Michigan 62 Arizona State 87
Arizona State was having a good time. Frankie Collins was having a good time. Jon Crispin was having a good time pointing out how good of a time Arizona State was having. The 95% Michigan fans in Brooklyn for the championship round of the Legends Classic were not having a good time. I have not checked in on Brian.
Sometimes one team makes shots and the other doesn't make shots, and you get a stupid basketball game. This was a very, very stupid basketball game.
Arizona State made shots. They made pullup long twos. They made fallaways, one-foot jacks, and threes contested and otherwise. They made 30-foot ones over zones, and another off a double-dribble. They went 11/19 on three-pointers and went 21/34 on twos, and the first of those anywhere near the rim was a fall-down flip that Duke Brennan managed to arc over Hunter Dickinson 6 minutes into the game. Michigan meanwhile couldn't get a dunk to go.
Arizona State shot better from the field (56%) in the first half than Michigan did from the free-throw line (53%), then shot 67% from the field in the second half. This was how it went until Collins put a layup over Dickinson on one end, Jett airballed an open three on the other, and Michigan stopped pretending their fortunes might change and inserted the bench.
This went in. [Wilcomes]
I wish I could report that there was anything interesting to this, but Arizona State just hit shots. For the most part they weren't good shots, advisable shots, well-coached shots, well-worked shots, or shots that revealed a fatal weakness in the defense. They just ran around until they thought they had a spot, put it up, and it went down. On the off chance it didn't rattle, roll, or bip bim bounce in, it caromed back out to a shooter who threw it or himself at the basket again, and that went in.
Okay, here's a couple: Frankie Collins put freshmen Jett Howard and Tarris Reed in a blender to create that shot at the rim. And after getting chased around the court by Jace Howard for an entire shot clock, DJ Horne made one off his chest at the horn. Jace Howard: not a guard. Frankie Collins: Still Frankie Collins. Analysis!
Michigan did have trouble against those defenders finding the types of shots they prefer. Frankie Collins in particular had an inspired night shutting down the guy he thought was recruited over him, Jaelin Llewellyn, who wasn't recruited over him. Lanes around the perimeter that were open in Michigan's first three games found Sun Devil arms tipping their passes out of bounds. Joey Baker couldn't get set up. Jett Howard's length made him somewhat immune from all this; everyone else found themselves dribbling until they could get rid of it.
This did not go in. [Wilcomes]
Michigan's guards especially struggled to find Dickinson at the rim, as Arizona State worked to deny him the ball and swarmed when it arrived. That and how luck was running contributed to Michigan getting a bagel from their star for the first 12 minutes. There was a missed dunk, and a bucket that ASU goaltended without a call along the way, but ASU's length and attention also helped hold Michigan's big man to an awful night. Tarris Reed entered with energy, ripping down three boards and drawing two fouls in 4 first-half minutes, but could only make 1/4 of the resulting free throws, part of another awful night at the line for this team. His defense was also hit and miss (see: blender).
Nobody had a more miserable night than Kobe Bufkin, who was 1/9 from the field, with three assists that could have been nine if his teammates didn't clang everything in the first half. He also drew ASU's DJ Horne (19 points, on 14 shots), and Austin Nunez (15 points on 10), neither of whom seemed to miss no matter how ridiculous their attempts. Michigan chipped the lead down to 14 in the first four minutes after the half, with Bufkin finally getting on the board with a layup/and-1 opportunity. But ASU countered with an alley-oop when everyone assumed Horne was taking another contested two from the top of the lane.
That's not to put the scoring on Bufkin. Michigan's strategy of going zone early against a traditionally bad shooting team backfired by getting Horne and Desmond Cambridge Jr. (who was 0/10 from three coming into this game) locked in. That pushed ASU's lead to ten, where it hovered until Nunez entered and hit a horizontal contested jack off the dribble over Bufkin to push the score out to 25-10.
Attempts to whittle away after the half were thwarted by Cambridge, who took over the second half. Out of the under-16 timeout he hit a contested triple, then hit a heat check on their next trip to push ASU's lead back up to 58-39. As Cambridge sat, Horne took over again.
