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January 25, 2018 - Image 8

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The Michigan Daily

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8 — Thursday, January 25, 2018
Sports
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

In No. 3 Purdue, Michigan faces toughest test

John
Beilein
believes

Purdue might be the best Big
Ten team Michigan has faced.

No, not this season. The best

ever.

Beilein began Wednesday’s

press conference by saying as
much, comparing the third-
ranked Boilermakers to great
teams of the past.

“I’ve
been

here
long

enough to tell
you
there’s

some
pretty

good
teams

in this league
we’ve
seen,”

Beilein
said.

“Look
at

the
great

Wisconsin
teams,
the

terrific Purdue teams from
earlier in my career that were
so good. Indiana, ourselves
had games where there were
just incredibly talented, these
guys are still playing in the
league. Purdue has everything
that all those teams had. And
maybe more than any of those
teams, they have incredible
experience. … I haven’t seen
anything like this.”

It’s high praise, but with the

way Purdue has been playing
recently, it’s easy to see where
Beilein is coming from.

The Boilermakers (8-0 Big

Ten, 19-2 overall) have won
three straight games by at least
23 points, rising to the No. 2
spot in the KenPom rankings
along the way.

They’re the same team the

Wolverines (6-3, 17-5) lost to by
a point two weeks ago in Ann
Arbor. They still impose their

will on the inside
with
7-foot-2

center Isaac Haas
and his backup,
7-foot-3
Matt

Haarms.
They

still
threaten

teams with their
outside shooting
— they made 20
3-pointers
in

their
win
over

Iowa. And they

still play elite defense both on
and off the ball.

Michigan
was
able
to

counter all of that to make the
first game close.

If anything, though, the first

matchup has propelled Purdue
to new heights, as its last three
outcomes may indicate.

Needless
to
say,
the

Wolverines have their work
cut out for them.

“It
presents
a
great

challenge for us — a really
good opportunity,” said fifth-
year senior forward Duncan
Robinson. “Like (Beilein) said,
they’re a really tough team to
beat, especially at their place.
But we’re excited for the
opportunity for sure.”

Perhaps the biggest thing the

game against the Boilermakers
did was give the blueprint on
how to guard the Wolverines.
Purdue switched on every
ball screen in
that
matchup,

refusing
to

allow
junior

forward
Moritz Wagner
get
open
for

his
patented

pick-and-pop
3-pointer.

Since
that

game, Nebraska
guarded
Michigan the same way, quite
successfully. It’s a problem
that Beilein’s teams have faced
before, but even he admits that
it’s been an easier conundrum
to solve in the past.

On Wednesday, he cited how

former guard Trey Burke was
able to break those defenses by
simply shooting over them.

This year’s team has tried

a variety of solutions, such as
attempting to feed Wagner

on the post and drive past
bigger defenders with guards.
Against the Cornhuskers —
and the Boilermakers, to an
extent — that strategy didn’t
work.

But in the end, Beilein

says, there’s only so much
gameplanning the coaches can
do. At some point, the players
have to be the ones to beat the
defense.

“It’s not only a schematic

thing,”
Beilein

said. “It is a
thing,
‘Alright,

can you actually
score
against

somebody doing
this? Can you
actually
score

— guard score
on a big, and a
big score on a
small? Can you
make that entry

pass in there? So we’ve tried
to think of everything, and I
know I grow as a coach every
day of what we can do. But I
don’t feel, like, ‘I can’t wait
until people switch on us right
now, because we’ve got the
answers.’ We’re still solving
that.”

In the end, Thursday’s game

will be a litmus test for the
offense against a particular
defensive scheme, sure, but it
will also mean more than that.

With the relative lack of

depth in the Big Ten, this
game will be one of the
Wolverines’ final chances to
prove themselves against an
elite team. They don’t play
Michigan State again, and
their one remaining game
against a ranked team is at
home against No. 13 Ohio
State.

