The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Sports Friday, January 17, 2020 — 7 ‘M’ snaps skid, beats Badgers 68-56 After Sunday’s blowout loss to Maryland, the Michigan women’s basketball team needed to bounce back strong. Thursday night against Wisconsin, the Wolverines did just that. Michigan (12-5 overall, 3-3 Big Ten) came out fast, scoring nine points in the first two minutes and jumping out to an early seven-point lead as the Badgers (9-8, 1-5) had trouble defending the Wolverines’ biggest threats. Sophomore point guard Amy Dilk — coming off two games in which she shot a combined 4-for-25 and turned the ball over often — was vital to the start, making Michigan’s first basket, assisting on another and grabbing a rebound. A Wisconsin timeout slowed the Wolverines’ offensive momentum, but they locked down defensively. Michigan didn’t force many turnovers, but the Wolverines prevented the Badgers from getting the ball in the paint and forced them to take contested outside jumpers. Wisconsin shot just 4-for-14 in the first quarter and only scored eight points. Michigan’s offense struggled at the beginning of the second quarter — scoring just two points in the first three minutes — but yet again, its stout defense kept the Badgers from coming back. Just as Wisconsin’s offense started to gain some momentum with two baskets in three possessions over a minute, sophomore forward Naz Hillmon found her rhythm. Hillmon, after being held to just two points on 1-of-4 shooting in the first quarter, scored nine in the final seven minutes of the second, leading the Wolverines to a 16-point halftime lead. She finished with 21 points and 14 rebounds. Dilk added four of her 12 points in this stretch. “Naz seemed like she had a little bit of a slow start and then you look at the end of the game, and she was incredible again,” Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico said on a postgame radio show. “(She) is a rebounding machine.” The Wolverines’ defense struggled a bit in the second half, though, allowing the Badgers to shoot 52 percent after shooting just 31 percent in the first half, but their offense continued to click. They got the ball into the paint for high-quality chances and often got to the line, where they were 10-for-10 in the half. Michigan led by 19 with four minutes left when Wisconsin ended the game on an 11-4 run to finish with only a 12-point deficit —most of which came with the Wolverines’ reserves in the game. Rebounding was key to the Wolverines’ strong offensive performance, with Hillmon at the forefront. In three of Michigan’s five losses, the Wolverines have been outrebounded by their opponents. With a starting five consisting of players all 6-foot or taller, and not many 3-point shooting threats on the roster, outrebounding opponents and getting second-chance opportunities has been crucial for Michigan. Thursday, the Wolverines grabbed 48 rebounds — 22 offensive — compared to the Badgers’ 23, and scored 27 second chance points. “I thought we were awesome on the offensive glass,” Barnes Arico said. “Obviously we can count on Naz every night to really offensive rebound. But Kayla Robbins was tremendous on the glass, as was AK and Amy Dilk. We just had a motor to the basketball tonight and that was great to see.” This game came at just the right time for Michigan. Wisconsin is one of the weakest teams in the Big Ten, allowing the Wolverines to gain some confidence and pick up their first conference road win. Michigan readies for Garza rematch On Dec. 6, Iowa center Luka Garza marched into Ann Arbor and dropped 44 points. Forty. Four. Perhaps even more astounding, though, was that his team lost — by double digits. Regardless of the outcome, there is no chance Michigan men’s basketball coach Juwan Howard is happy with letting any human being score 44 points on his team. So that leads to one big question heading into Friday’s match against the Hawkeyes: Should the Wolverines continue their defensive strategy of maintaining one-on-one matchups, or is it time to double the post and one of the nation’s most prolific scorers? That description is not an overstatement — Garza sits as the NCAA’s sixth-leading scorer with 22.3 points per game. For now, it seems that Michigan will look to maintain its defensive scheme — involving guarding the low post one-on- one — and to trust the strength of its big men on defense to limit Garza in the points column. For many teams across the nation, thinking of a way to effectively prepare for a 6-foot-11 elite scorer may leave coaches and players alike scratching their head. But for the Wolverines, with their plethora of big-bodied centers, the task falls on the shoulders of its scout team. Junior forward Jaron Faulds, in particular. “We got Jaron Faulds playing Luka Garza,” junior walk- on forward C.J. Baird said. “Jaron’s really good at taking his time and getting in good positioning, so we’re hoping