The Michigan Daily - SportsMonday - January 30, 2006 - 5B FASTBREAK Men's Basketball Saturday's Game MICHIGAN 85 - WISCONSIN 76 Hambone's hustle electrifies Crisler faithful By Kevin Wright Daily Sports Editor Eight minutes into the game, Brent Petway replaced Graham Brown. The substitution was nothing out of the ordinary until the sellout crowd in Crisler Arena rose to its feet. As Brown walked off the court, the fans gave him a standing ovation. The reason? It wasn't for his scoring. Instead, it was for what's become his calling card - his hustle. Before Petway relieved the 6-foot-9 forward, Brown preserved a Wolverine possession with his effort in chasing down loose balls. The senior ran to the sideline to save an errant shot. Brown got the ball to Jerret Smith, who rotated the ball to Dion Harris. Harris hoisted a 3-pointer that bounced out of the cylinder, and, coming from the sideline, Brown rushed into the lane to lunge for the rebound. He managed to tip the ball out to Daniel Horton, who was standing near halfcourt. Even though the Wolverines did not convert on their multiple opportunities to score that possession, the crowd rewarded Brown for his effort. "It feels great to have fans in the stands," Brown said. "They were huge the last two games, and they have to continue to do that." On the afternoon, Brown finished with seven points and 12 rebounds, but he also made an impact away from the basket. With more than five minutes left in the game, Wisconsin's Kammron Taylor pressured Smith as he brought the ball across halfcourt. Brown looked to free Smith and planted himself just inside half- court to set a pick. Smith dribbled past Brown while Taylor, failing to see him, hit the forward at full speed. Taylor fell to the floor in obvious pain. Brown finished the play for the Wolverines when he fed the ball to an open Courtney Sims under the basket for a dunk. "(The pick) just came out of nowhere," Taylor said. "It just caught me on the blindside. I didn't even see it coming." After referees stopped play, Taylor remained on the floor for a few minutes. Brown was the first player to check on Taylor's condition. Taylor left the game but returned less than a min- ute later to score 13 of the Badgers' final 19 points. "(It's in) situations like that where guys break jaws, noses," forward Chris Hunter said. "I was just hoping that he would be all right. He was a tough kid, came back in and gave them a spark." UP AND OVER: With 4:40 left in the contest, the Wolverines had the ball and a 10-point lead. As the shot clock ticked down to single digits, Sims took the ball in the low block and turned to attempt a hook shot from the baseline. The errant shot flew past the basket without drawing iron. But Brown, in perfect position for the rebound, tipped it out to Ron Cole- man on the wing. When Coleman rotated the ball to Horton at the top of the key, the shot clock showed four seconds. As Michigan coach Tommy Amaker rose to his feet to alert Horton, the clock was reset. Wisconsin coach Bo Ryan came over to argue the call, and the referees gave Michigan the ball out of bounds and reset the shot clock to four seconds. On the inbounds play, Hunter couldn't find either Dion Harris cutting to the corner or Horton streaking to the top of the key. With both pri- mary options covered, Hunter saw Sims sealing his man away from the basket. Hunter lofted the ball into the post where Sims finished with an easy dunk. "I just sealed (Alando Tucker) in because he had four fouls," Sims said. "I knew if he was on me that he couldn't really do anything." PERFECTION: Daniel Horton turns his eyes to the basket, bends his knees and hits the free throw. That routine didn't change on Saturday when Hor- ton went 10-for-10 from the free-throw line, hitting eight in the final 44 seconds. With the perfect per- formance from the line, the senior has yet to miss in conference play. In six Big Ten games, Horton has made all 38 of his free throws. PLAYERS OF THE GAME Dion Harris Michigan Coming off a 1-for12 performance against Michigan State, Harris caught fire against Wisconsin. He opened the game with two treys and never let up, finishing with 23 points. Kammron Taylor Wisconsin Minutes after being knocked out by a Graham Brown pick, the Chris Rock look-alike went unconscious. He scored 13 points in the last 2:17, leading Wisconsin's last-ditch comeback effort. WHAT DID YOU SAY? "Graham (Brown), in particular, was setting screens for