jon teske is normal mitch
1/13/2019 – Michigan 80, Northwestern 60 – 17-0, 6-0 Big Ten
The inevitable question came in the post-game press conference: what was the difference between Zavier Simpson's shots tonight and the ones that got him lifted for crunch time in Welsh-Ryan? Beilein went for the laugh line first: "the ball went in." The assembled press duly laughed. Same question to Chris Collins, same answer.
One question, to both head coaches, and the exact same answer.
— Big Ten Network (@BigTenNetwork) January 14, 2019
"The ball went in."@coach_collins & @JohnBeilein discuss @Xaviersimpson3's big night. pic.twitter.com/CQESTkNnOz
But because John Beilein is John Beilein, he realized that was flip and dismissive. So he quickly followed that up with "that's a great question" and noted two things. The first: Northwestern was the first and to-date-only team to leave him open like that. The implication was that despite the shots being open Simpson was maybe not mentally prepared to take them.
The second: Simpson took the Northwestern sag as "a personal affront." Northwestern made Zavier Simpson mad. This is inadvisable.
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So anyway there was a heat check at the end of that. It followed on from the first step-back 18-footer of Simpson's career and five makes from three in nine attempts. Heat checks are generally annoying since they are by definition bad shots.
This one had to be taken. Zavier Simpson had to continue shooting ever more improbably until he missed. If he hit the heavily contested off the dribble three that clanged, the next time down was going to be a flip throw.
This is not 'Nam. There are rules. Flip throw.
Perhaps lost in the second-half delirium was the first-half delirium when Jon Teske did more or less the same thing, flinging in three first-half three pointers and subsequently breaking the brains of his opposition. Dererk Pardon went from nine career three point attempts to thirteen without banking another one in. Pardon's backup, Barrett Benson, flung one so wide of the backboard it might have been a poorly-disguised assassination attempt against a photographer.
Northwestern's centers were convinced that this was magical opposite day. They thought they might live out their Steph Curry fantasies, and who could blame them? I counted my limbs last night and was unsure whether to be relieved or disappointed when there were still four of them. Surely in such circumstances a tall man will be permitted to hit career three pointer #3, in Crisler Arena where the walls between dimensions are thin.
It was not to be so for Pardon and Benson, who don't have the reserves of sheer cussedness that Simpson does. They cannot refine their anger to a fine white-hot line and use it for revenge and mincing garlic.
Simpson can. His career has been one long exercise in proving the skeptics wrong. And there were many skeptics, including yours truly. I may have wondered in the MGoSlack chat what Beilein saw in a 5'10" point guard who couldn't shoot. I still wonder what Beilein thought he was getting when he got tired of waiting for Cassius Winston. Beilein's as close as anyone can be to a genius when it comes to doing the basketball, but I struggle to believe even he saw a world in which a player who is the very opposite of everything he's done in 40 years of coaching became the beating heart of a 17-0 team.
But then nobody envisioned a Zavier Simpson heat check in a pulsating arena, either. Expectations are just another way to piss off the last man in the world you want to motivate.
[After THE JUMP: Fun With Torvik, Teske edition.]
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11/28/2018 – Michigan 84, North Carolina 67 – 7-0
Last year's game against North Carolina was a familiar script for Michigan fans. When one of college basketball's blue bloods deigns to play Michigan, it's the old college try for a while. Then the fact that the large men can jump over your head wins out, as it tends to in basketball games.
Sometimes Michigan stayed in contact until the very end, like they did in the Elite Eight against Kentucky. Sometimes they won the damn game, like they did in the Sweet Sixteen versus Kansas. Other times not so much. But even when the positive version of these events were transpiring every lead the opposition got felt like a million points; every Michigan basket was trying to empty the ocean bucket by bucket. Last year it was 20-20 in a flash because Michigan was hitting everything, but even then I was waiting for the bottom to drop out. North Carolina was taking a bunch of good shots. Michigan was taking… shots. They weren't all bad. They weren't all good. They were just shots.
When the lull inevitably came the deficit piled up quickly. Michigan never managed to eat into it. And that was the least unusual thing in the world.
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pre-hat-and-pistols phase[Campredon]
Last night Roy Williams got madder and madder and madder until he was Yosemite Sam in a suit. He was so furious about a four-point first-half deficit that he kept his team in the locker room for the full duration of halftime; when the second half started his team was so sped up that they were taking literally any shot they could get up without devolving into half-court offense. These were universally bricks.
Michigan responded with slick pick-and-roll baskets and open threes. Williams became beet-red at the neck, with the redness inching ever-higher. Jon Teske—honest friar Jon Teske—leveled the basket on an alley-oop dunk that I still do not believe happened; the red flew up Roy's forehead. The meter filled up shortly after. Williams pulled the ultimate high school move: all five starters on the bench, looking forlorn as their backups booted balls into the stands and threw up the kind of shots that are hard to rebound because they come off the backboard so fast they feel like bullets. By the time the starters returned the lead was well and truly insurmountable.
