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Recruiting Roundup (1-6-09)

By Dylan Burkhardt | Recruits | Posted on January 6, 2009 at 12:04 pm

Commits

Matt VogrichMatt VogrichVogrich led Lake Forest to a third place finish at the State Farm Holiday Classic. Matt was held to 15 points and no three pointers in a 48-38 loss to tournament champion Normal Community. In the third place game Matt poured in 23 points including 4 triples in the 73-67 win over Chicago DeLaSalle. Vogrich was named to the all tournament team for his performance.

Darius Morris

Since the last update, Darius Morris’ team split a pair of games at the Torrey Pines Classic and also dropped a game to state power Leuzinger at the Pangos Dream Classic. Against Newark Memorial in a 58-39 win Morris had 8 field goals and 5 free throws for a game high 23 points. In the fifth place game at Torrey Pines Windward fell to Rocklin 77-66, Morris had 10 points in the loss. UCLA bound big man had Brendan Lane had 25 points for Rocklin.

I posted video from the Pangos Dream classic here. Windward lost to Leuzinger 59-49 but Leuzinger is a solid team who only lost to Westchester (favorites to win states) by 4 points. Morris had 16 points in the loss.

Blake McLimans

Worcester has been out of action over the Holidays, they resume play on 1/10/09.

Jordan Morgan

U-D Jesuit is back in action 1/9/09.

’09 Recruits

DaShonte Riley

I stick my stance that DaShonte won’t end up in Ann Arbor but he plans to visit Marquette this weekend.

’10 Recruits

Will Regan

Regan’s Nichols School rolled through the NHSCA High School Basketball Festival with a 3-0 record.  I wrote in last week’s report that Regan had 19-10-6 in the opening win against Poly Tech.

In the next win, 62-57 (OT) over Gwynn Park, Regan had 18 points and 18 rebounds. Regan also sparked a late comeback with a three pointer with 38 seconds left. Nichols rallied from 8 down with 47 seconds left to send the game into OT before pulling away. The Terrapin Times (Rivals $) were in attendance and got a look at Will Regan. In their final game at the NHSCA Nichols got a win over 44-35 over Oxon, MD in their last contest.

In a 64-51 win over St Joe’s, Regan posted 20 points and 16 rebounds.

Alex Dragicevich

Dragicevich had 29 points (3-10 3pt), 4 rebounds, and 4 assists in Glenbrook North’s 65-51 loss to Homewood-Flossmoor.

Tim Hardaway Jr.

Palmetto lost by 2 points (44-46) to Leonard. Scout.com has an update ($) on Hardaway Jr’s recruitment and fast start.

Cameron Ayers

Germantown went 3-1 last week with wins over Lower Merion (74-71) and Malvern Prep (51-44) and a loss to Norristown (64-54). Ayers had 15 against Lower Merion and followed it up with a balanced effort against Malvern with 13 points, six rebounds, four assists and four steals. Cameron had 18 points and 2 triples in the loss to Norristown.

Allen Payne

Winton Woods beat Southern (60 – 42) but lost to Mason Co Fl (54-60) at the Daytona Sunshine Classic.  Payne had 11 points, 11 boards, 3 assists, and 3 steals against Mason.

Returning to Ohio, Winton Woods lost at Milford in overtime (72-66) but Payne had 29 points, 14 boards, 2 assists, 1 steal, and 3 blocks.

Casey Prather

Prather is a newer target on Michigan’s radar who talked about Michigan in a recent Scout.com update ($). Prather made a recent visit to UVa and talks about his experience here ($). There is no mention of Michigan in the article but there are tons of schools mentioned and he hasn’t really narrowed down his list.

Prather’s team was not in action over the Holidays but he is worth keeping an eye on and is a big time talent.

Trey Zeigler

Mt. Pleasant was out of action over the Holidays, they get back to it tonight @ Midland.

Moses Morgan

Back in action on Wednesday versus Arbor View.

Other Notes

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Game 14: Illinois Plus/Minus

By Dylan Burkhardt | 2008-2009 Season,Plus/Minus | Posted on January 5, 2009 at 3:32 pm
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Darius Morris Video: Windward vs. Leuzinger

By Dylan Burkhardt | Recruits | Posted on January 5, 2009 at 1:58 am

This wasn’t the best night for Darius and his Windward team as they lost 59-49 and Darius Morris had 16 points. Luckily UMHoops correspondent and commenter WTHef was on hand and got some more video. Again this isn’t exactly a highlight film because it’s only one game but it’s another chance to see Darius in action. Make sure to play it in full screen because it’s very high quality, I would also classify the lyrics as not safe for work.

