Offensive Rebounds
Rough loss for the women’s team tonight to Wisconsin 69-67. Michigan led by as much as 20 points and still managed to let the game slip away. As you can see from Borseth’s reaction, Michigan got out rebounded 40-33 (23-7 offensive rebounds). This was enough to cost Michigan the game even though they out shot Wisconsin 51% to 34%.
The loss will probably cost Michigan an NCAA tournament bid but it has still been a very successful first season for Borseth and the Wolverines. They beat Michigan State for the first time in six years (nine games) in front of a record 5,596 people (more people than have been at many mens games this year). They also probably will finish with a winning record in the BigTen as well. Not to mention winning 3 road games in the Big Ten (at Wisconsin, Northwestern and Illinois). Hopefully they can scrape together a few more wins and make some noise in the Big Ten Tournament to reach the NCAA tournament. Or at least get a few offensive rebounds. Read more
Recruiting Bullets
- 6-11 power forward Mason Plumlee verballed to Duke. This one was showing signs of being over once he raved about his visit to Duke. Plumlee also scored a team high 15 points in the North Carolina 3-A State championship win for the Greenies.
- Nice piece on Zack Novak and his father’s battle with cancer. Novak led Chesterton with 23 points and 9 boards in a win over Crown Point to wrap up their first ever outright conference title.
Kyle Cassity put up a solid double double with 15 points and 16 boards in a win over Harrisburg to advance to Friday’s sectional final. St. Louis headman Rick Majerus was in the house watching Kyle play.- Corey Person and K-Zoo Central have advanced to Friday’s district final as well, Person scored 9 points in the easy victory over Portage Northern.
- David Curletti, another potential walk on, scored 26 points in Orchard Lake St. Mary’s win over Birmingham Groves. Dion Sims was reportedly a non-factor and John Beilein was in the house. OLSM also rolled over PSL-champ Northwestern in the opening rounds of distrcits (Sims 30pts, Curletti 18)
- The talk down in Bloomington is that Tony Bennett might be the guy, although Washington State fans say no chance. Could Klay Thompson end up back on the board? Thompson recently scored a career high 40 points (5 3pfg) and had 8 assists. The reports were glowing about Klay at open-gym on his visit and he sounds like a guy that could come in and play from day 1.
- Donald Stewart is reportedly receiving Michigan interest. This is the first I have heard of Stewart who is averaging 16.3 points, 6 rebounds, 2.5 steals, and 2.4 assists.
Jordan Morgan and U-D Jesuit got blown out by Detroit Pershing and 2010 standout Keith Appling. Rumor has it that it will be tough for Michigan to get a sniff of Appling and this is pretty believable. A.W. Canada has not been around Crisler this year, let the PSL recruiting debate rage on. Ekpe and Manny were in the house as well.- Mater Dei junior forward Andy Brown had 25 points and 8 boards in a 70-61 win. Brown is definetely one to watch in the class of 2009.
Game 26: Northwestern @ Michigan: Post Game
There is really nothing positive to say after this game. A bad Northwestern team came into Crisler and just kicked our butts, There is no doubt that we came out flat and complacent in the first half. And Moore was on fire the entire game, kid was just raining threes, but that was just an inexcusable loss. As a couple people said in comments before the game, this one had all the signs of an upset.
It has been a painful season and we really shouldn’t have expected anything less than a loss to Northwestern honestly. The only positive spin I can put on this game is that it teaches this team a good lesson about bringing it every night. You better believe that we will bring 100% effort against Northwestern next year.
DeShawn Sims appeared to get it for a bit in the last stretch of game but something just isn’t there and its pretty clear that he just doesn’t have the motor. Manny is great but the turnovers are really killing this team, I’m confident he will get it straightened out but some of them are just awful. Ant Wright, our “shooter”, is not making shots even wide open ones. The only player who really played well was CJ Lee who helped get us back in the game at all.
This article about the state of the program pretty much sums it up for me. We have a LONG ways to go and it isn’t gonna be pretty.
Stuart Douglass and his Carmel team survived an upset bid in the first round of sectionals on a very rough shooting night. Stu led the team with 15 points.
