Basics:
Who: Savannah St @ Michigan
Where: Crisler Arena
When: 2:00 PM ET
TV: BigTenNetwork.com
Radio: MGoBlue, WWJ-AM (950), WTKA-AM (1050)
Another tune up for Michigan today, this one against the Savannah State Tigers. Savannah State is 4-1 with wins coming over Brewton Parker, North Florida, Coastal Carolina, and New Orleans and a 32 point loss to Clemson. Sadly you will have to try to catch this one on BTN.com if you can’t make the game.
Savannah State averages 72 possessions per game compared to Michigan’s 64 so we could see another faster game. Savannah State is just not efficient scoring the ball, they rank 309th in efficiency and have an eFG% of 43.2%. As a team Savannah State turns the ball over on 26.8% of their possessions, good for 19.4 per game. On the other hand they average only 13 assists per game.
The players to watch for Savannah are versatile forwards Chris Linton (9.4ppg, 6rpg, 2.6apg) and Rashad Hassan (12.8ppg, 5.8rpg). They also don’t have a lot of size, their only player over 6-7 is 6-10 junior Glen Izevbigie who averages only 7.6 minutes per game.
This should be an easy win for Michigan against a team that was clearly outmatched by their only high major opponent. Michigan needs to take care of business before their big test in College Park next Wednesday.
Predictions, game comments, and complaints about BigTenNetwork.com streaming are all fair game in the comments.
Has Deshonte Riley opend his recruitment back up?
DaShonte didn’t sign with Georgetown and has opened his recruitment back up. I wrote about this a couple posts back. I wouldn’t expect him in Ann Arbor.
First game I have gotten to attend this year, let’s go blue!
I dunno about you guys but this makes me cringe:
Klay Thompson, WSU’s silky-smooth freshman guard, led all players in the early game with 19 points and 10 rebounds. The 6-foot-6, long-armed Thompson also contributed plenty to yet another sterling defensive effort by the Cougars — and he did it while displaying almost no emotion.
“Klay’s got that poker face,” Washington State point guard Taylor Rochestie said. “He’s got a poker face when we’re playing and we’re up 20, and he’s got a poker face when it’s a close game against a good team like Mississippi State.”
I would like to see JB play a lot of Novak today.. I think he still might be a step behind and getting him in there as much as possible today will help immensely.
Dylan, how good will our chances be with landing Kearney?
I think we have as good of a shot as anyone at Kearney but there is still a lot of time in his recruitment because he’s a 2011.
Ky, if we can land Trey Zeigler that will REALLY increase our odds of picking up Brandon Kearney in the following class.
Two ’ships for ‘10 class:
Zeigler & Regan are who I’m hoping for.
Thanks guys..that would be amazing. I guess I could maybe see a little Joe Alexander in Regan…lets keep our fingers crossed.
I havnt read much about regan. Was just wondering why everyon was so high on him when all the services only have him as a 3 star ( and i know the services arent the end all be all, but was just wondering what you all are basing it on).
missed the first couple minutes…whats happened?
14-7 ssu 15:35… Ssu is not missing and Michigan looks rattled by the press.
kelvin should help with that
21-7 ssu. Ssu is shooting 100% if I’m not mistaken.
Can it be that SSU has missed only one shot so far?
Umm holy crap
They have missed two now… 23-7 ssu at the line for one.
feed is choppy as hell, is that my connection, or btn?
Terrible start, 28-13 now. Whats up with the white uniforms every game, its getting a little boring to look at.
28-15 ssu to the line for 3. 3:56 left.
Merritt was locking in on d till he fouled that three point shooter.
This is embarrasing, how can this happen? How hard is it to make a shot, anthony Wright is garbage. Sorry to sound negative but at some point you have to realize and accept the fact that Wright is not good enough to offer any consistency.
yeah giddings, wherever you are, lets continue our discussion about wright. also, the reffing has been rough, but matt sheperd is a joke and needs to quit btching about the refs on the radio. he’s a play by play, good lord.
39-19 half time….
for the love of God…
I don’t think he got that three off on time – and that was a huge momentum killer
Is there any way they can keep shooting 70%? I don’t think so…and Michigan has to start being more patient on offense.
This team has one player over 6′7
i can’t believe we lost
I think 5-5 and 0-8 tell the story – they can’t miss from three and we can’t buy one
Those who make threes will be champions
Well, this is miserable. We have to start Sims in the second half (and the rest of the season). We just can’t keep one of our best players on the bench in favor of either Wright or Gibson.