me, and as I was coming off them, he was telling me to shoot it. So I shot 'em. And I made 'em. - Junior guard Dion Harris describing his season-high and a team-high 23 points. KEY STAT The number of consecutive free throws 380 senior Daniel Horton has made to open up the Big Ten season. SATURDAY'S GAME Wisconsin 76 Player MIN FG M-A FT M-A REB O-T A F PTS i i - - i '"' "" i - , 1 1 1 Butch 17 1-6 o-o 0-3 ______ I _ 1L 4 5 4 Tucker 36 8-16 5-8 1-2 JASON COOPER/Daily Senior forward Graham Brown battled through multiple Badgers to get his game-high 12 rebounds, six of which were offensive. chappell 32 1-5 2-2 3-7 4 4 Nixon 27 5-7 0-0 0-1 1 2 Taylor 38 10-18 4-4 2-4 1 2 Flowers 9 1-1 0-0 1-1 2 4 Gullikson 20 1-5 2-2 2-2 1 0 Krabbenhoft 21 0-2 0-0 2-6 0 4 3 21 4 13 29 2 4 0 76 BELL Continued from page 1B Throughout this stretch, Michigan coach Tommy Amaker maintained that the team was just looking for a game to break out. That game finally came last Wednesday. And if Saturday's game was any indication of what this team will do for the rest of the year, Amaker was right. The team has broken out. The stage was set for a team suffer- ing from a Michigan State hangover to drop this game. Michigan was without Abram for the fourth time in conference season. Daniel Horton struggled, going 2-for-10 from the field. And the two- headed monster of Kammron Taylor and Alando Tucker combined for 50 points for Wisconsin. But all this withstanding, Michigan still won, and did so handily. It led from the first minute onward. The difference was depth. Outside of Taylor and Tucker, the rest of Wis- consin's team managed just 26 points. Michigan had four separate players score at least 14 points and played nine deep. Just eight minutes into the game, Michigan's lineup consisted of Jerret Smith, Jevohn Shepherd, Ron Coleman, Brent Petway and Chris Hunter - none of whom are regular starters. The key with this Michigan squad isn't just its ability to get everyone on the floor; it's what the players do on the court that's so special. All year long, an unself- E ishness that's rarely seen at other schools has been on display. If one player is hav- ing an off night, he is more than happy to let someone else do the work. Michigan took it one step further on Saturday. Prior to Saturday's matchup, Horton told Amaker that junior Courtney Sims needed to get involved in the game early. Since Sims had struggled through most conference play, Horton felt it was his duty to get him the ball early. After the game, Sims attributed Horton's unselfishness and determination to get Seni him the ball down low as the reason the 13 a center finally broke out with an 18-point show performance. lysts Graham Brown also did his part to Mic get a struggling Wolverine involved. He B continually encouraged Dion Harris to team shoot the ball while setting screens for and the junior guard. And it paid off. Harris this scored a team-high 23 points. both It's tough not to get too caught up to pi in Michigan basketball right now. The road campus finally seems energized, as may evident by the second straight sellout So of the week. The players seem excited, the g too - the buzzword in the locker the room is swagger, and the players are coni BADGERS Continued from page 1B Singer cruises to victory thanks to Harris's hot-shooting resurgence Scoring system: (Last game's points, overall points, single-game wins) TEAM TEAM TOTALS 0-1 13-16 11-27 200 27-60 141 25 FG%: 45.0 FT%: 81.3 3-point FG: 9-17, .529 (Taylor 5-9, Nixon 3-5, Butch 1-1, Tucker 0-2). Blocks: 2 (Nixon, Gul- likson). Steals: 4 (Tucker 2, Chappell, Gullikson). Turn- overs: 10 (Chappell 3, Taylor 3, Krabbenhoft 2, Flowers, Tucker). Technical fouls: None. Kevin Wright (D. Horton, J. Shepherd, B. Petway, T. Sanchez, P. DeVries) (18,1361,7) Jack Herman (L. Abram, R. Coleman, J. Smith, K. Price) (4, 289, 4) I knew when I drafted Daniel Horton that he was the unquestioned leader of this team. On Saturday, Horton understood that a victory would come from inside, so he made a point of getting Sims involved early. Contrasting his performance on Wednesday when he took the Wolverines on his back in the sec- ond half, Horton deferred to his teammates against Wisconsin. His free throw shooting in the clutch also didn't disappoint. After a game on Wednesday in which he had nine points, Ron Coleman's play at the beginning of Saturday's win made me believe he was poised for another big game. He hit a 3-pointer that