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The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
SportsMonday
Monday, February 19, 2018 — 3B
‘M’ uses physicality to top Buckeyes
After Ohio State’s Keita Bates-
Diop clinked a 3-pointer off the
front iron, it was a mad dash to
grab the basketball.
Sophomore point guard Zavier
Simpson had the quickest step
and promptly lofted the ball
to Moritz Wagner. The junior
forward had no one in front of
him as he sauntered to the hoop
for the easy layup, but not before
getting fouled by CJ Jackson for
an and-one.
In classic Wagner fashion, he
celebrated — flexing his muscles to
the fans along the south baseline.
For a team that typically makes
its money on offense with long
jumpers and shifty layups, it
was an unusual flaunting of the
Michigan men’s basketball team’s
hard-nosed play.
But
in
Sunday
afternoon’s
74-62
victory
over No. 8 Ohio
State,
Wagner’s
flex
symbolized
exactly
how
the
Wolverines
earned
their
second
top-ten
win this season: A
previously unseen
physicality.
“Give Michigan
credit,” said Ohio
State coach Chris Holtmann. “I
thought they played really physical
today. They played well, putting us
in difficult positions.”
On multiple occasions the two
teams bumped elbows. They
tangled in a number of loose-
ball scrambles, even getting into
shoving matches after jump ball
calls. On one loose ball in the
first half, Wagner emerged from
the dogpile, beating his chest
and chanting at the crowd to
rile them up, even for a routine
deadball play that gave the ball
to the Buckeyes. The significance
of Senior Day and a rivalry were
clearly not lost upon Michigan,
and that lit a fire for the team,
according to Simpson.
Simpson has been the sole
constant in having a physical,
swarming
presence,
and
his
teammates have called him a
“pitbull” because of it. Sunday
was no exception. In Simpson’s
30 minutes, he limited Buckeye
point guards Jackson and Andrew
Dakich to three combined points,
and
exposed
them
for
13
points
of
his
own.
“I
feel
like
I’m the middle
linebacker
of
the
defense,”
Simpson
said,
“just
playing
hard
defense
because
my
energy
is
contagious. Once they see me
doing it, then they’ll start doing it.
“We
definitely
played
aggressive which is good, and
we’re proud of that.”
Duncan
Robinson’s
name
hardly comes up in the discussion
of stifling defenders. He is more
commonly
characterized
as
Simpson’s antithesis than his
counterpart.
But
on
Sunday,
the fifth-year senior silenced
critics with one of his best
defensive performances of the
year, combining with freshman
forward Isaiah Livers to limit the
Big Ten’s leading scorer in Bates-
Diop to a 5-for-17 performance.
The stingy defense comes just
four days after Robinson stymied
Iowa’s Tyler Cook to just 10 points.
“You take a guy like Duncan
Robinson and you go, ‘Oh, it’s
senior night, he’s gonna hit some
threes,’ ” said Michigan coach John
Beilein. “No, he should be known
for the job he did on (Bates-Diop).
He was absolutely terrific. He and
Isaiah Livers just — Did they shut
him down? No, but it changed the
momentum of the game when they
took the top scorer in the league
and marginalized him a little bit.
It was just a great effort by him.”
While Robinson and Simpson
were the standouts, the intensity
coursed throughout the lineup.
The newfound defensive identity
was emblematic of philosophy
change for Beilein — a one-on-
one battle mentality that puts the
glamourous aspects of basketball
to the wayside.
“You get down to it, they realize
all the pretty plays or all the
3-point shooting, it doesn’t win
games, that you’ve gotta be able
to really defend,” Beilein said. “In
my earlier coaching career I was
more into technique and scheme.
… When you’ve got a guy, it’s a
personal battle. Who’s gonna win?
I think we’ve taken that on.”
Beilein claims his team needed
a little “magic in a bottle” to
complete the aggressive win. But
it also may just be a thinly-veiled
characterization of the typical
Beilein team — the Wolverines are
in a nice groove at the right time,
and they sure look hungry for
more.