Game 26: Northwestern @ Michigan: Pre-Game
Finally a game that Michigan should run away with easily. We were dominating Northwestern for the first 30+ minutes of the first meeting and our offense looked great all around. Then we took the pedal off the metal too soon and Coble went crazy. Northwestern almost beat a distracted Indiana team but they still should be no worry for Michigan Tuesday. Maybe the Wildcats are improving as they have lost their last two games by a combined 5 points.
It’s probably a pretty safe bet that Coble will score at least 20 points but Michigan should be able to neutralize the rest of the Northwestern lineup. Where Michigan looked best in their last contest against the Wildcats was on offense. They played lights out offense for about 30 minutes in Evanston, making shots, making cuts, playing true Beilein ball. Hopefully a game against Northwestern is what this team needs to get its offense back in gear because Saturday was simply a sickening offensive performance.
I expect Ant Wright to get the start again at the three, but at this point who knows. The production at the wing position has basically been reduced to nothing. Although both Wright (7 pts, 7 boards) and Shepherd (8pts, 4reb, 5ast) had solid games last time against Northwestern.
One thing to mention is that this is the teams 3rd game in six days. The team looked tired against Illinois and you can bet that the fatigue is really starting to affect these kids. Only one starter (Ekpe) on the team has played major minutes for an entire college season.
Luckily we don’t have to worry about Northwestern invading Crisler but you can sure bet that a 9pm Tuesday night game over Spring Break against Northwestern will be just about empty (update: The snow is only going to make this one worse, crowd is going to be embarassing tonight).
UMHoops Prediction: Michigan 80 - NW 63 - The Wolverines get a confidence boost and coast to a solid win before a big test at Penn State this weekend.
Purdue Game Time and TV Set
The Big Ten announced today that the Purdue game will be Sunday March 9th at 4pm on CBS. Hooray for more national exposure. Could be a great way to finish the season against a very good, but not invincible, Purdue team. The stakes will be high as Purdue will probably be playing for a share of the Big Ten title.
Links & Notes 2-24-2008
- One more visitor from yesterday: 2009 combo guard Colt Ryan (09 Hot Board here) From Ryan’s last game: “Batesville’s 6′4″ Junior All-State lock at guard, was held to eight in the first three quarters and finished with 14 points, concerning himself mainly with ball security and distribution.”
- Lacy on Jalen Rose and the game.
- Snyder: “Harris’ 14 points lead Wolverines“
- Prep Spotlight has the latest on 2009 shooting guard Alex Marcotullio (PrepSpotlight is well worth the subscription for any fan of midwest hoops and recruiting)
- Darius Morris scores 22 points in playoff win for Windward with Denzel Washington in attendance. (Check the link for a couple quick video highlights of Morris)
- Also it was really interesting watching the PSL kids (CDR and Ramar) play in that Memphis/Tennessee game. There were certainly knocks on both of those kids that led to UM/MSU not recruiting them but it shows that the PSL will produce talent year in and year out. An all-PSL team from around the country would look like: Tajuan Porter, Manny Harris, CDR, Malik, and Joe & Jordan Crawford just to name a few.
Game 25: Illinois @ Michigan: Post Game
Now that was a struggle. Painful all the way through and definetely a game you have to be glad was on Big Ten Network. But as they say, style points don’t count. Michigan shot a horrific 30% from the field for the game, luckily Illinois only managed 32%.
Players of the game have to be Grady and Ekpe. Grady played well offensively I thought for the most part and hit some big shots. One thing that pains me about Grady is how poorly he runs the fast break, this is something that the whole team really needs work on. Ekpe was a monster on defense and dominated Pruitt. Ekpe had 7 points, 7 boards, 5 blocks, and 2 steals and held Pruitt to 6 points and 5 turn overs. After the game while getting interviewed Ekpe said that he thought “he was the best defensive player in the country and loved challenges like this”. At least he has some confidence.
Ant Wright started on the wing which I think has to be done. He did a surprisingly decent job on defense especially with Illinois going small all game. Ron Coleman brings absolutely nothing and seems to regress every game. I think Wright should play about 30 minutes a game and Shepherd about 15. Ronnie needs to be the odd man out at this point.