It’s not like Michigan is in

need of a resume boost with
the successes they’ve had so
far this season, but Thursday’s
game is one of the last regular
season opportunities for the
Wolverines to prove they can
hang with the upper echelon
of college basketball.

It’s one of the final chances

for
Michigan
to
prove
it

belongs.

SAM MOUSIGIAN/Daily

Michigan men’s basketball coach John Beilein believes that Purdue may be the best Big Ten team he’s ever seen.

MIKE PERSAK

Managing Sports Editor

“Purdue has

everything that
all those teams

had.”

“But we’re

excited for the
opportunity for

sure.”

Three plays that told the tale of the first game between ‘M’ and Purdue

For
the
Michigan
men’s

basketball team, quite a bit has
changed in 15 days.

It
went
to
in-state
rival

Michigan State and won by double
digits, clung to a narrow one-point
victory over Maryland and got its
doors blown off at Nebraska in its
worst performance of the season.
While the offense has hit a bit of
a funk, the defense has sustained
itself as the backbone of the team.

The Wolverines are a different

team than they were when they
lost by a point at home to No. 3
Purdue 15 days ago.

Thursday, we’ll find out how

different.

Thursday, we’ll find out if 15

days were enough to correct the
errors that became apparent
in the narrow defeat to the
Boilermakers. In preparation,
The Daily reviewed the tape
from that game, noting three
plays that defined the struggles
— and arguably turned the tide —
in the one-point loss:

1) The Play: Purdue 0,

Michigan 0. 19:51 left in the
first half. Purdue ball.

Center Isaac Haas stands at the

top of the key with the ball and
an arsenal of shooters on each
side — each of whom essentially
requires being face guarded at
all times. Purdue runs an on-ball
screen
with
Haas
clipping

Duncan Robinson after a dribble
handoff — to try to free guard
Dakota Mathias — and guard PJ
Thompson screening sophomore
point guard Zavier Simpson off
the ball to free Carsen Edwards.
Robinson and Simpson recover
perfectly, fighting through the
screens to stifle the motion. The
pass to the wing deflects off the
leg of Vincent Edwards, who has
to chase back to half court to
recover. Michigan defends to a
T for the first 15 seconds of the
clock.

But here’s the problem with

defending
Purdue’s
shooting

ability: They force you to defend

for all 30 seconds, and any
defensive lapse will be punished
swiftly.

Mathias sets a screen off the

ball, but doesn’t make contact
with any defender. It doesn’t
matter.
Matthews,
expecting

to switch onto the cutter in the
lane, loses Mathias off the ball.
He and Robinson pick up the
same Purdue player who cuts
into the lane. Mathias swishes a
warmup 3-pointer, and Purdue is
off. Before the ball falls through
the twine, Matthews throws his
arms up in frustration.

The adjustment:
There were several instances

— largely in the first half — of
simple
miscommunications

that
resulted
in
Purdue

3-pointers.
That
may
seem

easily correctable, but those
miscommunications
or
failed

rotations will only be augmented
in
a
hostile
environment.

The
Boilermakers
shoot
44

percent from three, trailing
only Wofford and William and
Mary nationally. They have five
players who shoot better from
beyond the arc than Michigan’s
best shooter. After the game,
freshman forward Isaiah Livers

said he thought the team was
overly concerned about Haas in
the post, to the detriment of the
3-point defense. This cannot
happen the second time around,
or Purdue will simply bludgeon
them from deep.

“You’ve
got
to
just
give

multiple efforts on the defensive
end,” said redshirt sophomore
wing
Charles
Matthews
on

Wednesday
afternoon.
“You

can’t just come in there and take
away the lane and leave shooters
all around. You can’t just say,
‘We’re going to take the shooters
away and leave our big on a
7-foot-3 (guy).’ ”

Much of guarding Purdue

requires a degree of chaos. You
have to chase and fight through
screens,
hedge
on
shooters,

collapse on the big, then spring
back
to
the
shooters.
But

controlling that chaos may be
the key to containing the high-
octane offense. Minizimizing
such perimeter breakdowns —
as easy as that may be to write,
rather than execute — could be
the biggest key to winning the
game.