There’s no way they keep shooting this well, but can we score enough to come back?
can we score 40 in a half? can we hold them to 20? i dont think we could possibly hold them to less than 20, so we have to score at least 40
There’s absolutely no way that we will cover a 20 point spread in the second half. They have an aggressive defense that will continue to frustrate us. Unfortunately, they aren’t just winning because they’re hot. They’re actually a pretty athletic and fundamentally sound team. The question now is whether we just had an off night or whether we all drank too much koolaid too early.
Yeah were done
I think we can score 40, so I’ve got hope. Everything has to go right for us though. I’d like to see Sims, Shep, Grady, Douglas, and Novak out there. I know he’s never had Douglas and Novak out there at the same time, but we need every shooter on the court.
Cronin time?
well good start here, can we cover 15 in 18 inutes? wright CANNOT be in right now, i do not get it. or at least don’t let him shoot. i donunderstand that he STILL has a green light
We need Cronin to start hitting some threes or we are toast.
savannah state is shitty for a reason. they’ll come back down to earth and michigan will hit some shots. i’m not too worried
well, at the very least its a ballgame now. peedi huge on D so far
Great start to the half! I love Sims!
by the way, we REALLY need to work on odd man rushes on the fast break. its nice to know we’re athletic enough to ocnvert some alley oops, but we’ve failed more 3-1 and 4-1 rushes than i can count this year
10-0 run in the first four minutes. 39-29 ssu. Mich ball. Deshawn is playing hard and keeping us alive.
If we can continue to handle their ball pressure and keep gibson and sims on the floor it’s going to be a fiesta on the glass
Oh ye of little faith.
Go Blue!
good call jg
There’s no way we can come back from 5 down with 14 minutes left right?
Forty, did you ever think we would say that this year? BTW, who do you predict will be the better 3 point shooter when it’s all said and done, Novak or Stu?
ok, so that TO by harris looked bad but the rest of the team was just watching him drive instead of cutting to the basketball. Too often manny beats his man and the defense colapses on him in the lane and he’s got no where to go with the ball because zach gibson is scratching his ass at the 3pt line. get to the box son!
43-36 12 min to.
I think Stu’s shot is prettier so I’ll go with him. But it never hurts to have more shooters in beilein’s system! And zack noooooovak is makin it rain today
48-44 7:59. Ssu to the line
arggh finally hit a fast break. i think thats 1-4 on the day now on odd man rushes
Kelvin’s speed helping break that press.
woo another manny TO where somebody (sims this time) should have been fighting for position on his man instead of watching.
uh-oh, ant wright coming back in…just when we pull within 2
Boy if there’s no help behind you and you’ve got harris watch out – he’s going to the rack. Love it. 2 free throws to tie!
yeah love harris’ scorer’s attitude. wright doing a good job not pulling the trigger
Unreal no call on the charge there. And the three before was a walk on the baseline before he kicked it out. F this.
D up baby! Let’s get em in ot!
Also harris is the man with all these clutch fts. He hit some big ones against ucla too.
Novak misses the dunk at the buzzer. Overtime.
OH MY NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hey good defense let’s get em in ot. Novak has been excellent today.
HAHA YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!!
CANT BELIEVE HE TRIED TO DUNK THAT I LOVE YOU ZACH NOVAK!
/caps
win this is OT now plz
I can’t believe that happened.
no business reffing at this level hilarious.
This game is making me crazy!
haha yeah, shep was in rare form there. “I wouldn’t want him reffin at the Y.”
also, sims and novak really needed to switch on there men on that last possession. where’s the court presence there?
But for the grace of mannie harris go I!
Is Gibson still hurt?
that was badass
what a game WOW
deshawn for the win. What a game
Woo. Never say die!
Incredible!!
sigh of relief… still, i come away a little discouraged. this is the kind of stuff amaker’s team would have done (not show up against an inferior opponent). i understand it might be a thanksgiving hangover, and it’s impressive to come back from 20 down at the half to any team regardless of their skill level, but i don’t ever want to see a first half performance like that ever again.
highlights: seeing manny harris play through a bad afternoon and still make it to the stripe and hit ‘em all. sims played huge, key rebounds (especially on the offensive end) throughout the game.
ship it!
What was the final score?
