Rebounding and the 5 spot:
-Michigan is 7th in the B1G in defensive rebounding percentage, and closer to 4 than 8.
-Michigan has two of the top 5 individual rebounders (by rpg) - Donnal (3rd) and Walton (5th). Donnal is also averaging 3.5 offensive rbs, 2nd in the league, and 1.5 blocks, t9
-Donnal has the 9th best FG% at 61%,
I think we all knew we wouldn’t be a great rebounding team, but the hope was we wouldn’t be terrible. So far so good (or so not terrible, perhaps). Similarly, I don’t think anyone was hoping that one of our bigs was going to be on the all-B1G team, but the hope was for something decent consistently out of the 5. With Donnal, so far so good (or decent).
Shooting:
-Michigan has two of the top 3pt fg% shooters - and neither are Robinson (at 13 currently, 44%). Walton is at t6 at 47%, and MAAR is at t3 with 50% (though only 10 attempts). Zak is shooting 43% in conference play. Caris was shooting 45% this year and shot over 40% each of the last two years.
This team is one of the best 3 pt shooting teams in the nation and probably the best Michigan has had, with a rotation at the 1-4 positions that goes 6 deep with good to excellent shooters. So that’s the recipe going forward for a pretty good season: great shooting and average rebounding, and that will get us a bunch of wins. If we can get Caris back, which should help keep our two-pt shooting more consistent, and improve just a little on D, we could have something even better.