Michigan Hires Billy Donlon, Saddi Washington Comment Count

Brian

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These names had been rumored for a couple days and now they are official:

University of Michigan men's basketball head coach John Beilein announced today (Wednesday, May 4) the hiring of Billy Donlon and Saddi Washington as assistant coaches for the Wolverines.

Donlon was just fired from Wright State after a six-year tenure. His axing was controversial, to say the least, after Donlon saw his charges to 22-13 season and 13-5 conference mark, and the conference tournament final. I mean, this is a hell of a resume to fire for a low major*:

Three years after he was named the Horizon League coach of the year and three days after he led his Wright State team to its third 20-plus wins season in four years, a tie for the most league wins by a WSU team and the third appearance in four years in the title game of the league tournament, Donlon was fired as the Raiders’ basketball coach.

Donlon and Wright State had a rough 2015 but the years surrounding it were all 20-win seasons featuring excellent defense considering WSU's place in the basketball firmament. Here are some key stats from his tenure:

Year Adj D Eff Rk 2PT % RK BLK % RK TO% RK REB RK FTR RK
2016 58 136 311 42 22 341
2015 173 267 275 124 154 257
2014 39 154 192 6 83 272
2013 30 165 300 15 68 314
2012 92 335 300 4 90 321
2011 107 335 342 12 111 276

Donlon's teams played a high-foul, high-TO style that made them somewhere between respectable and just about as good as a low major can rank—with the exception of 2015. He's never had any shot blocking because of the nature of coaching at Wright State, but three of the last four years he's outperformed a ton of teams. (FWIW, His offenses were universally horrible. That doesn't matter because Beilein.) Donlon looks like the "defensive coordinator" I was advocating once LaVall Jordan left. Beilein:

"I have known Billy for almost two decades, and I love his passion and IQ for the game. He has tremendous experience as a player, assistant and head coach at the Division I level. Improving our defense is a huge goal for us, and defense is one of Billy's specialties."

If he can get Wright State into the top 60 three times in the last four years he's probably pretty good in that role.

The obvious catch is that free throw rate. That is emphatically not how Michigan plays right now, and it's an open question just how much rope Donlon will have to deploy his style of D. Beilein is notoriously persnickety about fouls. Insert hours-long autobench complaint here.

Meanwhile, Washington has been at Oakland for a decade, helping the Golden Grizzlies have disproportionate success in the Horizon League. He almost got a job in Ann Arbor during the last staff shakeup. I don't know much about him other than the fact that Sam Webb believes he'll be an excellent recruiter; unlike Donlon he doesn't have a helpful Kenpom page since he was an assistant.

*[Article states that Wright State pays its assistants less than the rest of the Horizon and doesn't have a full time strength coach; they are mid-major only if that's your term for literally every non-big-time CBB program.]

Comments

Bertello NC

May 4th, 2016 at 8:49 PM ^

Also I see we might be in the mix for Harold Baruti. Watched his tape and all I can think about is that we could really use his physicality and aggressiveness.




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bronxblue

May 4th, 2016 at 9:41 PM ^

Seem like guys who address the weaknesses of the past couple of years. That said, the foul rate probably won't stand, but I guess we'll see how it looks in practice. even getting the defense to the mid 60s or 70s in Kenpom would be huge.

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May 5th, 2016 at 4:00 AM ^

As a long-time HL watcher, Donlon's teams quite simply gave people fits, both the people who had to play them and the people who had to watch.  Despite a relative lack of talent, they were never any fun to play against (and not much fun to watch either); case in point being this year when Valpo mowed down the league and still lost to WSU twice.  (VU looked/did better against Oregon.)  If you liked watching 59-54 games, then you would have had fun, I guess.

The knock on Donlon is that he can't recruit.  He got good players for his system, and development was also good, but there was never really anyone on his roster that you wish you'd had on your own.  (Then there was the whole Tavares Sledge situation, but I blame the AD more for that.)

Which is really to say that he should be better in his current job than in his former.  Good person, entertaining coach.  

BrownJuggernaut

May 5th, 2016 at 7:42 AM ^

I like the hires on paper, but it's up to Beilein to make sure they work and the positive effects of their coaching are maximized. Defense and rebounding are two things that I've felt he has been prodigiously soft on and I hope Donlon is able to change that.

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May 5th, 2016 at 11:49 AM ^

I've noticed several people, including some on UMHoops, saying that Donlon runs a "pack line defense" system like that used to great effect by Virginia, Wisconsin, and Xavier. I'd never heard the term before so I did a little googling. Some good primers here on the basic concepts:

http://collegebasketball.nbcsports.com/2015/01/07/film-session-how-does-virginias-pack-line-defense-work-and-how-do-you-beat-it/

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/virginia-defense-pack-line-dick-tony-bennett/

http://www.basketballforcoaches.com/pack-line-defense/

From what I've read, it seems the basic idea is to apply lots of on-ball pressure combined with funneling penetration toward help defenders (who stay within the "pack line"), deny post touches, force contested jumpers, and crash the defensive glass with all 5 guys. What's the pack line's Achilles heel? An offense that has good ball movement, ball handlers who can create off the dribble, and shooters who can hit contested 3s consistently. (Sounds a lot like the ur-Beilein offense.)

I'm very curious to see how much of this system Beilein chooses to implement...

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