Blue and Joe

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:36 PM ^

I've gotten used to losing this year. For the most part it's just fun to watch a bunch of young weird guys try real hard and get better. But man, games like this are absolutely soul crushing and maddening. Beilein is one hell of a coach, but this team is making his flaws show.

Pinky

March 4th, 2015 at 12:07 AM ^

His genuis?  Have you watched the team this year?  This is at least the 3rd game the Beilein has blown with awful end-game coaching.  I mean Jesus Christ, hire an assisstant who knows how to coach inbounding.

The bottom line is that Beilein gets a major pass for what he's done for the program and the results that he's achieved over the last three years.  But there is a real concern right now that he isn't capitalizing on that success. Recruiting has been mediocre at best, there doesn't appear to be a whole lot of young talent on this team, we continue to see the same issues at the ends of games, we continue to see the same issues witht the frontcourt, and there really aren't a whole lot of reasons to be super optimistic about next year.  It's frustrating.  

Yostbound and Down

March 4th, 2015 at 12:17 AM ^

"Recruiting has been mediocre at best." 

Yeah that's why the whole starting five from the 2012 team is in the league. Fuck that noise.

It's an extremely young team and it will struggle when it is missing it's two best players. It sucks to lose the way we did tonight, and there are some things tactically he should have done (foul, adjust defense and get better looks for our last shots) but he's a damn good coach and this season doesn't change that at all.

OccaM

March 4th, 2015 at 12:19 AM ^

Recruiting has been mediocre. You can't tell me with a straight face that you expected anything less than that 2012 class quality level kids when Michigan got to the Final 4 and Elite 8 along with 2 B1G titles in 3 years.... 

Beilein got really lucky that MAAR and Dawkins somewhat bloomed this season. Chatman and Donnal are meh. 

 

Yostbound and Down

March 4th, 2015 at 12:26 AM ^

So it's luck when MAAR and Dawkins develop, but it's his fault that Chatman isn't delivering to his potential? You can't have it both ways.

And for the record, no I didn't expect us to just magically pull in five stars McDonalds guys after the Final Four year. It takes a lot longer than a couple, three years to become a consistently elite program in recruiting. 

Pinky

March 4th, 2015 at 12:35 AM ^

Developing?  MAAR is averging 4 ppg this year, and Dawkins is at 5.  Sure, they're showing some decent things, but neither one of them is demonstrating anything to suggest that they are elite Big Ten talents capable of carrying this team in the future.  Maybe I'd feel differently if this team hadn't been dong-punched so many times this year, but right now it's hard to feel positive about much of anything related to Michigan athletics.

 

Yostbound and Down

March 4th, 2015 at 12:53 AM ^

*cough Harbaugh *cough as far as positivity goes. Hockey, fair enough, although I still think they could make a run and win the Big Ten. I don't follow many of the other sports but softball seems to be doing well. We got rid of that Brandon guy. I'm pretty damn positive about Michigan athletics right now.

Dawkins just scored 21 points. MAAR is playing some good defense and showing growth in ballhandling over the course of the season, and is on the way to creating his own shot. And both of these guys are doing it without the benefit of playing with Walton or Levert. No they aren't elite Big Ten talents. They were pretty much 7th and 8th men off the bence at start of the season so it's delusional to expect them to be. Also, again they're freshman, and not ones that project to be one and dones. If they are it's because they did develop into elite players.

I'm disappointed in the season, because I thought we had a chance to be in the Big Ten hunt after Wisconsin. The NJIT and EMU losses were what I was most mad about, but that tells you what kind of team we had...one that wasn't talented or consistent enough to win games it should.

So after that we knew it was going to be a roller coaster in conference. It has been. And yet we've competed close in most games and yes, developed players.  So because we don't have the talent, it was always going to be a developmental year. It just became glaringly apparent in the non conference.

umchicago

March 4th, 2015 at 4:28 AM ^

to use per game averages for the year.  those guys played 3-5 minutes/game before the levert/walton injuries.  since then, they combine for over 16 pts per game.  pretty damn good for overlooked true freshmen.

that said, i don't expect them to be the best players on the team but they will certainly be very solid contributors going forward.  and (barring more injuries next year) this team will compete for the BIG title and finish no worse than 4.

rockediny

March 4th, 2015 at 9:04 AM ^

Dude.....did you seriously use the per game stats of freshmen who barely played at the beginning of the year to support your shitty argument? You realize they both have higher averages when they actually got to play full games right? I'm rereading your comment in disbelief at how dumb people can be after a loss.

OccaM

March 4th, 2015 at 12:55 AM ^

What I meant with my comment was Beilein's streak of hitting diamonds in the rough isn't just pure coaching. There is luck involved. 

MAAR and Dawkins were late offers that accepted when kids left for the league and recruits didn't pick UM. The fact that they are decent is Beilein's coaching and luck. They could have very well been busts. (which is far more likely since they barely had offers from other places)

Chatman and Donnal haven't blossomed yet and could very well be recruiting misses. Time will tell. 

When you got places like VCU making the NCAA Tourney every year, there shouldn't be a reason for Michigan not to hit 20ish wins every year. Idk. Even in Kentucky's NIT year they were 21-12. 

Yostbound and Down

March 4th, 2015 at 1:01 AM ^

The Big Ten is much tougher in terms of balance than the SEC is for sure (last ten years it's pretty much been just Florida and Kentucky, maybe some Tennessee and LSU sprinkled in as "challengers") and VCU beat up on the CAAA and now the A-10 every year it seems like. Their conferences are easier. I'm not going to make any excuses for the awful losses in the non conference, but I've moved on. Those told me this team has a ceiling, and it's not a title.

