The Book
1/3/2021 – Michigan 85, Northwestern 66 – 9-0, 4-0 Big Ten
The Book™ is one of the most durable sports clichés because it has the dual advantages of being accurate and exciting. Very good players with exploitable flaws exist. Coaches who can see just as clearly as anyone else that the regular stuff isn't working can tinker up weird stuff to go after those flaws. When it works, the very good player gets blown up. You can see why, even as a schmoe watching from home. Expectations get upset. Question marks about the future abound. The player has been Booked, and all opponents going forward will throw The Book™ at him until he finds a way around it. If he finds a way around it.
The canonical Booking also results in a paradigm-shifting upset. I probably do not have to tell you, the Michigan fan, this. The football program is currently in its throes of misery largely because they got hit with an all-time Booking in the 2018 Ohio State game. Michigan entered with the #1 defense in the country by metrics both basic and advanced. Incredibly to modern ears, they were favored to win.
Reader, they did not win. Ten million crossing routes later I was drinking whiskey in a forest while Don Brown began the three-year process of bleeding out on the table.
A less-depressing example: Ohio State stuck Aaron Craft on Nik Stauskas late in a win against the Burke team and it resulted in a crucial, dogged turnover. Tom Crean had some ideas about that, so he stuck Yogi Ferrell on Stauskas the next year. Stauskas scored 6 points in a gross 62-53 loss; Iowa then limited Stauskas to ten by putting Mike Gesell on him. Mike Gesell! There are hundreds of Mike Gesell pictures on the internet and four of them are of Mike Gesell playing defense. I don't want to paint with too broad a brush but generally speaking this guy, who is 6'1" and was coached by Fran McCaffrey, should not be shutting down the #8 pick in the NBA draft.
This is just my opinion.
The Book™ on Stauskas was to put your point guard on him and he'd freak out. Aaron Craft, defensive player of the century, was next up. Stauskas shot over him, going 3/6 from three, and that was the end of that, more or less. Watching Stauskas have a weakness and then overcome it was one of the more entertaining subplots of the year. And that's why people talk about books. They're real.
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Michigan's been on the disappointing side of bookings quite a bit. This is just the nature of where Michigan programs are in the firmament: usually good enough (or boring enough) to get by without weird adaptations, rarely so good that there aren't holes to exploit. Sunday's game against Northwestern is a rare instance of Michigan dropping it on someone else.
Northwestern entered with an explosive, pretty five-out offense that relied on Pete Nance being a perimeter mismatch for opposing centers. Michigan stuck Franz Wagner on Nance. This looked like a bad idea for a couple possessions on which Robbie Beran—currently a 13% usage guy—drove past Hunter Dickinson and dropped it off to Nance after Wagner had to help. Once Howard started icing ball screens, that spigot turned off and Northwestern was forced to start taking jumpers:
Collins had a great game plan early - pick/pop to suck Dickinson out + put Kopp/Nance on same side as shooter/dunker so that Livers couldn’t help on dumpoffs.
— LAbound (@LAbound2) January 4, 2021
Juwan took all of 3mins to effectively end the game. He responds w/Eli icing the screen=no more Kopp/Nance on same side pic.twitter.com/0JptqKUSja
Nance had Northwestern's first eight points on those two early dunks and two tough face-up jumpers. He had one bucket in the last 36 minutes. He finished with one assist and three turnovers. Northwestern's offense, which had been generating a ton of good looks fast, turned back into last year's pumpkin.
As this is happening, Robbie Hummel says that this is the new reality for Northwestern and they're going to have to adjust to it. Because Juwan Howard just gave them The Book™.
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I was pretty positive about Juwan Howard's hire when it happened and thought that he was a good bet to succeed because he did not have a profile like the various other NBA-to-college hires. I do remember thinking that Howard was going to have to recruit at a higher level than Beilein because no one was going to match Beilein's ability to spin straw into a hellish rain of three pointers.