2) The Play: Purdue 5,

Michigan 2. 18:16 left in the

first half. Michigan ball.

The Wolverines bring the ball

up the court effectively amid
some light pressure, and get into
one of their basic sets — some
on-ball and off-ball movement.
Simpson gets the ball at the top
of the key and takes a screen
from Wagner on the right wing,
getting the switch he wants
with the 7-foot-3 Haas. This is a
matchup Michigan theoretically
wants, and will likely get again,
assuming Purdue comes out
switching every screen.

But just because it wants

this matchup does not mean its
consistently capable of exploiting
it. Simpson settles back into
isolation and realizes he has no
viable path to the hoop. Haas,
meagerly respecting Simpson’s
jumper, lags three steps from
Simpson. Simpson dishes the
ball away, only to get it right
back in the same position with 10
seconds on the shot clock. Trying
to make something happen, he
aimlessly dribbles into the lane,
where Haas is easily able to
recover. Wagner gets the ball,
attacks the lane and is met at the
rim by a camping Haas for an
easy block.

The adjustment:
Herein lies the problem with

this matchup. With a score-first
guard like Trey Burke or Derrick
Walton Jr. the Wolverines would
be chomping at the bit to get
Haas switched onto a guard.
Either could simply pull up from
3-point range, or pump fake
and explode past the slower
Haas. But neither Simpson nor
senior
guard
Muhammad-Ali

Abdur-Rahkman
is
naturally

comfortable
generating

consistent
offense
in
the

isolation. In a vacuum, them
attempting to do so is not a recipe
for this team’s success.

“If we have Trey Burke right

now — an experienced player
at the point — that’s just got the
entire package, it’s a little bit
different,” Beilein said. “When
they switched on McGary and
McGary
is
big,
rebounding

inside. We said, ‘Alright Trey,
you shoot it, Mitch, you rebound
it.’ That was our solution.”

But
as
Beilein
noted

Wednesday,
they
have
little

choice but to try to attack those
mismatches off the switch. He
noted that it merely comes down
to guards making plays on bigger
defenders, rather than a grand
schematic change.

3) The Play: Purdue 69,

Michigan 69. 1:16 left in the
game. Michigan ball.

Simpson
started
the

possession with heavy pressure
near halfcourt. With the game
tied at 69 and just over a minute
left, this out-of-timeout play
respresented the closest thing
to a “make or break” possession.
Yet,
as
Simpson
is
being

pressured there is little, if any,
off ball movement. He picks up
his dribble, and only Abdur-
Rahkman cuts toward him to
get the ball, catching it nearly 30
feet from the basket, and the shot
clock dwindled down to 15.

It seems unlikely Beilein told

his team “Let the clock trickle,
and get Abdur-Rahkman and
Wagner in a pick-and-roll,” but
that was the result.

Finally, with eight seconds on

the shot clock the senior guard
dribbles into a Wagner pick,
once again earning the switch.
If either Abdur-Rahkman was
confident enough to exploit Haas
or he could get the ball to Wagner
on the guard, a go-ahead bucket
would seem imminent. Instead,
a
hesistant
Abdur-Rahkman

stutters right, trying to finesse
himself free on the seven-foot
defender. The result? An errant
step-back,
fadeaway
three

pointer that clangs the back right
portion of the rim.

The adjustment:
This
play
was
just
one

of
several
poorly
executed

possessions down the stretch
of the 70-69 loss. Michigan
failed to score in the final 2:54 of
this game, and while some can
point to the referees as blame
for the loss, a lack of late-game
execution played a major role.
For neither Wagner or Matthews
to get a touch on this possession
(Wagner didn’t touch the ball
in the final three minutes)
represents a negligence on the
Wolverines’ part.