As the baskets piled up for ASU, and Michigan's shooters were more likely to hit the heel than the rim, Dickinson started trying to put Michigan back in it himself. A few tough post moves drew buckets, but he also allowed himself to get swarmed, giving up a block/tie-up, and then several late turnovers.
Michigan finally put it a couple of three-pointers late when Dug McDaniel took a 30-foot heat check, and then Youssef Khayat put up a 35-footer that rattled in off a bank.
Drawing conclusions from this kind of game is beyond my skills. Bobby Hurley's going to conclude this means he's right to just have his career 29% shooters just jack up anything they feel like. QED.
[A cursed box score after the jump.]
November 18th, 2022 at 8:51 AM ^
Jett Howard being as interested in playing defense as old people are interested in winter is gonna be a fun journey to watch. Juwan has himself a bit of a dilemma, if Jett's defense doesnt improve substantially its gonna be open season of questioning about coaches son and special treatment
November 18th, 2022 at 9:33 AM ^
Chalk it up to a bad game early in the season with a young team. Shots just didn’t fall, and ASU made everything- bad combination. Let’s hope Coaches can make adjustments.
November 18th, 2022 at 9:34 AM ^
Dismissing this as a blow-off game strikes me as short-sighted. This is the second game where a (supposedly) inferior opponent shredded the defense. Did ASU get some shot luck? Of course. But there appears to be a team-wide lack of buy-in on the defensive end. In particular, Jett is maddening to watch on defense. Obviously he needs to be on the court for shot-making, but it wouldn't kill him to at least try on D. Like last year with Houstan - he was objectively bad on D for the first half of the year, but he was obviously trying to get it right. That matters.
We also need to figure out how to enter the ball to Hunter versus long teams. I think this team has the potential to be fine in the long run. But ignoring this game as a one-off is to ignore the other 3 games we've played.
November 18th, 2022 at 10:10 AM ^
Agree. I might reluctantly buy this inexplicable game theory if I had not watched us also struggle to beat EMU.
November 18th, 2022 at 10:00 AM ^
I know that lots of folks (and Juwan) seem to love T Williams, but his bad shooting and worse decision making have been obvious for a long, long time. I don't think we've had such a brick-risk since Anthony Wright. Every time TW touches the ball, he's looking to score (spoiler alert - he's gonna miss, badly, and destroy momentum), when instead he should focus on D and boards. Hustle, hustle, hustle. The scoring will come if he focuses on what he might be good at. In the meantime, introduce him to the bench, and let anyone else take his minutes.
Having both TW and Llewellyn (who maybe will get comfortable but sure isn't now) on the court at the same time, puts us at a massive 3 on 5 disadvantage. JL seems like he wants to hide in a corner and TW seems like he's screaming "KOBE!" in his head all game long. I'm not terribly concerned about one game, but it'll get worse if Williams continues getting superstar minutes with IM results. Jace can also score 4 points in 27 minutes - and he'll play with much more effort.
November 18th, 2022 at 10:30 AM ^
I can write off a hot shooting night from ASU. But we can't afford offensive performances like that.
Michigan was a Not Good defensive team last year and they lost their three best defenders (moussa, brooks, jones). All three have arguably been replaced by worse defenders (though I am optimistic about Kobe).
And while they replaced their worst defender too in Caleb, Jett has been bad on that end. He is physically more equipped than Caleb and will likely be a better defender by end of the year but unless he approaches like Franz level it's not mitigating the other losses (from, again, what was already a poor defense).
And the bench defenders are worse too. No more Moussa and Johns with the bench, instead its Reed and Baker. Baker has actually looked decent on that end but not as good as Johns. And while Dug is a pest, he's a downgrade from Frankie on D.