My typical Monday recruiting roundup will be on Tuesday this week but this should hold you over for now. Plus/Minus is also almost done, that’ll probably be posted Monday afternoon.

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Game 14: Illinois at Michigan Post Game

By Dylan Burkhardt | 2008-2009 Season | Posted on January 4, 2009 at 3:51 pm

Zack Novak Bloody

Now that’s how you win in the Big Ten.  Michigan didn’t look like they could handle Illinois on the defensive end early on but they tightened up the D in the second half and made the big plays down the stretch to pull off a W. It was a back and forth game and Michigan did just enough to pull off the win and avoid a damaging 0-2 start.

The story today for Michigan was balance. Michigan had 5 players in double figures and almost had a sixth in Kelvin Grady. In a game that featured 7 ties and 9 lead changes it was crucial for Michigan to have more than one option on the offensive end. Michigan isn’t going to be able to get by on the combo of Manny and DeShawn alone in the Big Ten and it’s encouraging to see complementary players stepping up.
Gibson Dunk
Even in a balanced effort, Zack Gibson was the star of this one. Gibson was forced to step up when Novak went to the locker room in a bloody mess after colliding with Alex Legion. Gibson poured in 8 second half points including a triple and two dunks that had the crowd at their feet. Gibson brought energy to the game when Michigan needed something to get them over the edge.

Michigan was stellar offensively and played one of their best offensive games against a very solid Illinois defense. Michigan’s offensive efficiency (121.3) was the highest allowed by an Illinois defense that ranks in the top10 in defensive efficiency (avg 85.2). Michigan shot the ball very well with an eFG% of 59.4% and got to the line when they had to. They also held onto the ball with a turnover rate of 13.1% against a team that usually forces turnovers on almost 25% of possessions.

In a battle of offense versus defense it was Michigan’s defense that came through down the stretch. The defense held Illinois to 25 points in the second half after giving up 39 points in the first. They managed to shut down Calvin Brock in the second after a first half where it seemed like no one was guarding him. Zack Novak was no match for Mike Davis in the post but he fought hard and the bottom line is that Mike Davis can’t guard Zack Novak either. Illinois went with only one of the big guys for large stretches of the game so that they could try to guard Michigan. I was convinced at half time that this Michigan team wasn’t going to be able to guard anyone all year but I think slowly but surely they are learning how to get after it on defense.

The Big Ten is a dog fight right now and Michigan needed this one. There are 6 teams at 1-1 and preseason favorite Purdue is sitting at 9th. Michigan has the out of conference wins to boost their resume come March but they aren’t there yet, this is how games will be in the Big Ten night in and night out. Next up Michigan attempts to win a game at Assembly Hall and knock off the dreadful Hoosiers for the first time since 1995 before coming home for a tilt with Iowa. Michigan will be favored in both games and really needs to be sitting at 3-1 a week from now.

Player Bullets:

