Michigan B-ball discussion thread

Hoping for an upset tonight.  I have been impressed with Matthews, but our PG play is below average and will be an achilles tar heel all year I am afraid.  

Due to work conflicts I haven't been able to watch the basketball team much this year and tonight will be the first one. I'm not sure what to expect with all the new faces in important positions but I'm hoping for a good game!

My school, Davidson, plays UNC on Friday.  Im looking for the rare back-to-back double win from my two teams over the same school in the same week.  Ideally, Michigan would humiliate and tire the Heels out so much that Davidson can dagger some threes en route to a huge win.

I am looking for fundamentals---defense and boxing out primarily.  Defensive intensity is what allowed last year's team to jump the chasm from decent to a very good team. 

The big ten is currently getting its ass handed to it in out of conference play so we need to win some of these games.  Going to be difficult raising our profile wih only two top 50 rpi  4 top 100 rpi teams in the league.  

Don't think this will be that game so just looking to see some good play.

North Carolina basketball is one of those programs I despise.  So naturally I expect them to drain everything they attempt tonight, sadly. 

And it's probably natural to expect them to show the Chris Webber timeout and then reference it about 5 more times.

I predict a looooooong night.   

I posted this on a different site, but I figured I could copy it here for people going to the game. Regarding food in CH...

"On Franklin St. (30 min walk from the Smith Center to the closest restaurants) Al’s Burger Shack is featured on a lot of those food shows, but it doesn’t have TV’s or much seating. Spanky’s, Four Corners, Might As Well, Linda’s or R&R Grill for your usual bar and grill type food where you can watch other games. Spicy 9 is a great Sushi place and Mellow Mushroom is a southern pizza chain, both have many TV’s. For the post game drinking, Carolina Brewery and Top of the Hill are both great breweries, but usually will have long waits post game. Goodfellows, Blue Horn Lounge, and He’s Not Here are all bars that I see get recommended a lot.

Franklin St. gets pretty busy after games and there can be long waits, so some other options in CH not in easy walking distance are Tobacco Road Sports Cafe, Hickory Tavern (Highly recommended for awesome southern food), Town Hall Grill, and Steel String Brewery."

I watched NC's game with MSU.  Basically, in the first 5 minutes every single shot NC attempted in the paint got blocked or altered and that decided the game.  From then on whenever NC got to the hoop they were tentative and tried to make some uneccesary circus shot instead of going up strong because they were afraid of getting it blocked.  We do not have that kind of rim protection.  NC was cold from 3, but most of them were highly contested.

NC was also playing its 3rd game in 4 nights far from home and fatigue might have been a factor against a deeper team like MSU.  Berry did not lok himself.  

I think we need to play fast and move the ball quickly, we can get open looks if the ball moves quickly.  Defensively, NC was averaging 93 a game before MSU, this could be tough on the road in a bounce back game for them.  You hope they are still cold from the floor.

doesn't really have a go-to scorer that they can depend on when the offense stalls. That is going to be their fatal flaw come tournament time.

If Michigan can continue to shoot well from 3s and not allow a lot of transition opportunties plus 3 pt attempts, they have a chance.

Have to be in Raleigh this week, and conveniently planned the trip around going to the game in Chapel Hill tonight.  Go Blue!

Let's see where we are.  Point guard?

Go Blue.