A year and change later Michigan is playing gorgeous offensive basketball and forcing opponents into a Yaklich level of bad, long twos. The shooting splits are so, so sustainable. Michigan is top 20 in: forcing long twos, defending long twos, preventing shots at the rim, and converting at the rim. That latter is not just Hunter Dickinson. Brooks, Wagner, and Brown are all 80%+ there. Livers is 63%; micro-mite Mike Smith is 58%. Michigan is generating great looks for everyone.
This is not a John Beilein team coasting through on the experience of the departed. This site has pushed the "Wile E Coyote year" concept for a while now, the idea being that the dropoff from coaching turnover doesn't really show up until the second year because in year one you've got a lot of the same guys running the same stuff. This should be Michigan's Wile E Coyote year, and is in fact trending to be so in the turnovers department. But Howard's overcome that because his team has a 23-point gap between its two point offense and defense. And they just wrote the book on Northwestern.
This is going pretty well.
[After THE JUMP: NET approaches WAB]
BULLETS
The actual defensive number. Northwestern scored on every possession after the rotation guys exited, racking up 12 points on those 7 possessions. Drop those out and Northwestern scored 0.84 PPP. That is their worst outing by almost a tenth of a point. Their loss to Pitt is next up with 0.91.
Franz get a triple double with blocks challenge. I think Wagner turned in Michigan's first inverse trillion—fill up every column in a tempo-free box score—of the year with an incredible 14-10-5-5-2 line. Five blocks from a wing is a shock even though I wrote this after the Nebraska game:
Wagner, on the other hand, has tremendous length and enough agility to alter perimeter shots. … Perimeter contests are usually more about making the opposing player uncomfortable than actually forcing the opposition to change what he's doing. Wagner contests are occasionally something more.
He blocked three perimeter looks in this game, one of them from a 6'7" guy.
One of the more dominant defensive performances you will see from a wing last night from Franz Wagner.
— Eric Shapiro (@eric_shap) January 4, 2021
He was everywhere -- providing rim protection, rotating to cut off drives, blocking jump shots, and defending at the point of attack: pic.twitter.com/kp8LigF7Rq
His offense was almost beside the point but 14 points on 12 shot equivalents plus five assists against one turnover is a quality outing as well.
a quiet 19 [Campredon]
Pick your poison. John Beilein had offenses that finished #1 and #3 in the country in back-to-back years despite losing the Naismith winner after the first of those. That second year was the Stauskas year, except insofar as it was the everyone year. Usage for the starters:
- Nik Stauskas: 24%
- Caris Levert: 21%
- Glenn Robinson: 21%
- Derrick Walton: 18%
- Jordan Morgan: 16%
(McGary did edge ahead of Stauskas but in only 13% of Michigan's minutes.)
This year's edition:
- Hunter Dickinson: 25%
- Isaiah Livers: 19%
- Franz Wagner: 19%
- Mike Smith: 17%
- Eli Brooks: 17%
This level of balance is brutal for opposition defenses, who can never hide bad defenders and are vulnerable to having closeouts attacked by anyone on the floor.
So two of the last three opponents have hard doubled Dickinson when they could and Michigan has still eaten their lunch. Nebraska
"held" Michigan to 1.1 PPP largely because Michigan didn't hit the wide array of open three point looks at the same rate they did yesterday; Northwestern was getting nuked for almost 1.3 before walk-on time.
And Dickinson still went for 13 and 19 efficient points in those games, give or take some turnovers vs woulda-coulda assists vs Nebraska.
graaaaaaaaaaaah! [Campredon]
I CANNOT THINK OF ANY GOOD ELI BROOKS DUNK NOMENCLATURE! I cherish this "Eli Brooks thunderdunks once per game" thing. I just saw him thunderdunk, and it was amazing and unexpected. This time when he thunderdunked, it was still amazing and unexpected:
Okay. So ...
— Michigan Men's Basketball (@umichbball) January 4, 2021
These ✌ DUNKS by Eli Brooks are just incredible. However we can’t decide which is better?