  • Zack Gibson: Zack was feeling it on offense today and scored 10 points on 4-5 shooting and added a monster block in only 17 minutes. The best moment for me was when Gibson called for the ball and drove into the lane for a huge slam late in the game. The shock of the Crisler crowd was priceless. Michigan is a much better team when Gibson is playing at a high level offensively and hopefully this boosts his confidence.
  • Zack Novak: Novak is a warrior, Zack hit shot after shot in the first half and it seems like he doesn’t miss. When you consider this is only his 14th game in college his confidence is pretty remarkable. Novak had 11points on 4-5 (3-4 3pt) shooting and added 3 boards and one assist. Novak is going to be giving up size in every game but he also forces defenses to guard him on the perimeter.
  • Manny Harris: Manny isn’t going to be able to pick apart defenses like he could against the Florida Gulf Coasts of the world but he had a solid game in my opinion. Manny had 16 points, 6 boards, 5 assists, 5 turnovers, 1 block, and 3 huge steals. He made a lot of big plays on defense (but also fell asleep a couple times) including a huge block and a couple run out slams. Hopefully Manny can find his three point stroke (0-5) but he needs to start taking better threes rather than frustration threes.
  • DeShawn Sims: Solid but unspectacular night for Peedi with 13 points and 9 boards. DeShawn hit some huge threes but didn’t get that involved in the paint. In the end though I’ll take a near double double every night from DeShawn especially when other guys are stepping up.
  • Laval Lucas-Perry: 13 points on 4-1 (3-7 3pt) shooting and 5 assists with 1 turnover. Solid night for Laval in his first start. Laval is still adjusting but you can see that he is getting more and more comfortable. LLP also had a big block on defense and brings the size and toughness to the D that we really need in the backcourt.
  • Kelvin Grady: Kelvin had 9 points on 3-6 shooting including the huge layup late in the game. Both Kelvin and LLP are starting to get in the lane more and it adds a new dimension to Michigan’s game.
  • Stu Douglass: Stu’s minutes are decreasing quickly but he is a solid backup for Laval. Stu had 2 assists and no turnovers off the bench today and didn’t take a shot.
  • Anthony Wright and Jevohn Shepherd: DNP. There just aren’t any more minutes at the power forward when Novak and Gibson play this well. Shep is more athletic than Novak but he just can’t score it like Zack. I don’t think we will see much Ant Wright the rest of the year.
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Game 14: Illinois at Michigan Preview

By Dylan Burkhardt | 2008-2009 Season | Posted on January 3, 2009 at 2:23 pm

Basics:
Who: Michigan (10-3) vs Illinois (13-1)
Where: Crisler Arena, Ann Arbor, MI
When: Sunday, January 4th Noon ET
TV: BTN
Preview: Stat Sheet
Radio: MGoBlue, WWJ-AM (950), WTKA-AM (1050)

January is far too early to call a game a must win but this is one that Michigan could definitely use. It certainly won’t be easy, Illinois comes in riding high at 13-1 after stealing a win in West Lafayette. Michigan on the other hand is looking to bounce back after being handled by Wisconsin at home.

This one matches up one of the conference’s best offenses (Michigan) versus one of the conference’s best defenses (Illinois). Both teams are coming off frustrating seasons which saw them tied near the bottom of the Big Ten standings at 5-13. While both teams’ strengths differ they like to play at about the same pace, 65 possessions per game.

On offense Illinois does a very good job of passing the ball, 71.8% of their field goals come off of assists (1st in the country). They also shoot a lot more 2 point shots (71.4%)  than three point shots but surprisingly don’t get to the line very well. Their offense’s bread and butter is the mid-range jumpshot.

On defense Illinois holds their opponents to 26.3% on three pointers (3rd in the country), this is scary for a team like Michigan who relies on the three. Illinois also forces turnovers on 24.4% of their opponents possessions and holds opponents to an eFG% of 43.3% (28th) while still keeping opponents off the line with a free throw rate of 28% (37th). Illinois’ opponents have shot 33-86 (57%) at the free throw line this year and this is the second lowest percentage in the country. Illinois clearly has no control over how opponents shoot at the stripe but hopefully Michigan can escape the curse at the line.

In terms of personnel the Illini are the definition of balanced with 4 starters averaging 12.1 ppg: Trent Meacham, Mike Davis, Demetri McCamey, and Mike Tisdale. Meacham and McCamey make up the 3 guard backcourt along with senior point guard Chester Frazier who focuses on distributing (6.5apg) more than scoring (5.9 ppg). Davis and Tisdale bring size and skill to the front court. Tisdale is a 7 f00ter who loves to step out and stick the mid range jumper. Davis is 6-10 and averages almost 8 rebounds per game while shooting 53.4% from the field.

Overall Illinois doesn’t have the kind of size at every position that Wisconsin did but they still have two very skilled big men in the post that could give Michigan fits. Michigan is going to need a big game from DeShawn Sims and even then he might need some help. Novak (6’5″) against Mike Davis (6’10″) is going to be an issue so I would expect Beilein to do some tinkering.

The advantage for Michigan might be on the wing, McCamey is strong but he doesn’t match Manny Harris in terms of height. I wouldn’t be surprised to see sixth man Calvin Brock get a lot of time to try and slow down Manny. Over the last few years Brock has started plenty of games and he played 28.5 minutes per game last year versus Michigan.