ETHAN WOLFE
Daily Sports Editor
The long week ahead
W
hen Nicole Munger
nailed a 3-pointer to
put Michigan up by
nine near the
midway point
of the third
quarter last
Wednesday
at Minnesota,
the collective
stress of the
program
seemed to be
dissolving.
A win over
the Golden
Gophers would have broken a
stretch of three losses in four
games — all of them games the
Wolverines were supposed to
win. A win would have assured,
once and for all, that the No. 23
Michigan women’s basketball
team would be in the NCAA
Tournament, no doubt about
it. A win would have gotten the
Wolverines out of their funk
just in time for a contest against
Maryland — the tenth-ranked
team in the country — and the
Big Ten Tournament.
Instead, over the next four
minutes, a nine-point lead
turned into a one-point deficit.
Michigan played tug of war
with Minnesota over the ensuing
minutes, then fell to the ground
as the Golden Gophers pulled the
rope away.
That night, the team’s flight
got cancelled due to fog and
bad visibility. The next day, the
Wolverines managed to get off
the ground, then were diverted
to Cincinnati. There, they sat
for three hours with nothing to
do but think, before mercifully
being given the go-ahead to
come back home.
“It’s super-frustrating and
I think, you know, we’ve been
trying to stay really positive,”
Michigan coach Kim Barnes
Arico told WTKA on Wednesday.
“Because of, you know, where we
are — like, we talked about, we’re
a little tired. We’re the only team
that really hasn’t had the bye
going into the stretch and I think
that schedule has been a little bit
tougher than anyone else’s.”
If a lack of rest has been the
issue before, it won’t be now.
The Wolverines don’t play again
until Thursday, their last regular
season game before another
week-long break leading into the
Big Ten Tournament. That might
be enough time for freshman
forward Hailey Brown to recover
from the leg injury that kept her
out Wednesday. It will certainly
be enough time for the rest of the
team to recover physically and
do some reflecting.
Michigan is facing its own
basketball mortality — a battle
it lost last season and seems to
be losing now. Thanks to the
relative strength of the Big Ten
and a resume-boosting win at
Ohio State, the Wolverines will
still probably make the NCAA
Tournament. Probably, of course,
being the operative word.
It’s never good to be falling
back on the strength of a league
to explain why one team from
said league deserves to make it.
It’s never good to be throwing
around qualifiers like “probably”
when discussing what, just two
weeks ago, was a certainty. It’s
never good to be talking about
how the schedule is harder for
you than anybody else in the
same league, all of the teams
in which have to play the same
number of games in the same
number of days.
Then again, it’s never good to
have lost four of five when you
have a number next to your name
and the other team doesn’t.
Michigan is in the type of
spot that defines careers — and
defines a program. And it has all
the time in the world to think
about what happens next.
Beating the Terrapins isn’t
everything — the Wolverines
would probably (there’s that
word again) be fine if they lost,
provided they won their first Big
Ten Tournament game. Even
if they lose them both, ESPN
Bracketologist Charlie Creme
told the Detroit News last week
that it would take blowout losses
to endanger their spot.
Of course, his opinion is just
that — an opinion — and though
it’s certainly a well-informed
opinion, that doesn’t mean the
selection committee will agree.
It’s just another way of saying
probably.
Winning a game isn’t an
unreasonable ask. Michigan will
have at least two chances to do
so; one of them will be against an
inferior team.
But the Wolverines, mind
you, were near the top-10 just
a couple weeks ago. Given
the talent on the roster, they
shouldn’t be happy with just
making the first round of the
Tournament, even if that’s how
they’ll be judged.
Right now though, eliminating
the word “probably” should
be Michigan’s only goal. It has
all week to figure out how to
accomplish it.
