lsa.umich.edu/philosophy
Lecture is free and open to the public
CHARLES W. MILLS
The City University of New York
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 2020
4–6pm | Rackham Auditorium
2020 TANNER LECTURE ON HUMAN VALUES
Torn apart
Whenever
Wolverines
and
Buckeyes collide, sparks fly — and
not in a sentimental way. That’s
to be expected from two bitter
rivals.
But
the
significance
of
Tuesday’s clash between the
Michigan
men’s
basketball
team and Ohio State extended
far beyond any semblance of
bragging rights for both teams,
who entered the game tied for
12th in the Big Ten standings.
Despite recent two-game win
streaks, postseason aspirations
were also on the line.
Ultimately, behind 23 points
from their best player, Kaleb
Wesson, and a controversial
flagrant foul in the closing
moments, the Buckeyes (15-7
overall, 5-6 Big Ten) extended
their run, beating the Wolverines
(13-9, 4-7), 61-58.
A
sense
of
urgency
characterized the early going as
both squads looked to jump out
to hot starts. Instead of catching
fire,
though,
both
Michigan
and Ohio State saw a slew of ill-
advised shots clank off the rim.
Ten minutes into the game and
the teams had combined for just
20 points — the Buckeyes holding
the narrow 13-7 lead.
“I believe we got some really
good shots that just didn’t go in,”
freshman forward Franz Wagner
said. “Had some good looks at the
rim that we didn’t make. Lack of
focus maybe, something like that
hurts in these types of games. You
need every point.”
Ohio State’s Kaleb Wesson
was the game’s most potent
scorer, knocking down fadeaway
jumpers and 3-pointers in the
face of the Wolverines’ big
men. His 15 first-half points
were counteracted primarily by
Michigan’s sophomore forward
Brandon Johns Jr., who led the
Wolverines with eight points.
At the end of a largely
inefficient but industrious first 20
minutes, where neither team shot
better than 40 percent from the
field, Ohio State led by just one.
The shooting woes carried
over into the second half. In the
rare case a 3-pointer or layup
would fall, the other team would
match it on the other end. At
the 9:40 mark, both teams were
knotted up at 38.
Wesson continued to go to
work on the Wolverines’ defense
as the half persisted, though. Now,
instead of drawing Michigan’s
bigs out to the perimeter, he was
bodying them down low.
“I thought Kaleb was fantastic
tonight,” Ohio State coach Chris
Holtmann said. “I thought he
imposed himself in a lot of ways
… we thought he was going to be
able to get some open threes. He
also made some tough fadeaway
shots. I think he was just playing
with a lot of confidence today.”
On the other end, Ohio native
and senior center Jon Teske
struggled to get anything going.
A point-blank miss off an alley-
oop feed from senior point guard
Zavier
Simpson
encapsulated
his 1-for-7 performance from the
field.
It was Simpson, though, who
almost single-handedly carried
the load for Michigan in the
second half. With his team down
by four after yielding yet another
layup in the paint, Simpson was
left alone on the wing and hit
his third 3-pointer of the game.
Mere seconds later, he finished a
contested finger roll off an Ohio
State turnover.
While Teske proved ineffective,
senior forward Austin Davis gave
the Wolverines critical minutes
down the stretch. He collected
an offensive rebound and tied
the game at 51 with four minutes
remaining, before completing a
rim-running dive to the basket off
an assist from Simpson.
Then, with things all square at
53, the sparks flew.
Wesson inched the Buckeyes
ahead from the foul line. After
the two teams traded 3-pointers,
Simpson took matters into his
own hands — he drove the lane
and drew a foul on Ohio State’s
Kyle Young. The ensuing cheers
from Michigan fans were cut
short as the referees conferred at
the monitor and slapped Simpson
with a flagrant-1 for dragging
Young down with him after the
foul.
“I couldn’t believe it,” Howard
said. “It was explained like,
Zavier went up for a layup, and as
he was coming down, he grabbed
his jersey and ripped it. And then
I said ‘Well, if he’s going up and
he’s falling, did he grab him to
brace his fall?’ And (the referee)
said ‘Yes.’ I said, ‘Well, I guess
that means that you know, he
needed some help.’ He did not
want to absorb the contact on that
momentum of hitting the floor.
At the end of the day, we have to
respect their call that was made.
Unfortunately, I didn’t see it.”
Simpson calmly knocked down
both from the foul line increasing
his total 15 points and temporarily
giving the Wolverines a 58-57
advantage.