The floor is yours 〽️ nation#GoBlue pic.twitter.com/U8EYUt2Mcy
This is entirely unfair but I mostly think of Eli Brooks as a mouse who was turned into a human by a wicked sorcerer and is forced to play basketball so he can go back to being a mouse. I'm pretty sure no amount of additional information will ever shake me of that opinion, which means that every Brooks thunderdunk will be a mindblowing experience. LFG.
[Campredon]
Going up. Chaundee Brown is reaching Zak Irvin levels of "yep, that's going up." If you get him a clean look from three he's going to shoot it. He's getting up 26% of Michigan's shots when he's on the floor, edging out Dickinson in that category. He's also shooting 62/40, so this is not a complaint.
In fact I think Isaiah Livers should be more like Brown. Livers had three turnovers in this game and two of them came after he turned down three-point looks that seemed like reasonable end points for a possession. Livers is a career 40% shooter from deep. If he gets an open look he should take it almost all the time. His TO rate has gone up seven points as he tries to get more aggressive and be more of a creator. It would be one thing if this team really needed that from someone; it doesn't.
A trepidation. Northwestern's backup C, Ryan Young, got 17 minutes. He's a traditional back-to-the-basket center without a lot of athleticism; he does have a fair bit of craftiness. Dickinson didn't exactly get roasted but he did give up a couple of buckets where Young's footwork and patience won out after an extended post possession.
It's not too hard to swap out Young for Luka Garza and see those buckets happening, except far more frequently. Dickinson will no doubt get his on the other end. Still, I think it's likely the senior gets the better of the freshman. One mitigating factor: the two guys faced off all summer, so this won't be new territory for Dickinson.
Please do not shoot the messenger. Maybe this shouldn't be a tech, but it's a tech:
Rather than a tech, Chaundee Brown should’ve been awarded 5pts for this possession w/the following distribution:
— LAbound (@LAbound2) January 4, 2021
+1 for giving Boo Buie nightmares
+2 for the actual dunk
+1 for maintaining conditioning w/chin-up
+1 for delivering overhand right that would’ve floored Ivan Drago pic.twitter.com/2rOWUXoVWr
You can hang on the rim, sometimes for a surprisingly long time, without getting a call. The chin-up is a tech. It's class B tech that's one free-throw and no personal and you're up 26 so go for it… but it is always going to get called.
NET out, funny. Michigan checks in sixth in the initial NET rankings, which is a few slots higher than Torvik's NET approximation had them. A reason for this that apparently slipped by everyone's radar:
The NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Committee announced that beginning with the 2020-21 season, the NCAA Evaluation Tool will be changed to increase accuracy and simplify it by reducing a five-component metric to just two. The remaining factors include the Team Value Index (TVI), which is a result-based feature that rewards teams for beating quality opponents, particularly away from home, as well as an adjusted net efficiency rating.
The TVI has been adjusted as well. This makes it sound like it's very close to Wins Above Bubble or various strength of record measures:
In addition, the overall and non-conference strength of schedule has been modernized to reflect a truer measure for how hard it is to defeat opponents. The strength of schedule is based on rating every game on a team's schedule for how hard it would be for an NCAA tournament-caliber team to win. It considers opponent strength and site of each game, assigning each game a difficulty score. Aggregating these across all games results in an overall expected win percentage versus a team's schedule, which can be ranked to get a better measure of the strength of schedule.
We'll have to see how it works out over the course of the next few years but a few rankings pop out: #12 St Louis, #13 Boise State, and #16 Colgate(!). Colgate is a clear Too Little Data So I Make Big: their season to date consists of two games against Army, one of them a 44-point blowout, the other a two-point loss. St. Louis and Boise are more interesting.
Boise State has a four point win at BYU, a ten point loss at a top-ten Houston team, and then various wins against teams 200+. They've got some huge blowouts in there—a 52 point win against SJSU, a 47-point win against New Mexico, a 41-point win over Sam Houston State—that are the only plausible reason they'd be ranked in the top 20.