There is another guy on the Illini bench that Michigan fans are all too familiar with, sophomore guard Alex Legion. Legion is averaging 5.5 ppg and 2rpg but he is shooting only 33% from the field in his four games back. Legion has been around the block after two Michigan commitments, a year at Oak Hill, and a stint at Kentucky. Through it all though the scouting report on Alex is the same: good shooter, poor shot selection, and lackluster defense. It’s a pretty good bet that Alex will be the Maize Rage’s “bum of the game”.

The good news for Michigan is that they have played some of their better games after a loss including the upset of Duke after a frustrating loss at Maryland. The bad news is that Illinois is playing very well and this is another student break game. I think Michigan has let their offense dictate their defense lately and it’s absolutely critical to get out of the gates with a good start, hit a couple shots and get a couple stops and set the tone.

Let’s hear thoughts and predictions in the comments, KenPom has the Illini 67-63.  Michigan is going to need help from the big two as well as some of the role players. I’d also like to see Laval Lucas-Perry have a good game but most of all a solid second half.

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Wisconsin Plus/Minus

By Dylan Burkhardt | 2008-2009 Season,Plus/Minus | Posted on January 1, 2009 at 1:07 pm

Note: There were two errors in the lineup data. They were with lineups: L-LP-H-N-G and D-LP-H-N-S. Just a sloppy mistake, thanks to GoBlue for pointing it out.

I added points allowed, points scored, per 40, points allowed per 40, and points scored per 40, and normal (+/- divided by square root of minutes) to the tables. These are all pretty self explanatory and they are an attempt to correct for the number of minutes played as well as find out whether contributions are coming on offense or defense. The cells are color coded green to red, and also sortable (click the column headings). If you are looking for more traditional post game thoughts, they are here.

Wisconsin Game Individual +/-:

Name All. Sc. +/- Min Per40 All./40 Sc./40 Normal
Lee 12 22 10 15 26.67 32.00 58.67 2.58
Gibson 15 22 7 14 20.00 42.86 62.86 1.87
Puls 0 0 0 0 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
Wright 0 0 0 0 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
Shepherd 7 6 -1 4 -10.00 70.00 60.00 -0.50
Douglass 38 34 -4 20 -8.00 76.00 68.00 -0.89
Merritt 22 15 -7 11 -25.45 80.00 54.55 -2.11
Lucas-Perry 55 46 -9 30 -12.00 73.33 61.33 -1.64
Grady 25 16 -9 11 -32.73 90.91 58.18 -2.71
Novak 66 51 -15 33 -18.18 80.00 61.82 -2.61
Sims 58 43 -15 29 -20.69 80.00 59.31 -2.79
Harris 67 50 -17 33 -20.61 81.21 60.61 -2.96

Total Individual +/- (NCCU & Wisconsin):

Name All. Sc. +/- Min Per40 All./40 Sc./40 Normal
Douglass 61 77 16 37 17.30 65.95 83.24 2.63
Novak 72 88 16 48 13.33 60.00 73.33 2.31
Lee 19 26 7 19 14.74 40.00 54.74 1.61
Grady 61 70 9 38 9.47 64.21 73.68 1.46
Sims 109 115 6 63 3.81 69.21 73.02 0.76
Harris 117 123 6 69 3.48 67.83 71.30 0.72
Puls 2 2 0 1 0.00 80.00 80.00 0.00
Gibson 40 39 -1 28 -1.43 57.14 55.71 -0.19
Wright 6 5 -1 3 -13.33 80.00 66.67 -0.58
Shepherd 31 27 -4 17 -9.41 72.94 63.53 -0.97
Merritt 43 34 -5 24 -8.33 71.67 56.67 -1.02
Lucas-Perry 89 80 -9 53 -6.79 67.17 60.38 -1.24

Some thoughts…..

Lee and Gibson were the only ones to post positive +/- totals against Wisconsin and they both played around 15 minutes.

Lee played better than I thought and he did a good job running the offense but where he really shined appears to be defense. CJ had the fewest points allowed per 40 minutes of anyone on the team and it wasn’t close. The offense was only mediocre when CJ was on the floor 58.67 points scored per 40 minutes but that was still better than Merritt and Grady. Speaking of Dave and Kelvin, the reason neither of them played much is pretty clear — they were getting abused on defense and posted very high “points allowed per 40″ numbers.