that’s a good imitation of Garza. Cause Garza’s elite at getting his body, getting position in the post and scoring, so we’re trying to imitate that as best we can, but honestly, it’s hard. He’s, I don’t know, number six scorer in the country. So it’ll be a good challenge for us.” How effective Faulds will be at this game of impressions will unfold on Friday in Iowa City. Faulds’ impersonation, combined with the defensive capabilities of senior center Jon Teske, sophomore center Colin Castleton and senior center Austin Davis as well as how many fouls these players will commit against the shifty Garza will dictate whether or not Garza will have another career night down low. So far this season, early foul trouble and hacking opponents down low has been the Wolverines’ defensive “MO.” In no game was this emphasized further than the most loss on the road against Minnesota. The team committed 19 fouls, emphasized by four by Teske, and let Golden Gophers center Daniel Oturu drop 30 points. Baird insists that fouling has been a focus for the team, defensively, as well as one-on- one situations, given the team’s defensive sets. “Guarding one-on-one without fouling is probably one of the hardest things to do in basketball, and I’d say, in my opinion, in the post as well, it’s probably one of the hardest things to do in basketball,” Baird said. “But there are some things that you can do with, technique-wise, that you can say look at this technique, this will help you in this situation. Or make sure you keep your foot planted here and stay down on a second jumper so you’re not fouling. There are a lot of stuff that goes with technique, especially in the one on one defense, that you can improve upon rather than just saying, ‘Be better.’ ” And if the technique doesn’t work, it sounds like Howard is relatively fine letting Garza getting those touches and points in the paint. As long as that plan of attack ends in a victory. After Michigan’s last game against Iowa, Howard sat down at the podium, stat sheet in hand, and visibly revealed his shock at what he was reading. The first-year coach was floored by the opposing offense and joked about his role in the affair. “Second-chance points,” Howard responded when asked what shocked him. “(Garza) had 27 second-chance points, and then points in the paint, 56. I was like, ‘Wow!’ That’s on the coach, man. I did a horrible job.” Joking or not, Friday’s game will be as credible an indicator as any of whether Howard’s defensive gameplan is reliable, or makes as brazen of a comment as his own as to the state of his coaching. Wojcik leads comeback As Evianna Roberson climbed onto the beam, she received the full attention of all in attendance at Crisler Center. Her performance was the last of the meet, and with a perfect score, she would force a tie between her No. 17 Washington and the No. 6 Michigan women’s gymnastics teams. The lead margin throughout the first two rotations of last Friday’s meet had been consistently microscopic in favor of the Wolverines. But Michigan ran into trouble in its third rotation, the beam, allowing the Huskies to move into first place and Texas Woman’s University to make up ground. “Quite honestly I was very disappointed, very disappointed with beam,” Michigan coach Bev Plocki said. “... We still have a lot of work to do.” The half-point deduction from sophomore Natalie Wojcik’s fall was symptomatic of an event performed at a lower quality than the vault and bars. A team score of 48.100 on beam was nearly a full point lower than that of any other event. The onus fell on the Wolverines’ floor gymnasts to reclaim the lead, and while not all were aware of the score, the necessity of ending on a high note after a subpar beam was unanimously felt. “Bev had us circle up and she was like, ‘Let’s do floor like we’re on a mission,’ ” freshman Gabby Wilson said. Plocki encouraged her team to control its own destiny. “My mindset is never really anything to do with the other team,” Plocki said. “My mindset is we need to entertain this crowd, and we need to rock and roll here on floor.” That’s exactly what Michigan did. It was the only squad that posted more than 49 points on floor, led by a 9.900 from Wojcik; after handing over the lead on beam, she helped engineer the effort to reclaim it. “It was good to kind of reset and look at floor as a new opportunity, and try not to let beam affect what happened,” Wojcik said. “I knew I had to keep going, push forward and finish out the meet strong.” Roberson could not achieve perfection, leaving the Wolverines with a comeback victory. But for Plocki, not all wins are created equal. “When you’re satisfied, you’re done, because somebody is doing better,” Plocki said. “This team is capable of being a 49.5 on any event. And so you can see where we still have room to improve.” Lambert focuses on improving defensive habits Jimmy Lambert remained on the ice. Long finished was