Sears can be reached at
searseth@umich.edu or on
Twitter @ethan_sears
AARON BAKER/Daily
Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico and her team have a long week ahead.
ETHAN
SEARS
The only ones that matter
It didn’t matter that Michigan
could only score one run all
game.
It didn’t matter that Florida
State had two runners in scoring
position in the bottom of the
seventh in a one-run game.
It didn’t matter that with a
full count, and two outs, a single
mistake could make or break the
game.
For the No. 20 Michigan
softball team (5-4), it was all
about one pitch — the one being
thrown.
“I thought that in the game
last night, we were really one-
pitch focused,” said Michigan
coach Carol Hutchins. “That’s
how we were just caught in
our moment. One pitch —
that usually equates to good
softball.”
Good
softball
would
be
an
understatement
for
the
Wolverines’
selfless
defense.
After shutting out Notre Dame
(6-3) earlier Saturday, the team
recorded its second shutout of
the day with the 1-0 win against
the eighth-ranked Seminoles
(8-1).
In
order
to
protect
the
slimmest
of
leads,
the
performances of the defense
showed grit and determination
that allowed Michigan to make
its only run the winning run
— an RBI single by senior first
baseman Tera Blanco.
However,
the
remaining
innings turned into fruitless
attempts
to
add
to
the
Wolverines’
lead,
causing
them to fall back on their only
constants of the weekend trip:
pitching and infield play.
Pitching in her fourth career
start,
freshman
left-hander
Meghan Beaubien had a perfect
game heading into the seventh
inning with seven strikeouts.
However, her hitless night
came to an end quickly, as
Seminole third baseman Jessica
Warren hit a ball down the
middle, narrowly escaping the
grasp of freshman shortstop
Natalia Rodriguez, who dove
up into the air for a chance at
the fly ball. The tip of her glove
brushed the ball, which pushed
it further from the clutches of
pursuing outfielders. However,
the
defense
regrouped
to
prevent any extra bases.
With a groundout to second
base,
Beaubien
put
Florida
State on its last legs. Facing the
highest leverage situation of
her college career, she allowed
another single before a wild
pitch pushed the two runners to
second and third base with two
outs.
As
Seminole
designated
hitter Zoe Casas walked up to
the plate to bat, Beaubien found
herself in a familiar situation.
In her first inning pitched for
Michigan — the seventh inning
of the season opener against
Alabama-Birmingham, a 7-0
win — she encountered multiple
runners in scoring position, two
outs and mounting pressure.
However, this time, there was
no seven-point cushion to act
as a safety net in case of her
mistakes — instead a measly
one-run lead.
Yet, Beaubien took it one
pitch at a time.
Four pitches, two balls, two
strikes.
On the fifth pitch, she raised a
look of triumph on her face, only
to be shocked at the call of a ball
— loading the count.
With the potential make-
or-break
pitch
determining
whether the Seminoles would
have one more go at bat,
Beaubien saw the pitch at hand
as she saw any other pitch.
“You have to always be one-
pitch focused,” Hutchins said.
“That’s all we ask for, just be
in your moment. So she’s a
very talented pitcher. But you
still have to just stay in your
moment … You have to just go
out there and work hard to do
your part.
“That’s all we want from
Meghan.
That’ll
make
her
great.”
Now with her back against
the wall, Beaubien did what
she’s always known — pitch.
Throwing a rising change-
up, she baited Casas to swing,
sealing the game on a strikeout.
Running
to
the
mound
brimming
with
joy,
the
Wolverines didn’t care that they
were forced to make a full-count
pitch or could only score one run
from the first play of the game.
They cared that the run and
pitch that came were the only
ones that mattered.
KATELYN MULCAHY/Daily
Junior forward Moritz Wagner and Michigan beat Ohio State with hustle.
“We definitely
played
aggressive
which is good.”
FILE PHOTO/Daily
Michigan coach Carol Hutchins said her team was one-pitch focused.
TIEN LE
Daily Sports Writer