Donnal seems like a miss. Chatman maybe too. You said it there, time will tell, yet no one has any for Beilein. It is damn hard to hit 20 wins consistently in a league with MSU, OSU, Wisconsin, Illinois and Indiana (now Maryland too) which are gonna be pretty much all on par with us in recruiting. 

Gulogulo37

March 4th, 2015 at 4:10 AM ^

Why only look at this year's young players? Novak was luck? TREY BURKE was luck? Jordan Morgan was luck? Spike was luck? LeVert was luck? His whole team of nobodies that made it to the Elite 8 at WVU was luck? And he's had all that "luck" with basically no busts. Who is the biggest bust under Beilein? Carlton Brundidge? At some point it isn't luck. It's also ridiculous writing off Donnal considering he's getting his first action ever this season and bigs take a while to develop. Chatman has obviously been very disappointing, but it's insane writing off a true freshman.

Just the fact that Kentucky was even in the NIT should tell you something. Also, yes, VCU gets in the tourney consistently but they're a somewhat gimmicky team. They do well because their system guarantees them a bunch of wins against teams that are turnover prone. They're also basically guaranteed to lose to teams like Michigan.

Also, as some others point out below. Besides all the guys leaving for the NBA, this team lost its best 2 players! If Walton and LeVert were healthy, this team would be in the tourney.

Point is, it's crazy to be concerned about Beilein's future going forward as some others are, especially Pinky. You know it's crazy when the criticism is that Beilein isn't capitalizing enough on making Michigan one of the elite teams in all of college basketball the last 2 years. People forget that Michigan basketball isn't Michigan football.

coldnjl

March 4th, 2015 at 8:15 AM ^

why are you here....you contribute nothing. 

If you can't see that our program is on solid footing, than that is your ignorance. We aren't going to be UK, but every few years, we will compete for a NC and B1G championships. If that isn't good enough for you, follow someone else, bc I am sick of hearing you bitch.

cp4three2

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:46 PM ^

The guy is starting freshmen, playing walk-ons, and has 4 ot losses in the Big Ten after some bad luck. the two bad losses earlier in the season were inexplicable, but it seems pretty amazing that this team is a few bad breaks away from having a winning conference record. 

I think the major flaw he has is the damn 2 foul rule. I guess you could say inbounding the ball, but that seems like a personnel thing.

Shop Smart Sho…

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:51 PM ^

Big flaws in previous games was not handling his bench in such a way as to prevent having two walk-ons on the court at the same time.

He obviously isn't going to play Chatman in the second half very often, so who cares if he picks up 3 fouls in the first half?

Why does he continue to rely on his PGs to inbound the ball?  Everyone else on the team is over 6'4" and quite a bit more athletic.  And none of them shoot FTs as well as Spike, but that rarely matters because Spike isn't going to get the ball back very often in a end of game situation.



The next time a Michigan player makes a competent entry bounce-pass to the post might just be the first time in years.  This has been my biggest complaint since basketball became fun again.  

HollywoodHokeHogan

March 4th, 2015 at 12:15 AM ^

             I don't think inbounding can be a personnel thing since it seemed to be a problem with other personnel as well.  Further, sometimes the plays themselves just seem badly designed.  That Beifeldt inbounds 1/2 court bomb was crazy stupid.  I know you don't have many options in that scenario but (1) even if Irvining caught it it would have been a half-court shot, which you could get throwing it a much shorter distance and having the guy run into the shot and (2) the absolute worst thing you can do is bomb it out-of-bounds without it touching anything inbounds.  That play call offered a huge risk for very little reward.  On the whole, it's not a massive problem.  But it is, I think, a coaching problem.

HollywoodHokeHogan

March 4th, 2015 at 12:20 AM ^

                  I think they've been good in past years on scoring from an inbound from under their own basket, but the concern tonight was inbounding under the opponent's basket.  I don't know of a good way of statistically assessing those types of inbounds, since points earned off this kind of inbound is really a measure of successful offensive plays and not the inbounding play.  The number of 5 second penalties a team receives and the number of times they must use in such situations would be a reasonable measure, but I've never seen it (only the BOB, SOB points scored data).

michclub19

March 4th, 2015 at 8:45 AM ^

People keep referring to this, but it seems to me our inbounds under JB have been either immediate baskets or chucking it back to the PG on the other side of halfcourt.  It's not that they never work, it just seems to me like there's usually only 1 option or panic.

That being said, if our biggest complaint about a coach is inbounds plays, I'd say we're pretty well off.

MaizeAndBlueInTN

March 4th, 2015 at 12:05 AM ^

FOUL  FOUL  FOUL  FOUL  FOUL  FOUL  FOUL  FOUL  FOUL  FOUL  FOUL  FOUL!!!

Up 3 points and had perfect opportunity to foul within the 3 point line.

I'm sure it's easier for me to tell on an 82" 1080p TV, as opposed to those monitors the refs look at, but the inbounds play before that was off of Lumpkin's hand.

Boom Goes the …

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:41 PM ^

if we foul and they hit 2 FT, we are up 1 and have to...inbounds the ball which we have seen is an adventure.  Maybe JB would rather force a prayer 3 than have a turnover on the inbounds.  Somehow we got to see it all tonight though

Indiana Blue

March 4th, 2015 at 8:12 AM ^

We're up 6 with 15.7 seconds to play.  That's when you foul !   So what they hit 2 FT's ... it's still a 2 possession game.

Last night was akin to first, punting from the opposition's 30 yard line ... then during the OT, punting on 4th and inches from the opposition 10 yard line.  What a fucking disaster !!!

Ugh Blue!

Jon06

March 3rd, 2015 at 11:38 PM ^

That was ridiculous. Aubrey Dawkins blocking a 7-footer's bunny? A loss is a loss but I don't think I could care less about an outcome of a game. Next year's going to be a hell of a lot of fun.