St Louis has a more credible top 20 resume with wins against LSU and NC State and a sole loss at Minnesota but again their resume has some giant blowouts against bad teams on it.
I'm not going to dump on an early-season descriptive ranking in the weirdest season in anyone's lifetime but I'll be curious to see if these teams continue to seem overrated because of giant wins over bad teams.
Oh, right, the funny part:
The first NET ranking of the season are out:
— Brendan Quinn (@BFQuinn) January 4, 2021
6. Michigan
119. Michigan St.
12 Big Ten teams in the top 51 of the rankings. https://t.co/T5SZLXst5P
BTW, MSU is still ranked in the AP poll.
BONUS: is KPI still on the teamsheets? Take KPI off the teamsheets.
KPI has to be the worst ranking system in existence.
The league: it's good. Great googly moogly:
The Big Ten is stronger, by far, than it’s ever been in the KenPom era. pic.twitter.com/t7yEP0FjMZ
— John Gasaway (@JohnGasaway) January 4, 2021
Outlier results are more likely when there's less data but—barring a historic tournament collapse—this is the third straight season the Big Ten is going to set a new efficiency margin record. It makes sense: Rutgers has gone from being one of the worst teams in the country to a top-20 outfit, Illinois is back, Iowa is at a generational peak, Minnesota's having one of its better seasons in the past couple decades, etc. There's only one hopeless team, Nebraska, and they look like they'll be interesting under Hoiberg as early as next year.
January 4th, 2021 at 2:28 PM ^
sparty at 119 is delicious.
also of note - kenpom currently projects them to finish 14-12. izzo finishing near .500 would make 2021 my favoritest hoops year ever. i can't bring myself to imagine sub-.500, though. life can't get that good.
January 4th, 2021 at 2:57 PM ^
They'll still be rewarded with a 15-seed at large bid...
January 4th, 2021 at 3:03 PM ^
And Izzo will give a backhand compliment to the selection committee.
January 4th, 2021 at 2:35 PM ^
I had the same jaw dropping reaction to the Eli dunk vs Maryland as the first time I saw MAAR thunder dunk as a freshman... Wha? did you see that?
January 4th, 2021 at 8:31 PM ^
The best is Anthony Wright's reaction on twitter
https://twitter.com/itsAntWright/status/1345923454386794505?s=20
January 4th, 2021 at 2:36 PM ^
Random FYI- The A10, where St. Louis plays, is having a very strong year so if they keep winning they should stay pretty high up the rankings. Maryland had a minor scare from La Salle over the break; that team was predicted to finish 13th in the conference.
January 4th, 2021 at 6:04 PM ^
Where is Oakland expected to finish in the Horizon league?
January 4th, 2021 at 2:37 PM ^
The guy who does KPI is Kevin Pauga the Associate AD at MSU right?
He tweeted out something today (@kevinpauga) explaining that early NET outliers are a result of small sample sizes either of # of games payed or # games played by opponents, Not sure WHY he felt the need to tweet that out today.
By the way MSU is rated #19 by KPI's metrics while M is at #49......... (Apparently KPI numbers don't directly relate to rankings) Also of note -#19 MSU has already LOST to the number 79, 82, and 165 ranked KPI teams (UW, Minn, NW)
January 4th, 2021 at 2:49 PM ^
If your "metrics" are spitting Gonzaga out at 18 and MSU at 19, I'm just gonna assume that your "metrics" aren't even as good as a random number generator.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:38 PM ^
KPI hasn't updated since 11/25/20 according to the website. All the rankings are still based off of one or no games played.
January 4th, 2021 at 9:29 PM ^
In that case, what's the point of having a metric if you spit out one set of rankings on the first day of games and then do nothing for the next five weeks?
His index remains terrible at doing the thing it's designed to do.