So what was the final score? ESPN.com say 67-64 in one place and 67-62 in another and mgoblue.com says 66-64.
dude matt sheperd is such an asshole, i cant believe they let him do broadcasts, i’ve never heard someone so unprofessional. he was being a dick about novak missing the dunk too, i mean, come on the kid’s a freshman and the defensive play saved the game.
i want to write a letter to u of m abut him.
Is this game available online anywhere?! I wanna see it!
goes to show – you can never give up on any game… remember MSU-UMICH football 2004-
Greg,
Archive of it should be up on bigtennetwork.com within a couple of hours.
I followed it on GameTracker, because I couldn’t get the feed working on from BTN.com, but I’m glad we got it done. It takes guts to pull that out, which is something Amaker’s team would NEVER have done. Manny has to take better care of the basketball, but was money at the stripe late. Go Blue!
The final shot was not a three, IMO. So, I think it was 66-64.
Good thing I didn’t turn the game on until the second half. A win is a win. Sims is a beast.
OK Let’s go M Soccer!! beat IU in the sweet 16.
looks like they’ll be a live stream on mgoblue.
I hear all the “we didn’t show up against a bad team” stuff. But I didn’t think our defense was porous per se in the first half. They just made 71pct of their shots, many of them quite difficult. Any team that shoots that well is going to look good. We fought through it, adjusted to the press, and went on a 15-0 run to open the half.
I’m going to focus on our 5-1 record, with a victory over a top 5 team, and our only loss to duke. That’s nothing to sneeze at.
i agree with you gsimms… matt shephard was very unprofessional. not only with novak but with the refs. i can’t count how many times he went on a rant about how bad the refs were. he called out one of them for being out of shape. he may have been right on many of his points on the officiating but as a representative of u of m he should not have said those things on the air like he did.
forty, i won’t argue with you that it’s good to be 5-1 and played well in the 2nd half… i’m more concerned about the mentality of this team. if this was the first time we had seen this sort of thing from a michigan team then i would not be concerned. it’s the fact that historically i’ve seen michigan repeatedly lay some stinkers against inferior teams. now this is belien’s team and different players that many of those teams from the past, but when i expect michigan to come out and throttle a team and they go down 20 and the half and need a last second buzzer beater in OT to pull off the win, i’m going to be a little disappointed.
but, i’m really not trying to be too negative. it was a really fun game to watch (2nd half on) and michigan is 5-1 and sims looked good, manny played well through a tough shooting day, some of the freshmen played well… i’m really not trying to be a downer i promise.
Alright gpsimms I will admit, Ant needs to go back and work on that shot some more before he pulls the trigger again. Still at least he didn’t completely disappear, he fought for some boards and had at least one nice assist where he pump faked (yes!), drove, and found Zack on the baseline for a triple.
Wright also rotated very well on d and pulled down some tough boards. Plus his airball three was really just a dish to harris
Im not too discouraged about the game. I think it was probably a mixture of thanksgiving weekend and maybe taking a lesser opponent too lightly…a lot of times a game like this can really help you…teaches us how to win in pressure situations. But in watching the game it makes me still yearn for a little bit more athletic ability out there. makes me excited for DMo and JMo. Another point Id like to bring up is how PATHETIC the refs were…I think they probably accounted for 6 to 8 of SSU’s points. I was really happy with Novaks play! actually very happy with it. He has a lot of potential and having a game like this will do wonders for his confidence. Watching Ant was a little troubling out there today..airballs, a lot of missed shots, a turnover or two, and all around just not a good game for him today. He did rebound well though. He needs to know when he is not on, and when he is not he needs to do something else with the ball…set up a teammate, post a smaller player up in man…just do something else besides hoisting bricks, and airballs. Especially if you miss badly, if you have a couple rattle in and out or you just miss by a bit then its different, but Ant wasnt even close today and he needs to recognize when he is not feeling it, because I agree that it hurts our team a bit when we run down the floor and he throws up bricked 3’s…those are lost possessions for us where he could have dished to someone else whos is feeling it..he just needs to round out his game more. All in all we won the game and thats the bottom line. I think SSU could give a lot of teams problems with the way they pressure you. Ill say that we played a much stiffer opponent than then buckeyes did today. And 1 last thing I really like the way we look as a team…everyone plays together and we look like a close knit family out there!! GO BLUE!!
I don’t get why everyone thought Matt Shep was being so unprofessional. I actually thought it was refreshing to hear a commentator tell it like it is instead of vanilla coating his emotion. Commentators will point out when a player is doing horrible, so why shouldn’t they be able to criticize awful awful officiating. People act like referees should get some kind of a free pass from crticism even though they get a paycheck and should be held to standards (even physical standards) like everybody else in the work force. He’s not an ESPN neutral announcer. He’s a Michigan announcer and the people listening should get a realistic description of what’s happening on the court. If the refs are a disgrace then that should be noted.
