Team 99

Video & Quotes: John Beilein talks road win at Penn State

Michigan head coach John Beilein was pleased to see his team earn a hard fought road victory at Penn State on Tuesday evening. Watch the coach’s comments in the embedded media player and read select quotes after the jump.

Michigan head coach John Beilein was pleased to see his team earn a hard fought road victory at Penn State on Tuesday evening. Watch the coach’s comments in the embedded media player above, or read select quotes below.

On strong shooting:

“Caris spoke about it — we have to take better shots. That’s one of the ways you get better shooting percentages. And I think one of the reasons we made the change and put the two point guards out there is because we have to be a better passing team and get the guys the ball to take good shots. I watch them every day in practice. We’re a pretty good shooting team, and a lot of that has to be defense, but some of that is self-inflicted. We get antsy and we shoot a shot that looks open but its really not.”

On LeVert’s hot shooting:

“When they went to that matchup zone, its a very different zone. It’s like its half man-to-man, half-zone, so we just wanted to get the ball to him with whatever matchup he could have and let him drive the ball a little bit and he did a great job against it. They were switching every screen and he could drive the ball. We had enough shooters out there that they couldn’t cheat off anybody. But you had to make great one-on-one plays and I think this was the first time his thumb was healthy so he could get off some of those shots.”

‘I think I got my swag back’

On LeVert becoming himself again:

“The last couple days in practice, there have times he hadn’t felt himself. I don’t want to make excuses but he just felt like, ‘I think I got my swag back, I think I can do some things.’ Because once again, he’s seeing the other team’s best defender every night. Last year, you had Trey or Nik or would be on Glenn, now you have him. People are loading up. And that can take a toll. You’ll remember it was Nik last year. So he’s getting more comfortable with that, and that can take some time.”

On the bench, which produced 18 points:

“Our bench was fantastic. The freshmen, bring them off the bench, let’s just play roles where we can do things. Kam comes over, hits two shots, Aubrey comes in, hits two shots, Ricky did a great job as a freshman. So it was the whole idea of, ‘get more rest. The bench is maybe more ready, or we’re going to find out. But we can’t keep pressing these guys 37 minutes a game, waiting.’”

On Michigan’s 15 turnovers:

“…They have some big shot blockers. We drive into that jungle and you get in there and there’s all these tall trees, and all of a sudden we’re just throwing the ball all over the place. But we’re encouraging our guys to drive the ball. Zak Irvin is driving the ball for the first time in his life, I think, really hard. And there’s gonna be some reward, but there’s gonna be some risk, I think. That’s the next part of his game: He’s got to do more than shoot threes.”

On Irvin’s nine rebounds:

“His summer in the weight room, as far as strength and vertical jump, is really improved. That allows him to bang around in there. And he’s gotta go [inside]. If he’s not there, he can’t get it. And a lot of that falls on me.”

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