practice, players had come in, completed their drills and left thereafer. Long gone were the coaches, who hurried off the ice to prep for the Michigan hockey team’s upcoming matchup. But the sophomore forward was far from done. He worked on shooting, rifling shots into the empty net. When he ran out of pucks, he collected them back up, and went again. And again. And again. Sometimes he’d spend up to 30 extra minutes on the ice, just firing the puck on target. If you look at Lambert’s numbers, it’s clear why he’s putting in extra time. He only has one goal this season, and he scored it almost three months ago. With just four total points, he’s tied for eighth on the team. Last year, he led the freshman class with 11. His name hasn’t been featured on the scoresheet since assisting on an empty net goal against Wisconsin on Dec. 1. Lambert’s offensive statistics are emblematic of how the first half of the season went for the Wolverines: rough. “Obviously the puck hasn’t gone in as much as I’d hoped,” Lambert said. “But when it doesn’t go in the net you’ve got to contribute in other ways.” And that’s exactly what he’s done. During the middle of November, Lambert switched positions from right wing to center. While not a transition he’d been anticipating, the Michigan coaches made sure their forwards were prepared to play in whatever role the team called upon them to play. Despite this expectation, having the trust of the coaches to fill a gap in the lineup gave Lambert the confidence boost he’d been in search of. With a new role and a scoring slump, he decided to focus on the aspects of his game he could control. His backchecking and forechecking habits, faceoffs and ability to set up opportunities for his teammates. “I think I made a lot of improvements in my game defensively,” Lambert said. “I think I’ve done a good job in the D-zone winning draws. I recently played on the penalty kill. Think it’s been good, really the only thing that could go a little better is scoring some goals.” Last weekend at then-No. 14 Notre Dame, with the Wolverines leaving a prominent penalty killer in Dakota Raabe home in Ann Arbor, Lambert saw significant ice time on the man disadvantage. Prior to the Great Lakes Invitational (GLI), he’d seen little to no time killing penalties. But in South Bend, he fit in seamlessly on the unit. He was getting his stick in passing lanes, taking away angles, even blocking shots. In the circle, he’s been averaging just over 50 percent on faceoffs with 68 won and 66 lost. Some of Lambert’s success on faceoffs can be credited to a new strategy Michigan has been using since the GLI — watching their opponents take draws. “It’s always good when you can have a little bit of an edge on the opponent,” Lambert said. “Being able to watch all four of their centers, and the guys that go in when they get kicked out. Just being able to know what they do. It’s really good for us to have a plan going into each faceoff.” This weekend, as Lambert and his teammates turn their attention towards the sixth- ranked Nittany Lions, his defensive improvements will be beneficial. Penn State’s offense is tied for second in the NCAA, averaging 4.00 goals per game while the Wolverines sit at 44th with an average of 2.32. While Michigan’s scoring numbers, much like Lambert’s, aren’t overly promising, the team’s defense is solid. Allowing just 2.05 goals per game on average, Michigan’s defense is ranked fifth. With that in mind, the key to this pivotal series for both Lambert and the Wolverines will be what they do without the puck — with Lambert noting that the most crucial aspect of the weekend is to play solid defense. “One way to keep the number-one scoring team off the scoresheet is by playing offense ourselves,” Lambert said. “And keeping them in their own end. If we can be heavy on them in the forecheck and get pucks in deep and just be relentless all night, I think we should have a pretty good weekend.” Coming off a weekend road sweep of the Fighting Irish that catapulted it out of last place in the Big Ten Conference standings, Michigan has an opportunity to prove itself. Its success will depend largely on Lambert and the rest of the team to make strong defensive plays, especially if the offensive woes of the first half creep in. ALLISON ENGKVIST/Daily Natalie Wojcik helped Michigan to a win over Washington last weekend.. JACK WHITTEN Daily Sports Writer This team is capable of being a 49.5 on any event. ALEXIS RANKIN/Daily Sophomore forward Jimmy Lambert has been working to improve on his defense going into this weekend’s series. MOLLY SHEA Daily Sports Writer I think I made a lot of improvements in my game. ALEXANDRIA POMPEI/Daily Iowa center Luka Garza scored 44 points on Michigan in December. JACOB KOPNICK Daily Sports Editor JACK KINGSLEY Daily Sports Writer EMMA MATI/Daily Sophomore guard Amy Dilk scored 12 points with six rebounds as Michigan beat Wisconsin on Thursday night.