seemed like it was from Ypsilanti, and, for a sec- ond, it made me forget I was miss- ing Lester Abram. But Dion Harris was on fire, and the Wolverines' post players emerged, leaving no more points for Coleman to score. I've been pretty hard on Courtney Sims during his conference dry spell. He has passed up numerous scoring opportunities and looked really soft for the majority of Big-Ten play. Saturday, he made me look like an idiot - but I don't mind eating some crow if it means the team will look like it did on Saturday. Sims was assertive, shooting early and often, and it translated to a solid 18-point performance. And I see the offensive fouls as a positive: His aggression can only help. It was a beautiful sight for a fanta- sy team owner to behold. Dion Harris and Chris Hunter weren't just light- ing up the score sheet - they were doing it together. At times on Satur- day, especially in the second half, the Harris-Hunter two-man game was the focal point of Michigan's offense. I doubt Tommy Amaker is actively scheming to impove my fantasy stats. But the Hunter-Harris combo put up 60 points in Michigan's two victories over ranked teams. My unbiased advice: Keep feeding Dion and Chris the ball. Player MIN FG M-A FT M-A REB O-T A F Coleman 30 1-2 0-0 1-4 2 2 3 Brown 26 3-3 1-3 6-12 3 3 7 Sims 15 8-10 2-2 1-3 0 4 18 Horton 31 2-10 10-10 0-5 5 4 14 Harris 37 8-12 2-2 2-4 1 1 23 Smith 18 0-2 1-2 0-0 3 0 1 Shepherd 4 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 1 0 Petway 14 2-2 0-1 1-2 0 2 4 MICHIGAN 85 Hunter TEAM 25 4-10 6-7 1-3 0-3 4 15 +1 i4 i I _--i TEAM TOTALS 200 28-51 22-27 12-36 21 16 85 FG%: 54.9 FT%: 81.5 3-point FG: 7-21, .333 (Harris 5-9, Cole- man 1-2, Hunter 1-5, Smith 0-1, Horton 0-4). Blocks: 4 (Cole- man, Horton , Petway, Sims). Steals: 5 (Horton 2, Hunter 2, Petway). Tumovers:18 (Coleman 4, Horton 3, Hunter 3, Sims 3, Harris 2, Smith 2, Brown). Technical fouls: None. Wisconsin........ 27 Michigan.......... 38 49 - 76 At: Crisler Arena 47 - 85 Attendance: 13,751 PTS 'M' STATS Player GP Min Pts R A Horton 18 34.0 16.5 2.8 5.4 Sims 18 24.4 12.9 6.2 0.7 Abram 14 29.4 12.1 3.1 1.4 Harris 18 31.2 11.4 3.4 2.9 Hunter 18 16.9 6.4 3.4 0.4 Brown 18 24.7 5.5 7.7 1.4 Petway 7 14.9 5.3 3.1 0.3 ior forward Chris Hunter had an offensive resurgence in the last week, going for nd 15 points, respectively, against Michigan State and Wisconsin. Scott Bell (C. Sims, G. Brown, S. Harrell, A. Brzozowicz) (25, 335, 3) Coleman 18 15.5 4.3 2. Smith 16 15.8 2.6 1.i 4 0 1 2 2. 4 Shepherd 16 9.0 1.7 1. D.6 .2 D4 .3 D.1 wing a lot of that. And even ana- s like Phelps are getting behind higan's cause. ut before fans start thinking this n is invincible, it's time to step back take a deep breath. Yes, both wins week were huge, but they were also at home. The Wolverines have yet ick up a big conference win on the 1, and before that is accomplished, be this attention isn't warranted. o before we dub our buddy Digger greatest prognosticator in the world, Wolverines - just 1-2 on the road in ference play - need to consistently prove themselves on the road. This week poses a great opportu- nity, with road contests against Penn State - which nearly upset Michigan State in East Lansing on Saturday - and Iowa, which will be looking to notch its 15th straight home win. If Michigan can play team basketball like it did Saturday, then another 2-0 week shouldn't come as a shock. And maybe Digger won't look so crazy after all. Grooms 9 2.4 0.6 0.1 o Harrell 8 1.4 0.5 0.5 0. Ba 9 1.9 BIG TEN STA Big Ten Overall 0.3 0.2 0 NDINGS SATURDAY'S RESULTS: ILLINOIS 76, Purdue 58; Team Illinois 5-2 19-2 Michigan 5-2 15-3 Iowa 5-2 16-5 Wisconsin 5-2 15-5 Ohio State 4-3 14-3 Mich. State 4-3 16-5 Indiana 4-3 12-5 Northwestern 3-4 10-8 Penn State 2-5 10-8 Minnesota 1-6 10-8 MICHIGAN STATE 69, Penn State 60; IowA 67, Ohio State 62; MICHIGAN 85, Wisconsin 76; SUNDAY'S RESULT: MINNESOTA 61, Indiana 42 - Scott Bell can be reached at scotteb@umich.edu Matt Singer (D. Harris, C. Hunter, A. Ba, H. Grooms) (38, 329, 4) Purdue 1-7 7-12 final tally of 8-for-12 shooting allowed him to record his highest point total this year. Even more impressive was the play have spread their "swagger" and confidence throughout the rest of the team. To the seniors like Brown, Horton and time this conference season, played without Lester Abram. Even better for a team that won a total of four Big Ten games last year. MONDAY'S GAME Florida A&M at Ohio State, 8 p.m.