But
Young
immediately
followed suit on the other end.
Per the flagrant, the Buckeyes —
now up by one with 23 seconds
left
—
retained
possession,
forcing Michigan to foul again.
All of a sudden, the one point
lead that Simpson had earned
dissolved into a three-point
deficit.
On
the
Wolverines’
final
possession, Simpson again found
himself at the center of attention,
finding junior guard Eli Brooks
wide open in the corner for a
last-second chance to tie.
Just like most of Michigan’s
3-point looks, it didn’t fall,
cementing a heartbreaking home
loss.
“I’m sure I’m going to replay
it over and over,” Howard said.
“It’s a tough one to swallow, I
swear. This — like all the losses
— but this one hurts a lot. It was a
very hard-fought game.”
Michigan loses to Ohio State, 61-58, falls to 4-7 in Big Ten after Simpson commits costly flagrant foul in last minute
For the second time in as
many games at Crisler Center,
the game still hung in the
balance as the clock wound
down.
After squandering a two-
point lead with less than a
minute to play against Illinois
last week, the Michigan men’s
basketball team (13-9 overall,
4-7 Big Ten) appeared to find
its footing. A long-awaited
road win at Nebraska and
a successful dispatching of
Rutgers in New York made
the loss to the Fighting Illini
look like an inflection point in
hindsight. A lesson learned.
But when the Wolverines
found themselves in a nearly
identical setting against Ohio
State on Tuesday night, there
was no sign of progress. After
junior guard Eli Brooks gave
Michigan a two-point lead with
1:21 left to play, the Buckeyes
(15-7, 5-6) closed the game on
a 7-2 run, ultimately escaping
with a 61-58 win.
In a Big Ten season defined
by
conference-wide
road
struggles, the Wolverines have
now dropped their last three
games in Ann Arbor. All of
them were there for the taking.
In the only game Michigan
didn’t hold a late lead, it was
down by just five points with
four minutes to play against
Penn State on Jan. 22.
The
most
recent
two,
however, have each come at
the buzzer. Against Illinois,
the Wolverines missed five
consecutive
free
throws
down the stretch in what
could’ve been a win over the
conference’s
hottest
team,
culminating in
Ayo Dosunmu’s
eventual game-
winning pull-up
jumper.
Tuesday
proved to be a
different story,
though,
as
Michigan
was
the team with
the ball as the
clock
ticked
down
in
a
one-possession
game.
With
over
39
grueling
minutes of physical basketball
already
in
the
books,
Juwan Howard huddled the
Wolverines
around
their
bench. He spent back-to-back
timeouts furiously scribbling
and pointing, whiteboard and
marker in hand the entire time.
The result was an open look
for Brooks from the left corner.
A look that Brooks had buried
from the opposite corner less
than two minutes prior. A look
that would’ve tied the game.
A
look
that
ultimately
clanked off the back iron.
“We were in the game the
whole game,” freshman wing
Franz
Wagner
said.
“We
didn’t play exceptionally well.
Sometimes that just happens,
but you’ve got to be able to still
win the game, especially at
home. It hurts a
lot.”
Especially
at home. Those
words
brought
the most strain
to his voice.
Over
the
last few weeks,
home is where
the Wolverines
have struggled
most.
From
knowing the arena lighting
and practicing on the rims
daily, there are a number of
advantages to playing at home.
Yet during this three-game
losing streak at Crisler Center,
Michigan hasn’t shot above 40
percent in a single game.
And
even
though
open
looks aren’t falling, Howard’s
unwavering
green
light
persists.
At this point, it’s difficult
for anyone in the Wolverines’
locker room to put a finger
on the root of the problem.
Slumped against the wall in a
scrum of reporters following
the game, Wagner tried to
gauge the situation.
“I think we got some really
good shots that didn’t go in,”
Wagner said. “We got some
good shots at the rim we didn’t
make. Lack of focus maybe —
I don’t know. Stuff like that
hurts in these types of games.
You need every point.”
With its last two losses
coming at the final buzzer,
Michigan has learned that
final lesson the hard way.
Missed shots a familiar refrain
For
all
the
romanticized
and clichéd reasons to love
sports, seeing a buzzer-beating
3-pointer hit nothing but net has
to be near the top of the list. It’s
pure anticipation as the shooter
pulls up and attempts to carve
themselves in the history books
of their program.
That’s the exact opportunity
junior guard Eli Brooks had in
the waning moments on Tuesday
against Ohio State.
