Michigan 86, UMass-Lowell 60
Facing a vastly overmatched opponent without their team leader in scoring, spacing, and uh leading, Michigan stuck to its ultimate weapons: Teske's massive size advantage, and Zavier Simpson's rocket passing. The combo helped to build an early 19-7 lead by the time television viewers joined us after thoroughly enjoying the last five minutes of #2 Ohio State's loss to West Virginia.
Laughing at Ohio State's misfortunes was a good warmup for basketball's second laugher this Christmas Break, which UMass-Lowell played without their third-leading scorer, on one-and-a-half day's rest, and without a player even Nebrasketball coach-turned-announcer Tim Miles (who's pretty good!) would play at forward. Though Juwan Howard made liberal use of his bench, we still got plenty of chuckles from watching Teske and the 6-foot-7 dwarves. We also got 19 assists—ten from Simpson—as the Wolverines took advantage of UML's distinct lack of length. Teske finished with a career-high 25 points (on 16 shot equivalents) in as many minutes, a delight made sweeter as the former Nebraska head coach recounted Big Sleep's previous career high of 20 versus his Huskers. Colin Castleton got in on the action too, with 9 rebounds, three assists, and a block in a solid—if not exactly representative—13 minutes.
Michigan didn't mess around, leaning on their distinct height advantage and running two-big sets [Campredon]
It wasn't all so charming. Most concerning was the first half by Johns, who started in place of Livers and looked awkward trying to guard various little guys and turned an open three attempt into a turnover when he wasn't ready for Simpson's drive and kick. He played the second half with a lot more confidence—the next time X kicked it to him Johns was ready to fake and drive for an easy two, and Johns was there late to help put the game away with his characteristically timely offensive rebounding.
His early giveaway was part of a rather sloppy Sunday afternoon—after climbing back to respectability in this department Michigan coughed up 14 turnovers. This an excusable, if unfortunate, side effect of a team-wide effort to put together a highlight reel of assists. Once Franz Wagner turned up his second wide open three to get the ball to Teske in the paint I was ready for them to just start shooting.
Building confidence [Campredon]
The one guy who didn't seem to mind putting the ball on the basket was Eli Brooks, who was 3/7 from distance, 6/12 on mostly long-ish twos, and unveiled a Rip Hamilton-esque catch and turn jumper that looked like a thing that'll be open against a much higher level of competition. Brooks was also the only Michigan player to play more than 4 minutes without a turnover.
UMass Lowell's slasher corps capitalized on those, of course, scoring, by my count, at least a third of their points on transition drives. The other worrisome bit was the play of Adrian Nunez, who got worked by UML's drivers. That was it for real scoring threats—most of Michigan's defensive possessions featured a handily denied three-point line (UML finished 4/13 with everything either contested or off the hands of a bad shooter), drives into a large man's chest, or bad jumpers that might burble into the basket, bounce off the shot clock, or both.
With Livers out and Wagner a bit under the weather Brooks was Michigan's go-to guy at the arc. [Campredon]
Backup hour featured two points of interest: a Luke Wilson three (yay!) and more good play from Cole Bajema, who racked up a block, an assist, a slam dunk, and two steals in just two minutes.
None of the above moved the needle for the gauntlet coming up nearly as much as losing Livers an to apparent groin injury at the start of this little stretch versus the Lilliputians. Michigan's vacation ends emphatically a week from now as they kick off real Big Ten play with a trip up to Breslin. From there the Wolverines get Kenpom #10 Purdue at Crisler, then visit Minnesota and Iowa. Getting Isaiah back for any of that would be huge.
[Box score after the JUMP]:
December 29th, 2019 at 5:15 PM ^
Was I seeing things when I saw Jaron Faulds have a nice little shimmy and hook shot for a bucket late? According to that box score I was...
December 29th, 2019 at 5:20 PM ^
Looks like they gave that shot to Baird mistakenly.
December 29th, 2019 at 5:22 PM ^
I wonder if Bajema will start taking some of Nunez's minutes.
December 29th, 2019 at 5:25 PM ^
I wonder what's going on in practice that he hasn't already.
December 29th, 2019 at 6:46 PM ^
I have beat this horse to death on the game blogs. I can not see for the life of me why Nunez keeps getting the nod. He gets worked badly on defense and Bajema is shooting better in limited time on the court. Nunez has to be a practice warrior.
December 29th, 2019 at 9:03 PM ^
I know people keep making references to Ben Gedeon from a couple years ago, but Ben Gedeon was a decent LB who is still in the NFL. Nunez just looks lost out there.