"It was because they stunk it up," Williams said when asked about the lineup change. "Every one of them stunk it up, and so did I." …
"I've got no positive things," Williams said. "If you want positive things, you'd better go out and find someone on the street. I've got no positive for me, no positives for my team."
This was unusual. Michigan has exasperated coaches before. They've rained death from above against half the country. They've never comprehensively whooped one of college basketball's upper crust on both ends. If Michigan could hit a dang free throw they would have cracked 1.3 points per possession. UNC was held under one on the other end.
This wasn't Michigan scrapping out a victory with pluck and an improbable three pointer launched nearly from halfcourt. From the 12 minute mark in the first half on it was a +27 beatdown in which Michigan felt like the better team in everything except getting shots up (but not down) fast. This year it was UNC hitting just shots for a while, and then the bottom dropped out on them. Their vaunted transition game was more curse than gift. Once in the halfcourt they looked around for one on one opportunities and executed far too few of them.
This is a new world.
When a Yaklich defense shoots like a Beilein offense, forget it
— John Gasaway (@JohnGasaway) November 29, 2018
John Beilein's Michigan teams are known for scuffling through early rough patches as the complicated offense comes together with new folks in new roles. Then they hit the warp speed button. Sometimes in January, sometimes in February, but usually around halfway through the year.
What happens when a Beilein team that has ripped Villanova and North Carolina hits the go button? Is there even a button left to push? Where can they even go from here? What's the hole to patch? Okay, other than free throws? I have no idea what the answer to these questions are. I project finding out is going to be fun.
[After THE JUMP: old man game and a deer on fire]
An irregular series about next year's basketball team. Previously: point guard, shooting guard, small forward, power-ish forward.
[JD Scott]
ROSTER
Jon Teske (Jr): 12 MPG last year, top-30 OREB rate, rim protector, 118 ORTG(!) thanks to scanty TOs and huge FT rate. 60% from line.
Austin Davis (So*): Played well in scattered minutes here and there. Projects as traditional big.
Colin Castleton (Fr): Stretch five is Wagner except with crazy gumby arms?
I HAVE SOME QUESTIONS
Wither five-out, and how crippling the loss?
I mean… it'll be fine? Probably?
BIG JON!!
— Michigan Men's Basketball (@umichbball) March 5, 2018
"Right in his grill!" #GoBlue pic.twitter.com/vmDsuLs6ZP
Midway through the season it became clear that Jon Teske had shed his freshman awkwardness and emerged into the kind of rim protector and possession generator that this site has craved for years. Once Moe Wagner became a borderline-NBA-level stretch five we stopped talking about it so much. The burning fire never left, though, for the ultimate Beilein C that doesn't need the ball to do a bunch of stuff.
Teske promises to do a bunch of stuff sans ball like nobody since Mitch McGary. Game columns around here more often than not had some note about how everything was going to be fine even if Moe left, usually citing Teske's excellent OREB rate—which would have been tied for 30th if he qualified for Kenpom leaderboards and got significantly better against better teams—and absurd-for-a-big steal rate. Here's a graph from Bart Torvik of 6'10"+ high major players who played at least 10 MPG:
Ray Spalding of Louisville and Javin DeLaurier of Duke are the only dots in the vicinity. Teske's combination of possession generation and sheer size is otherwise unheard of. That goes a long way toward replacing Wagner's diverse offensive skillset. (If you're curious, Wagner is the yellow dot just under the 2.25% steal rate line. Ethan Happ is the red dot at the very top in the middle.)
Meanwhile Teske's meh 5.4 block rate doesn't do his rim protection justice. This site after the game at Maryland:
Jon Teske didn't score but that might have been his best game of the season? I might be serious about that. His ten minutes saw him contest maybe a dozen shots, several of which looked like easy finishes until he got involved. Teske was able to fall off his defender despite the opposition starting their drive as Teske, back to the basketball, recovered on a pick and roll; he was only hit with one foul; he at one point intimidated Huerter into a bizarre miss.
In about 500 possessions against top 100 teams Teske's presence depressed opponents' 2P% by a whopping six points, at the cost of a slight uptick in threes attempted:
Michigan also forced more turnovers, got more rebounds, and gave up fewer free throws with Teske on the floor.
He even managed to survive against Villanova's pick and roll. Very few Wildcat points could be tied back to Teske's relative immobility. And that's the only question left about his defensive prowess: what happens if he plays Haas against an opponent's Wagner? So far, so good—and a brief survey of the league next year turns up only a couple plausible stretch 5s, give or take annual development. Issa Thiam of Rutgers(!) is the only returning player over 6'8" to put up 100 3s last year, and he's a super-sized Just A Shooter SF. Luka Garza, Isaiah Roby, and Juwan Morgan all tried around 50 with acceptable-ish hit rates and might blow up.
Teske is likely to be a defensive difference maker and shot volume asset.
[After the JUMP: Teske O click, Moe 2.0?]
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