January 4th, 2021 at 2:41 PM ^
I've said this in a previous thread, but I get strong Brent Petway vibes (in a good way) from Chaundee Brown:
-Highly athletic
-High energy/morale on the court
-Bull in China shop approach that can drive you crazy at times, but is mostly fine.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:04 PM ^
My memory of Petway is fuzzy at this point....but did he ever hit a jump shot? Let alone 40% of FIBA-distance three pointers? I think Zak Irvin is a more interesting comp at this point both good and bad. Irvin worked his tail off on defense at multiple positions and was probably never a great defender but put his all into it. Irvin was a good shooter who made you cringe any time he dribbled. Irvin didn't really have a natural position but was able to play multiple spots.
January 4th, 2021 at 5:05 PM ^
Irvin made people cringe when he dribbled but only because he was at times a primary creator. Overall he was a solid handler. By his senior year he was as much of a slasher as he was a 3pt shooter (in part because his shot got out of control form wise). In the GLeague he's a pure slasher and doesn't shoot 3s at all. Brown is a genuinely horrific ballhandler at the moment.
Irvin's senior year only 42% of his attempted 3s were assisted. 100% of Brown's are thus far. Irvin also took 186 mid range shots and 9.5% were assisted. Then 28.4% of his at the rim attempts were assisted. SO he was pretty much always creating his own shot at a level Brown is not at all capable of.
Offensively Brown is more GRIII (dunks and 3s), with some THJ confidence sprinkled in.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:15 PM ^
I mean, I agree until the "at times, but is mostly fine" part. For Petway, it was "most of the time, and is rarely fine (because he wasn't skilled at all)."
January 4th, 2021 at 3:16 PM ^
Eh. Petway was a tall, skinny dude with an insane vertical, maybe the best leaper we've ever had. He didn't have a lot of skill (and Amaker wasn't awesome at player development) but scored from his incredible athleticism . . . he was sort of like Dennis Rodman, but without the same inner drive (and weirdness).
Brown's a shorter, much more muscular guy with more skill.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:25 PM ^
For me, the best comp for Chaundee Brown is undoubtedly Wesley Matthews of the Lakers. Very similar physical profile + skillset, with Chaundee an inch or two taller.
January 4th, 2021 at 4:30 PM ^
Thought it was unanimous that Chaundee = Michael Finley?
January 4th, 2021 at 5:27 PM ^
Have to account for defense a bit (Chaundee better at college level) and the fact that Finley was a far superior athlete vertically with a bit more size.
January 4th, 2021 at 6:49 PM ^
Spot on doppelganger but their games are very different (see Matt EM post).
January 4th, 2021 at 4:40 PM ^
If I was going with a Michigan comp, I would probably say Hardaway Jr. Obviously Brown is more muscular and tighter defensively and THJ was a bit more refined offensively.
January 4th, 2021 at 2:43 PM ^
Why exactly did Fred Hoiberg take the Nebraska job? Really weird career move for him. He really should have just stayed at Iowa State for the long haul.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:51 PM ^
NBA came calling so he took the Bulls job before flaming out. That's why he's in Nebraska
January 4th, 2021 at 3:57 PM ^
I know, but he was still a desirable commodity at the college level. A guy who won big at Iowa State just a few years earlier should not have been desperate for suitors.
January 4th, 2021 at 4:10 PM ^
I wouldn't say Nebraska is a desperation job. It's in the biggest and best basketball conference (suck it ACC), has the BTN money, new facilities (remember the TVs in the bathrooms?) and when Nebrasketball gets good it can be fun and competitive.
I don't know his history but he's been in Iowa and Illinois as his last two career stops so it makes sense to stay in the Midwest. I can't think of any other jobs that would be obviously better. And if he's successful, maybe one of the big names will be interested soon. Coach K, Roy Williams, and others are getting up there in age and won't be around forever so when they retire, there will be a chain reaction of open jobs.