Hopefully the light just comes on and he improves but...it's not looking great right now.
December 29th, 2019 at 9:21 PM ^
It's a combination of looking lost and not having the foot speed to keep up on defense. Hes not providing a consistent microwave offense when he comes in either. At this point I would five Bajema more minutes and see what he can do.
December 30th, 2019 at 12:46 PM ^
In those references, Joe Bolden is the "practice warrior" whose playing time seemed inexplicable. Gedeon is the guy who should've played instead, as his senior season and NFL career have shown.
December 30th, 2019 at 10:54 AM ^
I wonder the same. Yesterday, when Nunez got all the first half play, I thought maybe Bajema would get all the second half. When he didn’t, I thought maybe he was being punished for getting back late from Christmas break or something. I respect the coaches judgement because he sees all of practice and games and knows more than I do.
But, here is the thing. IMO, the best that Nunez can become THIS YEAR, is a spot up deadly 3 point shooter that plays below average defense. That would not be all bad.
Bajema, on the other hand, is a better all around player who just needs to make the step up in competition level of play. Based on game action, he has already passed Nunez and could get much better this year. He is just as good of a 3 point shooter, can score in other ways, has a better handle, more length and is at least as good on defense. He could really help us this year as he continues to grow. I am a believer in the notion that game minutes help a player get better. I would like to see him get more minutes with the rotation players.
December 29th, 2019 at 5:26 PM ^
He should. Unless Nunez is practice superstar that doesn’t show up in games, I’m not sure why he’s getting more minutes than Bajema because Bajema has played well in the few game minutes he’s seen
December 29th, 2019 at 6:58 PM ^
Through 13 games here are the stats for Nunez and Bajema.
Nunez: 10 games, 9.7 minutes a game, 2.9ppg, 35.5 fg%, 26.9 3pt fg%
Bajema: 5 games, 5.2 minutes a game, 3.2 ppg, 75 fg%, 50 3pt fg%.
Nunez has yet to get a rebound. Bajema has 3.
December 29th, 2019 at 11:17 PM ^
Bronx blue, in that analogy, Nunez would be Bolden, and Bajema would be Gedeon.
December 29th, 2019 at 11:33 PM ^
I didn't get to watch this game but Nunez has generally been in against starters. Bajema has been coming in in garbage time.
December 29th, 2019 at 5:30 PM ^
How was the crowd? Lot of consternation about prices being too high for a 2/3 empty arena but it didn't look that way on tv.
December 29th, 2019 at 6:12 PM ^
I think only Oregon looked fuller. Great turnout but not very boisterous.
December 29th, 2019 at 8:56 PM ^
"Excusable" turnovers is an interesting concept. Luckily I'm am done coaching and won't have to try to figure out how to teach such a principle.
December 30th, 2019 at 8:33 AM ^
Never change, coach.
December 30th, 2019 at 12:52 AM ^
One correction: The OSU loss was not a road game, it was a neutral site game in Cleveland. It just sounded like a WVU home game on tv. The OSU fans must have been a little subdued for some strange reason.
December 30th, 2019 at 7:26 AM ^
A lot of them were probably coming back from Glendale, having watched OSU lose there, as well.
December 30th, 2019 at 10:35 AM ^
omigod I watched half of this game without realizing it. There was WVU stuff painted on the floor and the Mountaineer fans were LOUD.
December 30th, 2019 at 12:29 PM ^
Seth, much better analysis than offered by newspapers. I am not sure they actually watched the game but just reported on the boxscore results. I was there and not real impressed by the results, though they did beat the point spread and the margin that OSU beat them (20 pts). It seemed to me that M could beat these guys by 30 just by showing up, given the incredible height advantage. What happened was too many uncontested layups by UML, the reported turnovers which seemed excessive against this group, and not great shooting (the >50% was a result of Teske/Castleton/Davis under the basket not jumpers or 3's).
Meanwhile, it was impressive that Crisler was filled to (I would say) 80% and the student section looked filled (in spite of vacation). Crowd wasn't overly boisterous but what is there is shout about when you are playing UML and see a lackadaisical M team rout them.
Perhaps our guys had to have a game to get used to Isiah L's absence. If this carries them to a W at Breslin, then this game was worth it for players and fans alike.
Watched my recorded version of the game too and likewise impressed with Tim Miles' candor and true words of wisdom.
December 30th, 2019 at 1:51 PM ^
I wish Ebi Watson would've stayed....
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