Gibson posted a surprising +7 against Wisconsin and even more surprisingly it was because of his defensive numbers. Gibson’s high numbers point to a couple things. First, it really helped to have his size in there even though he is pretty soft and not a good rebounder. Second, DeShawn Sims was getting abused on defense and wasn’t assertive on offense. Watching the tape there were numerous times that Jon Leuer or Joe Krabbenhoft would blow by DeShawn and get in the lane for an easy shot or dish to a wide open player. DeShawn was the weakest link on defense yesterday in my opinion.

It’s hard to take that much from guys like Novak, Sims, and Harris who all played around 30 minutes because their numbers fall in line with the total of the game for the most part. The people with positive +/- numbers after two games are Douglass, Lee, Novak, and Grady. 2 games still is too small of a sample size to distinguish much in my opinion.

It’s also becoming clear that Stu Douglass being in the game is good for the offense. He has the highest “points scored per 40 minutes” of anyone on the team by a wide margin. Ignore Puls’ numbers because he only played a minute and Stu is around 10 points per 40 minutes higher than anyone else on the team. Stu’s numbers aren’t bad on defense and I think both his and Zack’s numbers continue to look good because they are smooth at running the offense.

Defense

Michigan only played the 1-3-1 zone on 11 possessions and they played man (and the trapping press late in the game) for 49. Wisconsin scored 14 points in the 11 possessions they played 1-3-1 and scored on 6/11 (54%) possessions for 1.27 points per possession. The Badgers averaged 1.20 points per possession against the man to man and scored on 28 out of 49 (57%) possessions.

Those numbers don’t really say much because they are really pretty close but I still think I would have liked to see a little more 1-3-1 to at least change it up. Wisconsin got some really easy baskets on the 1-3-1 but it wasn’t like we were shutting them down in the man-to-man.

Lineups

Wisconsin Line Up +/-:

Lineup Mins All. Scr. +/- Per40 A/40 S/40 Normal
G-LP-L-Sh.-G 2 2 6 4 80.00 40.00 120.00 2.828427
L-D-H-G-S 3 0 4 4 53.33 0.00 53.33 2.309401
G-LP-L-N-G 0.5 0 1 1 80.00 0.00 80.00 1.414214
L-LP-H-N-G 2 2 3 1 20.00 40.00 60.00 0.707107
D-LP-H-N-S 6 13 13 0 0.00 86.67 86.67 0
G-LP-L-N-S 0.5 0 0 0 0.00 0.00 0.00 0
L-LP-H-N-S 4 4 4 0 0.00 40.00 40.00 0
M-LP-L-N-G 2 2 2 0 0.00 40.00 40.00 0
M-LP-L-N-S 1 2 2 0 0.00 80.00 80.00 0
D-LP-H-N-G 4 7 6 -1 -10.00 70.00 60.00 -0.5
G-LP-H-N-G 1 2 0 -2 -80.00 80.00 0.00 -2
G-LP-H-Sh.-S 2 5 0 -5 -100.00 100.00 0.00 -3.53553
G-LP-H-N-S 5 16 9 -7 -56.00 128.00 72.00 -3.1305
M-D-H-N-S 7 18 11 -7 -40.00 102.86 62.86 -2.64575

Michigan played 14 different lineups on Wednesday and a lot of them we hadn’t seen yet this year. Only 2 lineups that we saw in the Wisconsin game were ones that we also saw in the North Carolina Central game (G-LP-H-N-S and G-LP-H-N-G). These two repeat lineups were pretty successful against NCCU (+11 combined) but against Wisconsin they were -9 combined. I didn’t include a total table because these were the only two lineups that were seen in both games.

The best defensive lineups all had CJ Lee at point guard or small forward and all of the lineups that posted negative plus minus numbers didn’t have CJ Lee. There were only 4 groups that “won” their time on the court and they didn’t play very much time.

I’m not really sure what more to take from these numbers because we saw so many different line ups. I think that in itself is frustrating because I would have liked to see a more established rotation going into the Big Ten season. It will be interesting to see whether CJ will continue to play more minutes or Douglass will see more time at point guard or whether those were just products of Wisconsin’s style of play. When so few lineups play together more than once I think it’s hard to establish much continuity.

I’d love to hear more suggestions about this data and any conclusions you guys might take from it. Happy New Year to everyone and hopefully the 2009 side of the Big Ten season will be a bit more friendly to Michigan starting this Sunday.

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