4B — January 28, 2019
SportsMonday
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
As Michigan delights, Assembly Hall’s student section dismays
BLOOMINGTON
—
Look
up any list of the toughest
road environments in college
basketball
and
Indiana’s
Assembly Hall will inevitably
be slotted at the very top.
Alternatively, you could just ask
Michigan coach John Beilein.
Just six days ago, when the
Wolverines fell at Wisconsin,
Beilein made sure to remind
reporters that, “People don’t
lose here because it’s the Kohl
Center,” instead praising the
Badgers’ on-court product. But
this, he explained, was different.
“They have a tremendous
home
court
atmosphere
in
Bloomington,” Beilein said on
Thursday. “… You’re on the road,
in an environment, and you’re
not comfortable. Then, all of
a sudden, you look like a shell
of who you can be. And it just
happens.”
Beilein’s
prediction
could
hardly have come further from
fruition, as Michigan stormed
out to a 17-0 lead, reducing the
Hoosier faithful to a stunned
silence.
“I love that,” said freshman
forward Ignas Brazdeikis after
the game. “One of my favorite
parts of basketball is shutting the
crowd down. I love going on the
road.”
Anticipating that boisterous
home
crowd
that
Beilein
referenced, I perched myself in
the middle of Indiana’s student
section, planning to write about
the challenge the Wolverines
would have to overcome.
Before the game even tipped
off, I realized that angle might
not hold up. As the students
struggled to fill the upper reaches
of their allotted section, I turned
to Justin, the kid next to me, and
expressed my surprise at the
attendance.
“Yeah dude we suck,” Justin
said, explaining that he didn’t
think
the
Hoosiers
had
a
chance of toppling fifth-ranked
Michigan.
Within minutes, it became
clear that he wasn’t alone.
When junior center Jon Teske
followed
Brazdeikis’
game-
opening three with a rejection
at the rim on Indiana’s first
possession, it drew a cacophony
of frustration.
“Classic IU start, we’ll be down
7-0 before we score,” predicted
Caleb, an out-of-state sophomore
who grew up a Duke fan.
Turns out his estimate sold the
Wolverines 10 points short.
7-0 came and passed on a
wing three from sophomore
Jordan Poole, before Brazdeikis
made it with 10 by driving past
Hoosier guard Zach McRoberts,
a common target of fan criticism.
“Fuck
this
motherfucker,”
sounded a voice behind me, who
spent the rest of the evening
proclaiming
that
McRoberts
“should not be on this team.”
After a turnover on Indiana’s
next possession, that voice —
belonging to Connor, a freshman
from Chicago — offered up his
only bit of optimism for the night,
even if it came doused in a heavy
dose of sarcasm.
“We’re really good guys, I
swear we’re really good,” he said,
as Michigan took possession.
Seconds later, junior guard
Zavier Simpson snuck behind
the Hoosier defense to score an
uncontested layup and make it
12-0.
Connor’s next words?
“WHAT THE FUCK WAS
THAT?!”
The dismay returned after
the
under-16
media
timeout
—
highlighted
by
Connor
exclaiming, “Wow we have a
good team at this school. Who
knew?” when the jumbotron
introduced
the
Hoosiers’
national champion cheer team
— when Indiana forward Juwan
Morgan bounced a pass off the
courtside advertising boards.
As the Wolverines got the ball
back, another voice behind me
pled for Michigan to “Just hit a
fucking dagger. End our misery
right now.”
Redshirt
junior
forward
Charles
Matthews
promptly
obliged, draining a wing three
to put the Wolverines up 15-0.
The misery, though, did not end
there.
“Just give me one bucket
please,” Connor begged two
possessions later, after the deficit
had ballooned to 17. His pleas
were predictably met by the
Hoosiers’ fourth turnover in five
possessions.
“It’s just an inept offense,” said
Indiana coach Archie Miller after
the game, providing a cleaner
version of the students’ dismay.
“Inept. I mean, you can’t get
down 20-2 against Michigan.”
Though
a
pair
of
free
throws got the Hoosiers on the
scoreboard at the 12:57 mark, the
frustration persisted.
The jumbotron — seemingly
dedicated to distracting Indiana
fans from their misery — provided
a look at the school’s new $17
million dollar wrestling arena,
as the students rained scattered
boos toward the announcement.
“Can we please put our money
toward a new basketball team?”
Connor pleaded. “Thank you!”
As an and-one from Brazdeikis
expanded Michigan’s lead yet
again,
the
student
section’s
despair turned macro.