And that was not a result

of Wagner being smothered
defensively, either.

“Give Zavier Simpson credit,

he almost beat us. My man didn’t
beat us — Moe Wagner,” said
Purdue coach Matt Painter. He
destroyed us last year. I wasn’t
going to watch that again. I’ve
got all the respect in the world
for (Simpson), but Moe Wagner
is a stud.”

That perspective, from the

opposing coach, about sums it up.

For a team that lacks dominant

perimeter
scoring,
it
must

position Wagner for success on its
most important possessions. He
is the team’s most gifted offensive
player, and the advantage he
presents with his ability to stretch
the perimeter is only amplified by
Purdue’s plodding big men. If this
game is close late, he must have
the ball in his hands — or at the
very least, be directly involved in
the play.

MAX MARCOVITCH

Daily Sports Editor

Munger adjusting to
new role as a starter

“I hate starting.”
That’s not something you

would expect to hear from one
of the starting guards on the
Michigan women’s basketball
team.

But Nicole Munger prefers to

analyze.

The junior misses the days

of her sophomore year, when
she would sit on the bench and
watch. She would carefully
observe her opponent and then
go in and provide a break for the
starters and, more importantly, a
spark of energy.

But this year

Munger
has

embraced her role
as a starter — and
playmaker — for
the Wolverines.

“I
think
for

this
team
to

be
successful,

(Michigan coach
Kim
Barnes

Arico) wanted me
to be in that role
but it’s just different, just trying
to come in and be ready very
quickly, it took time,” Munger
said. “The first couple times I
was very nervous because it’s a
different feel to the game. You
don’t get to sit there and watch
it and get your feet wet. I liked
coming in when everyone else
got a little tired and then I could
turn up the energy.”

It took some adjusting but

now Munger seems to be more
comfortable. She has assisted
Michigan in a five game winning
streak, which included a victory
each over rivals Ohio State and
Michigan State.

She scored a career-high 20

points at Ohio State on Jan. 7 and
had another career high of five
steals against Illinois on Jan. 20.

“She’s
playing
with
an

extreme amount of confidence,”
Barnes Arico said. “She was an
outstanding player last year as
well but she didn’t have that

same confidence and now it’s
nice to see her growth. She’s
doing a little bit of everything
for us.”

Along with her role as a

starter, Munger has also become
Barnes Arico’s voice on the
court.

“I’ve kind of turned to her

a little bit as the voice of the
team because she has great
recognition
and
she
sees

things,” Barnes Arico said.
“She’s a student of the game,
she really knows the situations
and the game a lot so I’ve been
relying on her a lot to be a voice
out there for our team, and I
think she’s really embraced that

role.”

Whenever

Munger
is

subbed out, she
sits
directly

next to Barnes
Arico on the
bench. Side-by-
side, the coach
and her player
break down the
plays and their
opponent.

“She listens to me the whole

time as to what I’m saying,”
Barnes Arico said. “We’re kind
of on the same page. She thinks
the same way that I do, she
doesn’t say it that much so now I
want her to say it when she’s out
on the court. She knows what
I’m thinking and she’s thinking
the game the entire time. I’ve
challenged her with becoming
more vocal and she’s embraced
that.”

While other teammates, like

senior forward Jillian Dunston,
have a fire in their belly and
provide
the
energy
to
the

court, Munger is clearly more
analytical, providing a different
dimension for the Wolverines to
balance Dunston’s attack.

It’s a formula that seems to

to be working, as indicated by
the Wolverines’ success this
season. Surely, part of that can
be indicated to Munger, even if
she’d prefer a different role.

“She listens to
me the whole
time as to what

I’m saying.”

SARAH HURST
Daily Sports Writer

SAM MOUSIGIAN/Daily

Sophomore guard Zavier Simpson and the other guards will need to prove more capable of driving past Purdue’s big men.

WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

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