And also, after re-watching the Norfolk game and then immediately moving into this one, all I have is visions of Ant bricks and airballs floating in my head. If you were a casual observer and didn’t know the guy you would have to assume he rides the short bus. Of the 12 shots he took in these games, 80% of them were not even close. We always talk about waiting until he’s hot, but the question has to be asked, “Does he ever get hot?” We can only reference the two times last year where he hit two 3’s in a row so much. That being said, I actually like the guy and think he provides some scrappiness, but pleassseeee get your stroke back son!
Oh, and I’m officially eating heaps of crow after saying we had no chance at half time. Awesome comeback. Go Blue!!
Alright guys… Back from the game working on a post. DeShawn Sims played his best game in the Maize and Blue and Manny doesn’t miss free throws.
Great win! Sims was a beast all day and Novak looked great. As always, Manny finds a way to get it done even when he’s having an off day. GO BLUE!
I’m feeling good being 5-1. When the tourney teams are being selected no one will remember that we had so much trouble getting by Savannah St, it’ll just be another in the win column. If we lost, however, it would’ve offset what the UCLA win did for our resume. Now we need to get another resume win against the Terps!
If we want to talk about announcers and how much of a dick they can be we have to look no further than well his name serves him well and its richard vitale! Does anyone remember the UCLA pregame when he couldnt shut up about how amazing ben howland is and how awesome the UCLA program is and how they had the BEST recruiting class last year and how just down rite amazing they are…..but then as the game played on and UM was right in it we heard him start to change his overview of UCLA and how young they are and how much they lost from a year ago, and how overrated they are and not deserving of a top 5 team(which they probably arent, they are more like a top 15 team) but how often did you hear him complement UM and JB on how well they were playing or how they are turning a corner in their program to become a national contender in the very near future?? he said a few things but he said very little about UM and how much better we are! not to mention the guy gets on his knees and assumes the position whenever he sees coach k, roy williams, or jim calhoun come around. I used to like Dickie V, but after that game I lost a lot of respect for the guy. If we want to talk about dicks for announcers, look no further than DICK himself.
Count me in the Shepard was refreshing category. Its nice to hear the announcers tell the truth and point out the fact that UM was getting jobbed. I agree A. Wright has a role and it includes rebounding but the point I would stress is when hes not hitting he needs to stop bricking and contribute in other ways(passing, defense and rebounding).
My personal opinion is that Matt Shepard is a good announcer, but I can understand why he might rub some people the wrong way.
I can’t remember Wright ever getting “hot.” At this point, he is not a “streaky” shooter either. He is not a good shooter, period. To be a streaky shooter, you have to rattle off 4-5 in a row every once in awhile. Wright never does that. A good game for him is hitting 3 of 8 from behind the line.
I don’t think it is a coincidence that the hot start by SSU happened with Gibson and Wright starting the game. We have got to stop the madness. They are mediocre players at best and we can’t have a player like Sims sitting on the bench at tip off.
Yep i agree with you UMDC. There were 2 or 3 times when we were in the 1 3 1 and gibby had a shot to steal the ball and was just too slow and unathletic to get there. If we have more athletic ability in those areas we will be better. Jmo would get be there for the steal…but its what we have right now.
MY comments on the game:
Crowd was light but very into the game.
We are in trouble if we can’t make a three.
To be successful we need a third scorer. Wright plays hard but is killing us right now. Point guard play is adequate but not scoring. Shepherd is playing much better but Shepherd is shepherd. We have two NBA players in Sims and Harris but if we cannot get one or two other players to step up we won’t make the NCAA.
Novak and Douglas maybe they can help but they are freshman. I am not sold on NOvak-I think Douglas will be better. LLP unproven but he is the key if we are to make the tournament.
Late post so maybe no one will see this, but my final point on matt shepherd is this: i like him, i like his radio show, and i like him as an announcer. i don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing to criticize refs, i just think he went a little overboard, that’s all. he’s calling the game FOR michigan, and so when he’s going off on refs it reflects on michigan as well. so i guess what i’m trying to say is i thought he should have made his point about the refs and moved on, but instead (again, in my opinion only) he bitched about it a little too much. that’s all, not really a big deal to me just a minor gripe.