January 4th, 2021 at 4:19 PM ^
Under different circumstances the Nebraska job might not be that bad, but they are down at a time when the conference is super strong. Nebrasketball might not get better for awhile. Somebody's got to finish last and it looks like it's not going to be Rutgers anymore.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:01 PM ^
Is it me or did Hunter Dickinson even look a little scared of Chaundee after that dunk? Love the energy and emotion Chaundee brings to his role and this team.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:01 PM ^
A couple of other under-rated things from the game last night that I think are worth mentioning:
- UMHoops pointed this out but on the possession right after Chaundee gets the tech for monster-dunking on the rim.....Juwan draws up a back-door alley-oop for him to monster dunk again. Unfortunately he botched it. Love that coach went right back to him for another dunk - awesome.
- Sometimes it appears like Chaundee is an impactful defender with how aggressive he is right off the bench, but this was another excellent defensive night for Brooks that will go under the radar. Boo Buie played 25 minutes and scored 0 points. Yes, he got dinged, but he still played most of the game and Brooks neutralized him (with a little help from Chaundee too).
- Mike Smith turns the ball over 2-3 times per game in frustrating fashion, but otherwise he has been the perfect floor general for this team. He is very good in ball screens, he hits open shots when asked, he can handle a couple of possessions per game where someone needs to attack and get a shot, and despite being the smallest person we've put on the court in years he works his ass off on defense. He isn't ever going to be "good" on that end, but he's been better than anything we hoped for.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:20 PM ^
Brooks is starting to get a little recognition for his defense around here, but yes, this is why he plays so many minutes a game. He is a very sound defender, and has underrated athleticism. He's more than just a try hard. His main difficulties is that he's usually a lot shorter than the guys he's guarding since he's a short-ish combo guard. But he's very good at staying in front of guys and is always in the right spots. And he tries hard but that is really important on defense!
January 4th, 2021 at 3:24 PM ^
Excellent points, AC.
I'll add to the praise for Brooks - he played a terrific game yesterday, and his play all year has been really good - mature, smart, balanced.
He's a great example of a guy who continues to improve over the course of his time at UM, finally blossoming as an upperclassman.
Great job, Eli!
January 4th, 2021 at 3:30 PM ^
Eli's best value as a defender, which is why it often goes under appreciated, is off the ball. He is always going to get the assignment on the best ball-handler and chase him around screens all day. Now that Franz has become a plus defender and Livers/Brown are both a little above average we have a solid defense despite Dickinson being a freshman and Smith being 5'9".
January 4th, 2021 at 4:34 PM ^
Eli is showing out this year because he's more comfortable in the role aside Mike Smith. Playing with X was a contrast in styles and expected useage rate. A little different when your backcourt partner passes you the ball, and clears the area to allow you to create.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:22 PM ^
The Michigan men's basketball team.....
- Recruits at a high level
- Has a good idea what its philosophy and system are, and recruits to that system
- Has player buy-in to said philosophy and system
- Develops players so that they improve within the system
- Tweaks the system as needed so that it is tailored to each opponent
- Has players that are effective in executing the system
- Utilizes in-game adjustments well to adjust on-the-fly
- Uses halftime well to make adjustments
- Has a positive attitude and clearly enjoys what they are doing
If there's a better way to run a program, I'm not sure what it is. I hope Juwan coaches here for a long, long time.
January 4th, 2021 at 4:06 PM ^
Said exactly what I wanted to say, so much better than I would have said it. +1.
I freaking LOVE this team.
January 4th, 2021 at 5:31 PM ^
I hope Juwan coaches here for a long, long time.
I hope so too, but I don't think he's gonna be around here for as long as we would like. The NBA has been consistently calling since before we hired him
January 4th, 2021 at 8:26 PM ^
I dunno, Juwan made a lot of money as a player and has had a good idea of what the NBA is about. His career moves won’t be based on money or unrealistic NBA expectations. Given his background, humility, love of and gratitude toward Michigan, he may feel he can be more impactful of young men’s lives at the college level than in the NBA. I’m also hoping he’s here for along time.
January 4th, 2021 at 9:58 PM ^
That all makes sense. I hope you're right.
January 4th, 2021 at 10:21 PM ^
He seems to really really enjoy what he’s doing and it shows in how the guys play.
