Monday, March 18, 2019

Michigan Monday: Not A Party

They say the NBA is a miss or make league.  You can use that analogy for basketball as a whole.   To take statement a bit deeper, it is saying that players win games and if you shoot the ball well you will win the game.

To my eyes that wasn't the case for the rubber match between Sparty and the Wolverines last night.  This loss falls directly on the Michigan coaches.   MSU is going to beat you maybe 3 ways:

1. Death by Winston
2. Death by McQuaid shooting 3
3. Getting out rebounded in the low post

Michigan focused so much on 1 and 3 they left McQuaid wide open and Izzo knew it.   Coach B basically bet that McQuaid would not beat them shooting 3's and he was wrong.  I was yelling at the TV for Poole, Iggy, or Zavier not to pinch down to the post and leave McQuaid wide open.  They did it the entire game and it cost the Wolverines a Big Ten Championship.

If the Michigan defender had moved a few feet closer to him, that pass is never made and he doesn't hit all those 3's.   Why the Wolverines didn't adjust, doesn't make any sense.  I understand they needed help on the boards but sometimes you have to trade a 2 instead of a 3.   They made an average player look like superstar with pre-game jumpers during the game.

I also don't understand the watch and no movement on offense for large stretches during the game.   Many times, Michigan's best shooters are standing on the other side of the court as Michigan's offense is struggling to get an open shot.

Michigan's struggles against MSU late in the game continues and Coach B got out coached against MSU 3 times this year.

With that said, Michigan gets a better seed then MSU as the Wolverines head out West again.   So the NCAA basically said, the result from Sunday didn't matter in the seeding.   You could see on CBS how excited Michigan was, when they got their seed and nobody but Coach B stood up.   It was clearly not a party.

  • Michigan Football also started Spring Practice on Sunday.  Josh Gattis seemed very excited on twitter to install his Speed in Space offense.

1 comment:

EzmoB said...

What does coach Gattis mean by "speed in space"?