All our players had fouled out, MSU could have won by 50 like in the Amaker days!
Why was Iggy the only one allowed to foul out? He should have had company!
Oh my God. We don't recruit for shit. What ass! Get rid of Belein!!!!!
/IBM
(In before Maizen)
This loss was a real team effort: players, coaches and refs.
The phantom travel call on Teske which should have been an and one and 4th foul on Winston. Was the real travesty
The way tonight went Teske should have gotten a flagrant one.
Don't forget the MSU guard falling down on his own and Z getting a foul.
So, on the Loyer call. I thought this at first too but go back and watch it. Z pulls on his arm causing him to go down. I thought it was a smart chance to take, but the ref caught it.
Lots to be upset about when it comes to the refs, but that call was fine.
I think it depends upon where you decide he had possession. If he had possession when he got his first hand on the ball, it was a travel. If he had possession when he got his second hand on the ball, it wasn't. It looked like a travel live and it looked clean in slow-motion, and that's why.
March 10th, 2019 at 12:34 AM ^
It wasn't a travel either way. You can take a step as you catch the ball (not only that, he didn't even step; it's just that his feet hit the ground at a different time which to the untrained idiot ref looks like a step). The second step was a pivot with an established pivot foot that never left the floor. It was a complete Breslin Special of a call.
March 10th, 2019 at 10:09 AM ^
Or from 55sec remaining to 35sec remaining when michigan was down and trying to foul, and the announcers were saying "many how many hack jobs are they going to allow Michigan to give right now?" The decision to not call any of those fouls (but as we saw vs PSU to try to do a more obvious foul creates a flagrant 1 situation) effectively ended Michigan's chances of tying it up, and as a point of order there were only 2 sets of end of game type free throws, so it wasn't like that 7-30 ratio was due to 20 FT's in the last 2 minutes.
that bullshit sequence shut the door on us. JB should’ve got kicked out for that one. It was over anyway after that.
30-7 foul shots - is that correct?
March 10th, 2019 at 10:01 AM ^
Actually I think it's larger than simply a free throw differential. Yes, number of calls vs a team matters if you had a desire to manipulate the score of a game. The NCAA doesn't really grade on this though, they look at calls, and whether they were a foul/travel, etc, not really missed calls.
In reality they should be graded on obvious missed calls and secondly on percentage of iffy calls given to each side vs what could have been given. However that would take more work and probably raise some awkward questions. There was a really good ESPN investigative article on the Tim Donaghy scandal, and what his methods were that raises the hair on my neck every time I see a ref acting in a similar fashion. Ignore this at your own risk, especially considering that the risks to the refs (cash) are no longer a concern (bitcoin), and that sports gambling is a much larger enterprise now than it was back then:
Donaghy acknowledged that, yes, he deliberately called more fouls against the side he'd bet against. He told the gambler about other tactics as well. "He said he liked to call an illegal defense call, right away, in the first minute." That way, the gambler said, Donaghy could force the side he'd picked against to play a little less aggressively on defense. "He said he'd pick on the big center, or the most valuable player of each team, and he'd try to get them in foul trouble."
Point of this is simply, early calls against key players can drastically shift the tempo and strategy of a team. Heck, for much of the later part of the 1st half we had two starters in.
March 10th, 2019 at 10:32 AM ^
Thanks for posting the article link. We are not imagining this crap.
March 10th, 2019 at 10:50 AM ^
Heard an interesting interview with Brian Tuohy who wrote books on corruption in sports. The majority of his research is based on FBI investigations. Essentially he says the more money involved in a sport the more likely there are games being fixed. The mainstream media never touched the topic. He spoke of the FIFA scandal and Donaghy mess-which to me seemed to be swept under the rug. If you ask the average sports fan about Donaghy they have no idea what you are talking about. If I see an impact player in NCAA basketball pick up a quick ticky tack 2nd foul first half or a quick 3rd foul early 2nd half I get a little suspicious. Last night fouls 2,3 & 5 on Iggy seemed very weak calls and he was the most efficient scorer on the floor. Feel free to make your own conclusions as to how some players never foul out or get in foul trouble. http://thefixisin.net/
March 10th, 2019 at 11:16 AM ^
You have to get almost to the end of the ESPN piece for this tidbit:
"He said he liked to call an illegal defense call, right away, in the first minute." That way, the gambler said, Donaghy could force the side he'd picked against to play a little less aggressively on defense. "He said he'd pick on the big center, or the most valuable player of each team, and he'd try to get them in foul trouble."
