8 — Tuesday, February 12, 2019
Sports
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
The Wolverines’ Quinn Hughes and the process of bouncing back
With
17
minutes
left
in
Michigan’s game against Penn
State at Madison Square Garden
on Jan. 26, the Wolverines
trailed 4-0.
But
then
sophomore
defenseman
Quinn
Hughes
fired a shot at goaltender Peyton
Jones, and redshirt sophomore
forward Luke Morgan was there
to clean up the rebound and
send it home. After 43 scoreless
minutes, the Michigan hockey
team was on finally the board.
A few minutes later, the
Wolverines were on the power
play with a chance to further
cut into the deficit. Penn State
was able to clear the puck down
the ice, and Hughes was the
defenseman assigned to bring
the puck back into the offensive
zone.
As the sophomore skated
toward center ice, Hughes tried
to send a backward pass to a
teammate. But there was no
one there, and forward Alex
Limoges picked up the puck and
sent it past a sprawling junior
goaltender Hayden Lavigne. It
was the Nittany Lions’ fifth and
final goal of the night — and the
second that came from Hughes
giving up the puck.
“That game against Penn
State, (Hughes) stood up in the
locker room after the game and
said, ‘Hey, I was Penn State’s best
player tonight,’ ” said Michigan
coach Mel Pearson on Saturday.
“First, you have to own it. I
think that’s the first thing is you
have to own it to be able to move
forward and make changes. And
he’s a smart guy. He knew it, he
knew it. I give him a lot of credit
for standing up in front of his
teammates and saying that.”
After completing the first
step of taking ownership for his
mistakes, Hughes’ next move
was to talk with the coaching
staff and watch film from the
game.
Pearson
and
the
rest
of
his staff like to watch film
with their players early in the
week. Hockey is a sport more
dependent
on
the
decisions
of an individual than other
team sports, so every Monday,
Tuesday and Wednesday, players
will individually file into the
coaches’ offices for a personal
film session.
Hughes
sat
down
with
both
Pearson
and
assistant
coach Brian Wiseman — who
spends his time focusing on the
defensemen — after that game
in New York to look at Hughes’
performance.
“He’s a smart hockey player,”
Pearson
said
Monday.
“He
understands the game. At times
they weren’t — it’s nothing he
doesn’t know and the beauty
of it is, it’s nothing you can’t
overcome or you can’t correct. If
it’s something you can’t correct
or the player continues to do it,
then you have an issue.
“But the way he plays, we’re
gonna let him play his game,
just like we would any of our
players. There’s a certain style
we
play
with
and we’re gonna
let
guys
play.
They just have
to
limit
their
major mistakes.
You’re
gonna
make
mistakes,
but you have to
learn from them
and try to limit
them.”
It’s
easy
to
look at Hughes’ turnovers in
New York and say they’re the
result of a player trying to get
too cute or attempting to make
an eye-popping play.
But according to Pearson, it’s
the exact opposite.
“The thing with him is he
wants to win so bad,” Pearson
said. “He’s trying to create
opportunities
for us. You have
to
understand
that. I don’t think
sometimes a lot
of people maybe
get
that.
They
just want him to
dump it in and
stay
back,
and
anybody can do
that. But it’s not
in his DNA, so
now we have to work with him
to manage the game.”
And
since
that
game
in
New York, Hughes has clearly
internalized what he talked
about with his coaches and
worked to limit his mistakes.
His effort level has visibly
been higher, and he’s made
impressive plays in all four
games since. This time, his plays
have made Michigan’s highlight
reel — not the other team’s.
Hughes is refocusing on the
little things that make him
successful, and it’s been effective
thus far.
“As a competitor, when you
don’t play that great, you want to
follow up, trying to have a really
good game and string together
some good games,” Hughes said.
“That’s what I think I’ve done,
and I think that was my mindset.
Just to — I think it was good for
me just to refocus and get ready
for the following weekend.”
Added Pearson: “I think he’s
more aware defensively, more
aware with the puck, more aware
when he’s the last man, more
aware when he can jump into the
rush versus just putting himself
in a bad position defensively.
Being more physical, playing the
body more. All those things.”
Bouncing back from a bad
game is a process, and it’s not one
that Hughes — the No. 7 overall
draft pick in the 2018 NHL Draft
and one of the top prospects
in college hockey — has a lot of
experience with.
But
Hughes’
performance
in the last four games shows
that he’s moved on and come
through to the other side, and
his comments follow those same
lines.
“I haven’t thought about New
York since New York.”
BAILEY JOHNSON
Daily Sports Writer
Jordan Poole: Don’t call it a slump
Don’t tell Jordan Poole he’s in a
slump. At least not to his face.
“I personally don’t like to use
the word slump. It’s a media thing,”
the sophomore guard said last
Monday after he shot 3-for-9 in a
loss to Iowa. “But there’ll just be
games where you don’t hit shots.
… I bounce back. That’s all there is
to it.”
Whatever term you use, it’s
undeniable that Poole’s recent
shooting numbers have been below
his usual standards — something
that
has
contributed
to
the
Michigan men’s basketball team’s
offensive regression in conference
play.
Since a Jan. 3 game against Penn
State, Poole has shot just 19-of-63 —
30 percent — from beyond the arc.
Though Poole’s dislike of the term
“slump” may come down to just
semantics, his shooting struggles
go deeper than a simple blanket
term.
“One of Jordan’s issues was
where he was shooting,” said
Michigan coach John Beilein
last week. “He was open, but he
didn’t have — he didn’t need to
be standing at the NBA line and
shooting.”
In
recent
contests
against
Rutgers and Wisconsin, it seemed
like maybe Poole was breaking
through. But lost in the cheers
after
Poole
drained
a
triple
for Michigan’s first points of
Saturday’s win against the Badgers
was the fact that he still released
the shot a few feet beyond the arc —
the exact kind of NBA three Beilein
wants him to avoid.