“Can’t
wait
to
lose
our
tournament
bid,”
shouted
someone a few rows back.
“To
the
NIT?”
Caleb
responded — a thought that
would have seemed insane just
six games ago, when Indiana
went to Ann Arbor ranked 21st in
the country. It hasn’t won since.
So, when an Aljami Durham
airball prompted the kid in front
of me to order an Uber before
the halftime buzzer had even
sounded, it was hard to blame
him.
A few plays later, the girl to my
right made her way to the exit
and never returned. At halftime,
a steady exodus followed.
And unless they really wanted
to be present for a resounding
chorus of “Fuck you” and “Fuck
this,” they didn’t miss much.
THEO MACKIE
Daily Sports Writer
ALEC COHEN/Daily
The Indiana student section reached an extreme level of frustration as the Hoosiers fell down 17-0 to Michigan on Friday, starting what became an embarrassing 69-46 loss to the Wolverines.
Wolverines lead from tipoff to buzzer in 69-46 win over Hoosiers
BLOOMINGTON
—
Two
Indiana
defenders
converged
around Zavier Simpson as he
dribbled inside the arc. Suddenly
and inexplicably, they were gone.
The junior point guard took
another dribble and tossed in an
easy layup. Hoosier coach Archie
Miller stormed onto the court,
unable to call a timeout fast enough.
A once-raucous crowd stood
shell-shocked. Michigan had taken
a 12-0 lead within the game’s first
four minutes.
It would somehow get worse for
the Hoosiers.
Indiana’s first points came at the
12:57 mark, already down by 17. It
needed almost three more minutes
to get its first field goal.
While
the
Hoosiers
self-
destructed,
the
fifth-ranked
Wolverines (19-1 overall, 8-1 Big
Ten) continued to play basketball.
They cruised to a 69-46 win that,
thanks to an opening sequence that
sent Assembly Hall into a fugue,
rarely seemed even that close.
“We were just so mentally
prepared for this game,” said
freshman
forward
Ignas
Brazdeikis. “We watched a lot of
film on them, we knew exactly
what we had to do defensively and
offensively. None of us were shying
away from shots. … We were really
confident in ourselves and we were
ready to go.”
For a moment, the Hoosiers had
hope. After being booed off the
floor at halftime — the result of a
33-18 deficit and a 5-for-25 shooting
display — Indiana (12-8, 3-6) came
out of the break energized. A
3-pointer by Rob Phinisee three
minutes into the second half cut
the deficit to single-digits and
restored life to the arena.
Just
as
quickly,
however,
Michigan snuffed it out. Brazdeikis,
who led all scorers with 20, threw
a stiff-arm by calmly nailing a
catch-and-shoot trey on the next
possession to push the lead back
above double-digits. It would stay
there for the rest of the night.
The Wolverines continued to
create distance. Redshirt junior
forward Charles Matthews, who
finished with a double-double,
scored seven points in 70 seconds
to make the score 48-32, while
the Hoosiers suffered through
multiple droughts of over three
minutes without scoring.
“They might score two and then
we make a three, and then we get
a rebound, we make a three,” said
Michigan coach John Beilein. “All
of a sudden I look and we’re back to
16 or 18. That’s really hard to come
back from.”
These two teams met on Jan.
6 in Ann Arbor. In that game,
the Wolverines also stormed to a
17-point lead within 10 minutes and
won, 74-63.
This
was
different.
The
first meeting was a nationally
televised battle of two teams
with sights on a Big Ten title
and a deep run in March. That
was a Michigan explosion after
a lethargic month of December.
That was the Wolverines hitting
big shots, jumping passing lanes
and throwing down dunks in
transition.
Friday night, by contrast, saw
Indiana come in on a five-game
losing streak that began with the
loss three weeks ago. This was
a struggling squad desperately
needing a resume-booster and
injection of energy. This was
the Hoosiers not getting it at all,
appearing sluggish and half-awake
instead. This was a nightmare
performance at the worst possible
time, a plunge further into a
month-long abyss.
The performance of star guard
Romeo
Langford,
an
almost-
Messianic figure in Bloomington,
was representative of the entire
night. The freshman committed
three early fouls and never found
his rhythm, totally stifled by
Matthews. He scored just nine
points on 3-of-12 shooting.
“They came in here and did
what they wanted, when they
wanted,
how
they
wanted,”
Miller said. “Our team in general
right now is soft. We’re also, for
whatever reason, scared. You could
just tell by the way that we played.