Now I have to check out the link you posted.
30 to 7 free throws
this is gene keady bobby knight type ref manipulation all over again. Its too bad. That isnt anything like what these two teams play like. We dont send a team to the line 30 times without the refs making it a point to help them out.
State has the best player in Casious. They were the better team. It sucks to say it...
Cassius wasn't the best player on the floor tonight. Xavier Tillman was. MSU actually lines up better against Michigan without Ward. Tillman was 4/5 from 2, 9/12 from the line, got 8 rebounds, blocked five shots, and was credited with two steals. Winston scored more points, thanks to his constant parade to the free throw line, but he turned the ball over 5 times and went 1/6 from 3 -- the one, of course, being the one that he missed so badly that he banked it in.
March 10th, 2019 at 12:06 PM ^
I've been saying MSU is better without Ward then with him since the second half of the OSU game when he went down. Their defense is far better and their ball movement on offense is much better without him holding onto and pounding the rock.
March 10th, 2019 at 12:53 AM ^
They do have the best player. The most impactful person on the floor though was the one that decided 23 more free shots should be awarded to MSU.
Winston drew 'fouls' by lunging forward going into his shooting motion and causing most of the contact. His shots in the first half were particularly awkward looking but he got the calls. But if he is so great - why no NBA buzz?
Maybe you don’t send most teams to the line like that, but VERY GOOD teams who do that to everyone, can figure out how to do it to you too?
OR POOR BANKRUPT ILLITERATE STAEE FANS BOUGHT THE REFS OFF, Occam knows what might be true.
NCAA refs are incompetent but big Ten refs take the cake.
Oh well, when they get beat down in the tourney they have nobody to blame but a conference that coddles them
There are no Big Ten refs in basketball, just NCAA refs. We could possibly have these guys call our game again. But at least it will be at a neutral site.
Also, the difference is, at tournament time the refs have a (TV) schedule to keep. Playing 2 or 4 games at one site doesn't allow for 30 foul shots for one team. That's to our benefit.
Wow. Mods deleting every single thread critical of the officiating. After every game, no matter what the sport. I hope I'm not the only person extremely put off by this.
This one was especially ass and deserving of a thread. I can get behind nuking a bunch of duplicates but it's definitely worth discussing this go-around.
It's sad that I'm more relieved that Big Ten play is over than anything.
Brian believes all officiating is 100% unbiased and ALL bad calls are because officials arent good at their jobs.
So anything implying otherwise gets caved
If you listened to the podcasts, you would know that's not true.
My hunch is that he's got his tongue planted in his cheek with that comment, because if you read the blog you know that's not true. Then again, by simply creating this platform of free content Brian has been a target of vitriol from entitled know it all plebes who claim Michigan fandom. I think the logic is more that complaining about the constant reffing ineptness is self defeating because it will never change until they change transparency in sports, which isn't happening.
Michigan didn't lose entirely because of the refs. They lost because of the following...
- They didn't seem to know who their man was on defense. Multiple times guys caught playing no one.
- They didn't play physical enough.
- The takes to the basket were soft. Take the ball to the rim with authority if you want foul calls. Instead they got their layups blocked.
- Michigan missed 5 or 6 layups in the 2nd half.
- Michigan didn't shoot well from the outside.
- The motions on offense looked disjointed. Guys drive, but their are no cutters to pass to.
- Michigan could not stop scramble despite knowing it was coming.
And 23 extra free throws
March 10th, 2019 at 12:13 AM ^
Take the ball hard to the basket, into the chest of the defender, if you want calls. Brazdeikas did and got to the line.
The refs weren't good, but blaming them is ignorant.
March 10th, 2019 at 12:23 AM ^
Actually he didn't consistently. He had a stretch where he took three straight to basket in the second half and got one call despite being fouled all three times. And no MSU was not going any harder to the basket. Flopping on plays with no contact is not going hard. The only thing ignorant is not acknowledging how that big of free throw difference and UM having guys in and out in foul trouble impacted the game. UM did outplay MSU for almost the entire first half despite two starters sitting for half if it, free throws were the only thing keeping them in it at that point.