Beilein estimated that Poole has
hit 45 percent of his shots from the
college line in practice, but just 33
percent from the NBA line. It’s a
hard habit to break. After all, a shot
is mostly muscle memory. Poole
just gets himself open, takes the
ball and shoots, the way he always
has. These moments happen in a
split second during a real game, so
Poole has no time to look down and
check his proximity to the arc.
Instead, to combat the problem,
Beilein and the other coaches
have been working with Poole to
readjust. During a practice last
Sunday, assistant coach DeAndre
Haynes stood on the sideline
behind Poole, watching to see if
he drifted too far out. Every time
he did, Haynes pushed him back
toward the arc.
“It’s a hard thing,” Beilein said.
“There’s some players with their
GPS — it just takes time to adjust.
I mean, they just have this feel of
where they should be and it’s really
hard. … And he’s not saying, ‘Heck
with you, coach, I’m gonna stand
over here!’ It’s the GPS thing that
people will go through.”
The
changes
won’t
come
overnight, but if Poole continues
to adjust his internal compass, it
could pay dividends for him and
the team. Meanwhile, there are
other steps Poole has taken to put
himself in better situations to get
quality shots.
He’s talked to junior guard
Zavier Simpson about how to not
only keep passing lanes open, but
also how to angle himself so that
he’s in a good position to catch and
shoot from an optimal location.
And he’s also become tuned in to
where his defenders are and how
they might close out in different
looks. That allows him to strike a
balance between getting open and
being as close to the arc as possible.
As for his depressed 3-point
numbers, Poole’s just going to keep
shooting. If there’s one thing he has
in spades, it’s confidence, and he
won’t let anything — whether it’s a
few bad games or talk of slumps —
faze him.
“Most of us shoot thousands of
shots a day in practice and you’re
working on shooting your shots
and then you come to practice,”
Poole said. “I mean, you shoot all
the time. There’s gonna be days it
ain’t going in and days it is. … You
can’t change anything due to one
game or two games.”
ARIA GERSON
Daily Sports Writer
ALEXIS RANKIN/Daily
Sophomore guard Jordan Poole has shot just 30 percent from 3-point range since a Jan. 3 win over Penn State.
Storako starts season with a bang
After last weekend, one thing
was cleared up for the No. 19
Michigan softball team: who will
back up sophomore left-hander
Meghan Beaubien in the pitching
rotation.
Alex Storako answered that
question when the freshman
right-hander made her collegiate
debut in the first game of the
season
on
Friday.
Storako’s
entrance at the top of the fifth
inning, when the Wolverines
were trailing North Carolina State
by two, was a testament to the
confidence she has earned from
Michigan coach Carol Hutchins.
She didn’t disappoint, pitching
the final three innings without
allowing a single hit, which
allowed Michigan to squeeze out
a narrow 4-3 win.
“We were certainly excited to
see what (Storako) was going to do
for us,” Hutchins said. “She’s done
nothing but get better for us.”
And from the looks of this
weekend, Storako may be able
to do a lot for the Wolverines.
She gave up just nine hits over
four games, seven of which were
translated into runs. But things
weren’t entirely smooth sailing for
the freshman pitcher.
Just a few hours after her first
collegiate pitch, the Wolverines
started Storako in the circle in
a game against No. 7 Arizona.
Showing her first signs of faltering
in the bottom of the third inning,
Storako walked two Wildcats.
This prompted Hutchins to visit
Storako at the mound and provide
some straightforward advice: Be
confident out there.
“We want all pitchers to have
command
of
their
pitches,”
Hutchins said. “In (Storako’s)
case, she did a really nice job. She
had a walk throw against Arizona
and, more than anything, she
needs to be very one pitch focused
and really intense. Every pitch
counts in this game. You can’t take
a pitch off.
“I think (Sunday) she was
probably a little tired. Everyone’s
a little tired. Five games is a lot
of games. It’s a long weekend,
especially for a young pitcher.”
While Storako was later taken
out of that game, she went on to
play in games on both Saturday
and Sunday.
Over the course of the weekend,
Storako pitched a total of 15
innings, just shy of Beaubien’s 18
and far surpassing sophomore
right-hander
Sarah
Schaefer’s
single inning. Last week, Hutchins
said she was looking for a pitcher
to step up and allow Beaubien
some rest. As a freshman last year,
Beaubien pitched 217 of 371 total
innings, a statistic that possibly
accounted for the rise in her ERA
towards the end of the season.
As Storako began to step into
that role, Beaubien began to guide
the younger pitcher.
“(Beaubien) is a great mentor,”
Storako said. “I’m so excited to
have her. She has such great poise
and is someone that anyone would
love to look up to. She’s really
pointed me in the right direction
at times and I love having her on
the pitching staff with me.”
If the first weekend was any
indication, it looks as though
Storako will play a pivotal role in
the pitching rotation alongside
her mentor.
“I just want to improve on
getting ahead of the count and
attacking batters from the get-go,”
Storako said. “Just staying loose
throughout the whole game. I
hope I can contribute to the team’s
success because we just want to
win and I will do whatever it takes
to do that.”
LANE KIZZIAH
Daily Sports Writer
ALEC COHEN/Daily
Michigan coach Carol Hutchins tapped Alex Storako as her No. 2 starter during the season’s opening weekend.
ALEC COHEN/Daily
Sophomore defenseman Quinn Hughes bounced back from a poor performance on Jan. 26 in a 5-2 loss against Penn State with three assists in Michigan’s sweep of Michigan State over the weekend.
The beauty of it
is, it’s nothing
you can’t
overcome.