As
each
second
escaped
forever
off
the
clock,
the
Wolverines were running one
final play to tie the game and
salvage a win at Crisler Center.
Like most late-game scenarios,
senior guard Zavier Simpson
drove to the basket where he
looked to find the open shooter.
There sat Brooks, alone in
the corner with his defender
desperately trying to get in
position to make the stop. The
junior caught the ball, rose up as
he has done thousands of times
and … the ball clanged off the
back rim.
Michigan got the look it
wanted — a wide-open shot in
the corner from one of its best
shooters — and just flat out
missed it, giving Ohio State a
61-58 win.
So why didn’t it go in?
Not only that, why didn’t all of
the Wolverines’ wide-open shots
find nylon? Michigan’s shooters
consistently found themselves
staring at an unobstructed view
of the basket in its entirety — a
bright green light screaming at
the ball handler to let it fly.
This
tendency
has
done
nothing but grow under coach
Juwan Howard, whose policy
since Day One has been: If you’re
open, make it rain.
Unfortunately
for
the
Wolverines,
there’s
been
a
drought in Ann Arbor.
“I know we missed a ton
of layups,” Howard said. “We
missed a ton of open shots.
We just have to finish, it’s that
simple. We have to finish games.
We have to win games at home.
We started off with a pretty
good run in the beginning of the
season by winning some home
games, and our first loss ended
up being against Oregon, but
we haven’t gotten back to that
basketball that we were playing
in the beginning of the year.”
Perhaps no one player has
struggled more to hit open looks
than freshman forward Franz
Wagner.
Tuesday, the freshman went
just 2-for-8 from 3-point range
and 2-for-12 from the floor. That’s
good for a 25 percent 3-point
percentage — a disappointing
mark to say the least.
But the German will be the first
to tell you that these misfires are
not the result of a mental hurdle
needing to be conquered. Often
times, pundits and onlookers
alike suggest this could be the
reason for a shooting drought. If
a player is not shooting well, the
thinking goes, they just must not
be shooting confidently.
“It’s not, ‘I’m goin’ bad, I need
to fix my shot,’ ” Wagner said.
“I’m confident in my shot, I think
you can see that. I’ll continue
to do that. We got good shots. A
couple shots felt really good, but
they didn’t go in. Sometimes my
wrist doesn’t flex in the direction
I want it to, so that’s why you
gotta keep working on it, but it’s
not that I’m not confident.”
Rather, it could boil down to
slight alterations in how the ball
leaves his hands.
After a win against Nebraska
on Jan. 28, Wagner — who had
just gone 1-for-5 from beyond the
arc — assured the public that the
coaching staff insisted there was
nothing
mechanically
wrong
with his shot. The dang thing
just needed to fall in the hoop.
“I talked to the coaches, and
we think there’s nothing wrong
with my shot,” Wagner said in
Lincoln. “We’re just gonna keep
working on it, and you can ask
anybody. I’m trying to work on
it and get my reps up, during the
game and just trust it and believe
that it’s going in.”
So how does Wagner address
this problem in practice?
He does not attempt to correct
the trajectory of his previous
miss. Say he’s too strong on one
of his shots and the ball pops
off the back of the rim. Instead
of attempting to put less muscle
on his shot, Wagner holds fast in
his approach, refusing to cave to
the pressure that he overcorrect
the amount of force put into the
shot. The opposite is true for
balls that fall just short of the
basket.
Given
the
secrecy
that
typically
surrounds
players
shooting mechanics, Wagner’s
approach may be unique among
his teammates.
But for someone shooting
under 30 percent from 3-point
land while attempting five long-
range bombs a game, a change to
his shooting mechanics in some
form may be on the horizon.
Either
that,
or
Wagner’s
persistence pays off and open
looks may no longer be a gaping
hole in Michigan’s offensive
inefficiencies.
Because if a team can’t figure
out the little things in a wide-
open shot over the course of a
regulation game, how could it be
expected to hit it with the game
on the line?
JACOB KOPNICK
Daily Sports Editor
MILES MACKLIN/Daily
Freshman wing Franz Wagner has struggled from 3-point range recently.
MILES MACKLIN/Daily
Zavier Simpson committed a crucial flagrant foul in Michigan’s loss Tuesday.
DANIEL DASH
Daily Sports Writer
CONNOR BRENNAN
Daily Sports Writer
We didn’t play
exceptionally
well. ... It hurts
a lot.
8A — Wednesday, February 5, 2020
Sports
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com