Now, I do think the team can be better on offense this year. There should be real spacing around Hunter now and sophomore Kobe and Jett Howard offer more firepower than we had last year. But as I anticipate a defensive kempom finish somewhere around 100, Michigan probably needs to get into the top 10 or even top 5 to replicate Garza Iowa. That probably looks like an 8th seed. Which is fine, but they can't afford offensive nights like last night, because they don't havethe kind of D they can fall back on on off nights
November 18th, 2022 at 10:41 AM ^
Agreed with Seth that this was just a stupid game.
Frankie didn't destroy us, he had 4 points.
Interesting take on guard recruiting compared to Harbaugh's QB recruiting.
Our new pieces will surely gel over the course of the season, right?
What I can't get over is how HD doesn't look improved and that we just look so CLUMSY as a whole.
November 18th, 2022 at 11:17 AM ^
This notion that every win is a reflection of how good the coach and team are but every loss is attributed to the random chance that a team is just going off and there's nothing you can do about it is absurd. Howard is a bad coach period. You can love the guy all you want because he harkens back to a time when Michigan won a basketball title, one they had to promptly give back, but you shouldn't let that blind you from the mess that's on the court. I'm not solely talking about the basketball team, but also about his behavior. He should have been done coaching at Michigan the moment he slapped another coach, yet he remains. The Michigan "difference" is a lie we tell ourselves and this lie is made evident by his continued employment. If the Michigan difference existed we wouldn't have kept him based on how well he did in recruiting and what that potentially means for future on the court success with competent coaching. This is the behavior of other universities we denigrate constantly for their perceived lack of integrity. This is why the "difference" is a lie because we lack said integrity too. Yes it's easier to say this after a loss but even if he has a Harbaugh-esque rise from the ashes I will not change my mind.
November 18th, 2022 at 12:23 PM ^
Damn bro, relax. Your pearls are gonna spill all over the floor if you keep clutching them so hard.
November 18th, 2022 at 3:09 PM ^
The "clutching your pearls" retort is so cliche and intellectually lazy. It makes me laugh because you're equating my unwillingness to accept physically assaulting other people to something like an old person that can't stomach twerking. When did assualt become okay and something to just accept and get over? That's just asinine, but thanks for the chuckle.
November 18th, 2022 at 12:27 PM ^
he harkens back to a time when Michigan won a basketball title, one they had to promptly give back
When did we give back the 1989 title? News to me.
As for Juwan being a bad coach, the man has a .714 win percentage in the NCAA tournament. I'll take that all day.
November 18th, 2022 at 11:38 AM ^
Thank you Seth for this remarkably accurate recap. It captured my exact feelings about that stupid flukey game. It was a cathartic read.
This is what happens sometimes in basketball. Football is different, where a superior team can simply impose its will by sheer force. The Michigan football team would simply RUN OVER the ASU football team. Basketball is subject to the vagaries of "touch" or an unfriendly rim.
And thank you for the lack of coaching complaints. This stupid game was 0% the result of bad coaching. ASU was throwing up ridiculous, contested jacks all night. At some point I just started to SMH.
I will say, though: Juwan needs to find/play more shooters (YoYo?) and PRACTICE YER DAMN FREE THROWS!
November 18th, 2022 at 12:28 PM ^
I love and admire Seth for his prolific football knowledge and how he has taught me literally everything I know about the game with his writing. But when it comes to basketball, it's not nearly as accurate or insightful.
I agree that ASU was hot and hit a lot of shots. However, I think there were a lot of serious problems with our team that need to be fixed. Mainly I agree with what others have said: defense, rebounding, and hustle. Luckily we've seen Juwan's teams improve on defense over the year, especially during our elite 8 run a couple years ago.
One thing that I was surprised to be disappointed by was the in-game coaching. Normally I think Juwan is extremely astute with his substitutions but in this game I thought a lot was left on the table. I think Jace could have come in and completely changed the complexion of the defense with his constant hustle. When he did get in, it seemed to change things a bit, but he got pulled. Same with Joey Baker -- we really needed someone to can some outside shots, and he barely played.
November 18th, 2022 at 1:04 PM ^
The 2 games I've been able to watch this year were the EMU game and this one. Go figure. Yeah yeah i wont watch anymore games this year.
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