THE ESSENTIALS

WHAT	#109 Michigan (8-20, 3-14 B10) at #95 Rutgers (14-13, 6-10 B10)
WHERE	The RAC Piscataway, NJ
WHEN	8:30 PM
THE LINE	Kenpom: RU-5 Torvik: RU-3
TELEVISION	FS1 (link)

THE OVERVIEW

Randy and Jason Sklar are a brilliant comedy duo, a pair of identical twins who went to Michigan then carved out a career in Hollywood, most famously with their own ESPN show The Cheap Seats, plus regular TV and film appearances, and of course stand-up. That show returns this weekend to where it all started, Mark Ridley's Comedy Castle in Royal Oak, MI. There are still tickets left for those shows, including one tonight at 7:30 PM.

If you can't make it to see the Sklars, but you're still up for a laugh on a Thursday night, Michigan basketball travels to Rutgers for a matchup between the fourth-worst Big Ten offense (relative to the conf average on Kenpom) since my freshman year in college, and the 13th worst defense since 1998-'99.

The words "Historically Bad Basketball" are unusable in this context, only because it would be almost impossible to reproduce anything as unwatchable as the last 17 minutes between these teams, at least from the Michigan perspective.

What happens when you transport that game to The RAC? Maybe not much? Rutgers just lost there 63-46 to Maryland, a team they beat (56-53) on the road. The vagaries of their consistently atrocious offense opposite their consistently excellent defense make this Rutgers team consistently immune to predictive metrics. This Michigan team on the other hand has been remarkably consistent in their passivity. Even with Dug McDaniel finally cleared to travel once again, they're without Olivier Nkamhoua, their most defense-independent scorer.

So I say again: The Sklars. In Royal Oak. Guaranteed good time, hilarity without the darkness, and afterwards you can go up and tell the stars that everything's alright because Michigan won the national championship in football without them getting the least bit annoyed. Just don't tell them the Rutgers score.

[After THE JUMP: You wanna know what's funny?]

THE US

My graphic [click to embiggen]:

faq for these graphics

Dug McDaniel is back in the road lineup.

THE LINEUP CARD

My graphic [click for big]:

Pickiell runs his lines out like a hockey team—the better to stay fresh when playing defense as hard as they do—so the bench goes deeper than my chart can really capture. Guys who didn't make it:

• Emmanuel Ogbole is a 6'10" traditional paint-bound center.
• Antwone Woolfolk is a 6'9" win who can't shoot; he dropped 25 pounds from last year but still has a long way to go.
• Oskar Palmquist has been around forever. He's a .337 lifetime Just-a-Shooter who will play 16 minutes when he's hot or not at all.

THE THEM

Randy is the one with a mustache and Jason is the one who's not broke from paying out-of-state tuition at the University of Michigan.

They're both excellent finishers of each other's sentences.

I MEANT THE THEM IF I MADE THE UNWISE DECISION TO SEE THE BASKETBALL GAME INSTEAD OF THE SKLARS TONIGHT

For most of this I'll refer you to the previous preview. The major change since then has been the emergence of their Temple transfer G Jeremiah Williams, who returned from a season-long injury against Michigan along with backup big man Emmanuel Ogbole. The addition of Williams allowed Rutgers to rotate their coldest guard—usually Aundre Hyatt—off the court and take some pressure off of Cliff Omoruyi and Derek Simpson.

The return of Williams keyed a four-game winning streak, over which he scored 10, 14, 18, and 15 points with 16 assists to 7 turnovers. He's cooled from the floor in the three losses since, but just adding a major usage, on-ball offensive player turned a joke of an offense into a merely bad one without sacrificing the team's defense-first culture.

It also technically pushed defense-only wing Aundre Hyatt to the bench. Time-wise though it's mostly affected Mawot Mag, who missed a couple of games and only plyaed 18 minutes in his last start.

THE TEMPO FREE

Offense:
Defense:

THE KEYS

Comedic Timing vs Jet Lag. It's a long flight from California, and if you're just a fraction of a second off an otherwise good joke might not hit.

Good Audience. If people are in a good mood and enjoying themselves there's a definite feedback loop with the performers.

A lot of Michigan fans. They've got some good Michigan material from doing the alumni club's events at the Rose Bowl and National Championship, but like a Moritz Wagner three-pointer, if the first one doesn't go down they might not try again the rest of the night.

Don't mention the basketball score. See the part about a lot of Michigan fans in the audience and the audience being in a good mood.

THE SECTION WHERE I PREDICT THE SAME THING KENPOM DOES

Kenpom doesn't do comedy shows so Rutgers by five.