Fight isn’t there right now and the
confidence isn’t there on either end
of the floor.”
Even Assembly Hall wasn’t
ready. A clock malfunction just
seven seconds into the game led to
a six-minute delay. The shot clock
on one side of the court never got
going, forcing PA announcer Chuck
Crabb to shout out the time at five-
second intervals.
“That place was charged up
like I remember it was in (2013)
when we came here as the number
one team in the country and you
couldn’t hear yourself think,”
Beilein said. “And our kids went out
and just executed. Says a lot about
who they are and how they adjust.”
Michigan
adjusted
to
the
delay with a series of punches.
Brazdeikis nailed a corner three on
the first possession. Simpson used a
hesitation dribble to blow by for an
easy bucket. Matthews hit a triple
off an Indiana turnover.
The Hoosiers were unable to
do the same. After the Wolverines
extinguished Indiana’s second-half
run, it never threatened again.
When the final buzzer sounded,
you could hear a pin drop in the
storied arena.
BLOOMINGTON — Charles
Matthews stood in the back of
Crisler Center’s media room on
Tuesday night, wearing a sly smile
and a sober tone. A little earlier,
the redshirt junior had won a
game for Michigan, hanging in
the air for what seemed like a
millisecond too long as ball found
net, the buzzer sounded and the
Wolverines avoided disaster.
You wouldn’t have known it
from talking to him. Michigan had
let Minnesota inch back into the
game until it was the Wolverines
who had their backs against the
wall. That was what Matthews
cared about.
“Usually, we all have a saying,”
he said. “We usually come out
to the game looking, we be like,
‘Alright, let’s run ‘em out the gym.’
And we usually put our foot on
their neck and touch it to the floor.
But this game, they made some big
shots.”
The subtext: We let them make
some big shots.
Four nights later, as 17,222 fans
at Assembly Hall rose to their
feet, the Hoosiers having slowly
cut into a Wolverines’ lead until a
domineering performance again
turned into a single-digit game,
a defender collapsed off Ignas
Brazdeikis and the ball found the
freshman forward in the corner.
The ensuing shot found bottom.
The ensuing run — keyed
by Matthews, who responded
to a literal kick in the head by
scoring seven straight points and
continuing to make Indiana’s
Romeo Langford his plaything
on defense — put
away an eventual
69-46 win.
The Hoosiers,
who came into
Friday’s
game
the losers of five
straight,
then
started
it
by
embarrassing
themselves
and letting the
Wolverines jump
out to a 17-0 run, had every reason
to throw all the effort they had
into the second half. If that was
what they did, it didn’t matter.
“At the end of the day, I felt
like the energy’s gonna change,”
said junior guard Zavier Simpson.
“Once we see Charles doing that
(to Langford), it kinda rubs off to
myself, rubs off to Iggy, rubs off to
the rest of the floor, players on the
floor. We see that. We feed off that.
Just keep it going.”
The thing about a 17-0 start,
whether it be on the season or
in an individual game: it lends
itself to complacency. On Friday,
Michigan refused to fall into that
trap.
This game could have easily
gotten close. The Wolverines
suffered multiple offensive lulls.
The crowd stayed
in it until the very
end.
Indiana’s
chances
were
there. Michigan
didn’t let it take
them.
“I don’t think
anyone
realizes
as a coach how
you
envy
that
situation
where
you got off to a
great start, how difficult that is
to manage,” said Michigan coach
John Beilein. “When you get off
to that great start, what happens
in the game, if you lose that game,
it’s nothing. To up that much that
early. Nothing. To manage and
have your kids persevere through
it is really good, especially when
they make that little run to get to
10.”
That’s a product of a culture
instilled
by
Matthews
and
Simpson and Beilein — one of
accountability, that doesn’t allow
satisfaction to creep in after a poor
performance that happens to have
a W next to it.
“We
maintain
(intensity),”
Simpson said. “Look at what
we control, know our scouting
reports. Get the Xs and Os from
coaches. Just maintain it. There’s
no special or secret ingredient to
what we do. We just play together,
listen to the coaches and do things
we can control.”
Simpson
was
then
asked
whether that had been a particular
focus this week.
“It’s emphasized every single
day,” he said.
This week, two completely
different games proved him right.
ETHAN SEARS
Managing Sports Editor
ALEC COHEN/Daily
Junior guard Zavier Simpson has helped the Michigan basketball set a culture that emphasizes maintaining intensity.
JACOB SHAMES
Daily Sports Writer
Once we see
Charles doing
that, it kinda
rubs off.