I’ve been extremely happy with Livers recently. He knows his role and isn’t doing dumb stuff that oversteps his ability. If Robinson is having a good game he’s been playing more minutes. I think Beilein’s doing exactly what he should here.
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Reading Dylan’s recap it’s pretty clear that turnover rate was the difference in this game. 8% is just ridiculous. I wonder if our constant insanely low turnover rate is a result of our offensive philosophy/motion or something specific that Beilein teaches.
Thought he did a good job of staying in front of McIntosh. I figured NW would run ISO with McIntosh running downhill and just bullying Eli, but Eli kept good leverage out at the 3pt line to stop any momentum.
I think this game was more a function of wanting to have Duncan’s shooting on the floor. Really I thought Duncan played one of his better all-around games with the obvious exception of his shooting. I imagine Beilein saw the looks he was getting and figured he would start hitting them at some point.
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Not sure why you need such elaborate means to convince yourself that this was a comfortable win. It’s much easier than that. If Watson and Davis are on the floor at the end, it was a comfortable win.
Not sure why you need such elaborate expectations to convince yourself that it wasn’t comfortable. And you really need to get your reality in check if you think Michigan should be beating every conference opponent by 20+
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Such elaborate means as an auto-generated win probability chart? Woof, no stats academic experience it seems.
Really want to know Z’s condition - that did not look great for the back. Livers was too focused on getting his part of the defense right - that’s about as bad of a non-callout on a screen as you’ll see…
Beilein said he should be fine (see Ethan’s article above). I think the problem on the last play was that Livers was in at the 5 which is a spot he’s not used to and calling out that screen is usually the 5-man’s job.
Looking back and looking ahead, one thing I don’t understand is why show the zone last night?
Your best chance to beat Michigan is at home. You just threw out the element of surprise and Michigan will be ready for it next Tuesday.
Maybe the answer to Norhtwestern’s struggles this year falls on the coaching staff.
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Just clicked the link and saw it a few minutes ago, many thanks. Hope they’re right that he’s all good. That makes sense about Livers being asked to do something new - probably was why he was also kind of looking at his feet, trying to make sure he was in the exact right position, which is when you miss something like Pardon walled up at midcourt…
“I want him to hunt,” Beilein said. “But there’s certain shots that you hunt that just aren’t — they’re tough 2s — and they’re just not good analytically. And it’s proven, they’re not good shots to take.
I’m so glad our coach isn’t one of the analytics deniers on this. I was watching a game and someone passed up a 15 footer to drive and the color guy said he hates how the mid range game is being used less. A couple possessions later someone took a pull up jumper with one foot on the line and like 20 seconds on the shot clock and it was supposedly “just the kind of shot he likes to see.”
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You’re probably more likely to get blown out on the road - at home, they may think the crowd can carry them some. They’re going for it, and they desperately need something like a road win at Michigan - I can see why they rolled the dice and figured it was worth a shot. Also, they simply have massive problems with foul trouble and needed something to get themselves to the latter stages of the game. Personally, I think they got away with foul upon foul upon foul as the refs swallowed the whistles and the first half was almost over by 7:26 pm. I thought they got a good 6-7 minutes of free fouling and they still ended up in foul trouble.
Anyone who thinks a long two is a good shot in 2018 is just dumb.
They’ve been playing zone a bunch lately, I believe, so it wasn’t a big reveal.
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From Beilein’s presser: “And so, had [X] inbound the ball late, and if you hear me yelling ‘Ohio’ it means he’s inbounding the ball.”
Clearly JB doesn’t take rivalries as seriously as some others…
I hadn’t watched them much recently, so just never noticed. I can’t recall them going zone a full game though.
That’s kind of my point. Congratulations, your zone kept you close on the road but you lost. Now you have a better chance at losing at home because Michigan will come prepared for it. (Which Beilein helped tear up in the 2nd half anyway)
I just can’t imagine them going back to that zone and Michigan struggling with it.
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I think they’ve played different zones under Collins, but have been playing the matchup a fair bit lately. I don’t have the stats for just how much or anything, but enough that Beilein said in his presser that they’d been trying to simulate it in practice. JB also pointed out that it’s not a typical zone, as they’ll follow cutters sometimes, etc., so it’s not always easy to spot just casually watching a few minutes of a game.
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