January 4th, 2021 at 10:22 PM ^
I share this hope. +1
January 4th, 2021 at 10:48 PM ^
Agree with this. I also will point out that Juwan was pretty much in tears when he got this job, and he has the #1 recruiting class in the country coming in next year. I just can't see the guy not taking it in and enjoying all this for a few years. At some point he might go after an NBA job but I have a feeling Juwan is going to be everything Harbaugh was supposed to be..and I am sooo ready for this shit!
January 4th, 2021 at 3:29 PM ^
It's amazing how different Franz is than his brother. Franz has incredible gumby arms that come up with blocks out of nowhere and the ability to guard a lot of positions.
Moe had t-rex arms that meant, despite his height, he had a microscopic block rate (just 2% his final year, 1.9% in his career). It seemed like the ball passed through his arms sometimes with the way shorter guys were able to get up shots against him. Offered no rim protection. But obviously was an amazingly skilled offensive player with a pretty shot.
Franz has more than double the block rate despite not even being the primary post defender and hence not the primary help guy. And he has a wonky deep shot that's yet to be very effective. So fun to watch him though (as it was to watch Moe of course).
January 4th, 2021 at 3:29 PM ^
I will cop to thinking Franz wouldn't be as good defensively as he has been this year. Early in I thought he looked a step slow, and maybe that'll be exploited by better players, but right now he's one of the best defenders on a team of plus defenders. Really surprising.
MSU will annoyingly finish fine this year, but they are decidedly not good this year and I don't see them making massive strides forward with their current roster.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:31 PM ^
Those dunks are great, but Eli’s three balls are going in this year. He hit a couple big ones early to push past NW. his defense is stout as well. I heard a lot about him being a liability in the preseason.
January 4th, 2021 at 4:38 PM ^
He shot 36% last year. Only 2% worse than he's shooting this year. Last year, people dismissed that as him only making shots against bad defenses (despite him going 3-6 v Rutgers, 2-5 v MSU, etc.).
He's the Rodney Dangerfield of M bball.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:32 PM ^
One of the many frustrating elements of Michigan fandom over recent years is how things always seem to work out splendidly for Ohio State, the prime example being Urban Meyer falling into their lap when Tressell flamed out. Going from Beilein unexpectedly leaving to Juwan being primed for the job has a similar feel, minus the scandal. Yeah, Juwan is a first-time HC without a couple of national championships… but man the guy can coach, and do it The Right Way. He's the best piece of luck around these parts since we got Harb… nope, since we got…Beilein, my favorite Michigan coach in any sport. Let's hope the good parts of the Urban analogy hold up.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:37 PM ^
What did Eli do different defensively between play 2 and 3 in the video clip? I'm not seeing it.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:48 PM ^
People can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe in the plays where he "iced" the screen, he went over the screen and turned his body to make sure the screen couldn't be used, forcing the ball handler the other way. In the previous plays, he was getting screened and basically trying to fight through it, allowing the ball handler to go to the side the play intended
January 4th, 2021 at 4:41 PM ^
That's correct he stepped over the screen and made the ball handler go the other way than was intended. It's not super obvious because the screener is almost parallel to the half court line, but the key is that he forced the ball handler to go away from Kopp's side / the way NW wanted it to go.
It's not so much that the screen couldn't be used, because stepping over the screen so agressively similarly puts him behind the ball handler playing catch-up (which is why you usually don't do it) but it's more about disrupting the play design which was meant to take advantage of the guys not involved in the pick and roll. It was worth it to give up something on the ball handler to disrupt that.
January 4th, 2021 at 3:40 PM ^
This is entirely unfair but I mostly think of Eli Brooks as a mouse who was turned into a human by a wicked sorcerer and is forced to play basketball so he can go back to being a mouse. I'm pretty sure no amount of additional information will ever shake me of that opinion...I can never un-read this, and now it will be all I can think about every time I see Eli Brooks on the floor. I hope you're happy, Brian.
January 4th, 2021 at 10:04 PM ^
Some mice can really jump!
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