Recruiting concerns.

There is an elephant in the room. We dance around it and it's time to stop. We don't have the proper athletic talent at our 4 and 5 spots. We try and win with middling talent in the paint and stretch 4 and 5s!?!?! This is not going to work for this program in my opinion. The Center for SMU had 8 dunks tonight. 8! That's absolutely a result of inadequate recruiting and coaching in the paint. We have som great wing players but we sorely lack in the paint. We are one of the worst rebounding teams in the B1G year in and year out and have to shoot extremely well to win. Connecticut ..Xavier and SMU all featured athletic front lines and all 3 embarrassed us badly. Many will think we lost tonight because Caris shot miserably. We lost because we have guys playing in the paint that simply can't get it done. It's very similar to our line backing core down the stretch. The level of athleticism simply isn't there to compete on an elite level.

 

The Xavier game sticKS out most because that Center was from Detroit....and he manhandled us. We have 3 players at the 5 spot that are not physically able to compete on an elite level. Moritz may get there and has talent and youth on his side. He may turn out to be an exception and is very likeable. The other 2 just have not progressed and are assuredly great kids...but not effective simply put. Why does DJ Wilson not play? He's by far the best athlete and plays the least. It's a head scratcher for me because his ceiling suggests that he'd be worth the invested minutes. He gets scrap minutes...and is our best athlete in the paint. This wouldn't be as troubling if there wasn't more of the same coming down the pipe in recrutiing. We still don't have an athletic big coming in for the next 2 classes and Beilein seems to be willing to settle with this. This is simply upsettling. Webber...Howard....Baston....Taylor...Trayor......hell even Courtney Sims and J. Morgan! Where are our athletic bigs these days? It sure seems like everyone else has them. We used to have them and we've gotten completely away from it.

 

You do NOT win without athletes in the paint. Simple and plain. The notion that we can shoot our way around it or hit on one single big recruit (Mitch) in a 4 year span is absolute rubbish. Something needs to change. Michigan used have some of the most dynamic athletes in the country in the paint and until we get back to that it's just going to be hard to stomach. We need to recruit Detroit for starters and play our athletes. We can continue to avoid this elephant and make excuses as to why we are consistently losing to physical front lines...or we can adapt and change. We are not going to win without help in the middle. 8 damn dunks from one player.....that's not even pride. If Bacari is in charge of the bigs....then he needs to be held responsible because it's awful. Youth is something everyone plays with and isn't an excuse.

 

Recruit Detroit please...or at least fight like hell to do so. Tired of seeing homegrown talent go elsewhere and us running to the damn burbs to grab underrated kids who don't play with the same explosiveness and passion. Enough is enough. Your 5s don't need to be able to knock down 20 foot jumpers. That's horse crap. Get some dogs in the paint. We look straight up soft right now and thats the worst thing to look like.