The only drive he got a call on was the one he took right at the defender. MSU did get into the chest of the defenders and get fouls called. Michigan had a 12 point lead with 3:00 minutes to play in the first half. Michigan played poorly the rest of the way.
The refs were not the sole cause of this loss (as you noted, UM played poorly in a multitude of ways), but "oh the refs were bad but stop complaining" is also ignorant. A poorly officiated game can have a major effect on how teams play and can contribute to other issues, such as stagnant offenses, lack of aggressiveness on defense and rebounding, and sub-optimal substitution patterns.
Iggy also got a total of 4 foul shots, both sets in the second half, about 11 minutes apart. Those weren't the only two times UM tried to generate offense going toward the basket.
IF you saw with your own eyes 7 - 3pointers go in for UM and the ref just waived them off would you say that didnt effect the game? Because thats only 21 points. Yeah 23 more free throws is kinda like that.
It wasn't just the free throw difference, it was that 2 of our 3 airball threes were blatantly obvious hack jobs that didn't get called, but there was no reason not to.
Yep ... we made more 2 pointers and also made more 3 pointers than msu. Go figure that out. It was solely the refs calls. How in the hell they call a foul every time winston shoots in the lane is beyond me. He's as bad as the Wisconsin flopper.
Go Blue!
•Wrong
This isn't all on the officiating, but a 23 free throw differential in this game is ridiculous. Michigan went strong to the hoop, they got hit on the hand or across the arm on drives, they just couldn't get a call. I mean the walk on Teske and then the foul that was waved off was ridiculous. Lamont Harris took out Michigan's best scorer on three rebound foul calls in the space of what 7 minutes, and he called the Teske walk that wasn't. His best call of the night was the charge on Winston that Izzo couldn't even contest because Poole had him. But they coulld have easily called MSU for multiple fouls in the paint for holding and arm bars. They decided not to call that, instead they called touch fouls on drives. Winston's first drive was a blowby with a whisper of contact that was called by Harris.
I think you mean Lamont Simpson, not Lamont Harris.
This game had two referees in KenPom's top 10 -- and Simpson, who is #97. (He ranks them basically by who gets assigned to the biggest games, on the assumption that the conferences are rewarding the best officials with the best assignments).
I still can't figure out how Castleton got called for a foul on the MSU drive to the basket in the first half. I didn't think he touched him.
And Iggy fouled out when he got thrown away from the basket by Tillman. It looked like a hook and hold (by Tillman) and instead Iggy gets shown the door. Odd.
March 10th, 2019 at 12:04 AM ^
Michigan did not go strong to the hoop. They went soft, except for Brazdeikas...and he shot free throws. You have to go at the chest of the defender if you are going strong. That wasn't the case...and it resulted in a bunch of blocks. Also, dunk the ball.
March 10th, 2019 at 12:05 AM ^
What? That doesn't even make any sense.
If you go at the chest of the defender, you're asking to be called for a charge. The goal is to get past the guy, not run over him.
Winston wasn't going into anybody's chest. He was driving by, tossing the ball toward the hoop, hoping it would fall, and going to the free throw line.
March 10th, 2019 at 12:44 AM ^
It is charging if you drop your shoulder and run over a stationary defender.
It is not charging if you jump into the chest of the defender who is in motion...to create space and to draw foul calls.
Winston did go at the chest of moving defensive players on a couple of occasions.
he also dove to the floor without getting touched and drew a foul on Teske. DD praised Tillman for jumping straight up when he landed literally 5 feet away from where he jumped in the direction of Iggy. Rewatch the game, the refs were a shit show
Your point fails when you watch Michigan state take it to the basket and get soft touch fouls and Teske the one time we get it in the post on a mismatch gets called for a bullshit travel.
No team in history is going to overcome a 30-7 foul disparity
Basketball officiating is garbage, it's the only sport where you literally interpret rules on the fly and it's getting exposed by players in the NBA
March 10th, 2019 at 12:56 AM ^
Teske got mismatches a six times or so...and he got the ball twice. My point is still valid. Bad reffing and my point are not mutually exclusive.