It was great to see Jalen in the house looking sharp. A quick recap over what he said:
- Always a Michigan man and it was great to be back. First time he had been back to a basketball game since he played on the court (not because he didn’t love it but he was playing professionally).
- Mentioned Perry Watson, Bo Schembechler, and Fisher.
- RIP Bo.
- Gave a shout out to the rest of the Fab Five individually (Jimmy sat on the sidelines with him) and said he would be back the day the banners went back up.
- Said he would be around the program and it was great to be back.
- Said Go Blue! once in his speech and the band started playing and he had to cut them off and continue.
- “Every time you see the black shoes, the black socks, the baggy shorts, the Fab Five lives. I’ll be back one day when those banners get hung back up.”
- Crowd reaction was great the whole time, he got a big welcome when he walked out to half court before tip off. The starters all gave him hugs before the game.
A win is a win and Michigan has to learn how to win the tough ones like this because they aren’t all going to be easy. But man I hope we can start hitting some shots. There were ALOT of wide open shots today and very few of them went down. Good physical gutty effort. Another note, saw Jordan Morgan was there, not sure if any other recruits were in the house.
One more addition: huge props to Anthony and DeShawn. They have really started attacking the glass. DeShawn had 9 rebounds and Wright pulled down 8. Not to mention Manny pulling down 6 and Ekpe 7. All together we outrebounded Illinois 43 to 36. I think the man-to-man has really helped our defensive rebounding but DeShawn especially seems to have started to find an extra gear in terms of hustle.
Game 25: Illinois @ Michigan: Pregame
The first game in Illinois was ugly, Michigan shot less than 40% and Illinois shot 52%. The two people who killed Michigan were Randle and Pruitt. Randle had 19 and 10 in only 28 minutes and on 7-9 shooting, the fact that he is out tonight is huge for Michigan. With Randle being out it looks like neutralizing Pruitt should be enough to win the game because Illinois is so short on weapons. Then again shooting 35% again certainly won’t help, this team has had some painful shooting games.
The Wolverines have played better at home of late with the big wins over PSU and OSU and on paper Illinois looks like a game they should win. Illinois has been nose diving of late and has lost five of their last six. Michigan also got virtually nothing from Manny in the first game so hopefully a better effort there will help as well.
The Jalen Rose festivities should be fun and we all know that Jalen will be Jalen when he’s out there talking at halftime. Don’t forget to get there early for a Jalen Rose Day t-shirt as well. And in honor of Jalen, I’m putting together a couple Fab Five video mixes that will be up in the next week.
UMHoops Prediction: Michigan 67-Illinois 64
Links of note:
- Jalen Rose and DeShawn Sims friendship grew this summer.
- CJ Lee embraces new role for the Wolverines.
- Jalen Rose on WTKA yesterday talking about Fab Five, ceremony, and more.
- Stuart Douglass was lights out last night on 10 of 16 shooting for 25 points.
- Cronin and the Black Knights got another victory (Video, click ‘Watch the Story’) in the state playoffs. Cronin had 15 points and 12 boards and says he wants to finally play Proctor in the next round (Proctor has beat the Knights many times in a row).
- Split the hot board into two parts and updated the 09 information. View them here: 2008 Hotboard and 2009 Hotboard.
- Kyle Cassity video here.
Randle Out For Season?
ESPN is reporting that Brian Randle is likely out for the season with a shoulder injury. This is huge for Michigan because Randle killed them last time around. Randle put up 19 pts FGs 7-9, 3pts 2-2, 10 rebounds s in 28 minutes. Could be a big break for Michigan and makes tomorrows game even more winnable. Rough way to go out for Randle in what has already been a rough year for Illinois.
Links 2-22-2008
- Brent Petway challenges NBA Dunk Contest Champ Dwight Howard
- Manny and Beilein on why Manny got benched down the stretch.
- Rosenberg on Jalen Rose’s Celebration and the Fab Five, Jalen says he plans to “wing it” and “No question about it. Anybody that is embracing me is embracing everybody involved. I’m going to be the representative. I’m looking at it as though Chris and Juwan (Howard) got a game, and I’m going to be the representative.”
- Justin Watts is the “total package“(Rivals $$)
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