in a game that was only competitive for as long as it was because of a weird cross-match defensive strategy that saw Luka Garza score over Brazdeikis on every one of his first half possessions that Teske didn't block (he rebounded two of his own misses for putbacks). In all other ways Michigan stuffed the Hawkeyes in a burlap sack and threw them in the river.

Thanks to another questionable Carsen Edwards outing—4/17 from the floor—Michigan meets Minnesota for the third time. This version of the Gophers is whittled down and probably pretty tired, but the version of Michigan that shoots threes like a man who's been told making one will cause a kitten to explode lurks around every corner.

THE LINEUP CARD

Click for big.

Projected starters are in bold. Hover over headers for stat explanations. The "Should I Be Mad If He Hits A Three" methodology: we're mad if a guy who's not good at shooting somehow hits one. Yes, you're still allowed to be unhappy if a proven shooter is left open. It's a free country. Minutes are from the last five games except where starred.

[Hit THE JUMP for the rest of the preview.]