The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Sports Thursday, February 20, 2020 — 7 As it entered the locker room at halftime Wednesday, the Michigan women’s basketball team had to catch its breath. The Wolverines just watched Illinois guard Brandi Beasley drive the length of the Crisler Center floor in five seconds, sinking a layup to give the Fighting Illini — the No. 13 team in the Big Ten — a one-point lead entering the break. It was a fitting end to a first half where Illinois shot 56.7 percent, including an electric 8-for-13 from three. For Michigan to avoid an embarrassing loss to the Big Ten’s doormat, it would need to lock in defensively. The Wolverines did just that, allowing just 17 points the entire second half and running away with an 80-59 victory. “It was really nice that we weren’t in a panic mode,” Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico said. “But I also thought that we needed to be locked in and focused. I said that we need to defend, we need to lock in, we need to focus. I was kind of on them during one of the timeouts, that we need to turn this up … and I think they really took that to heart and went back out there and tried to do a better job on the defensive end.” From the beginning, the Illini were on fire offensively. With 3:28 remaining in the first quarter, they entered the first media timeout with 21 points, 15 of which came from their perfect 5-for-5 on 3-pointers. The Wolverines hung around — largely thanks to scoring from sophomore guard Amy Dilk, senior guard Akienreh Johnson and junior forward Hailey Brown — but they couldn’t keep up with Illinois defensively. But the second half looked like a completely different ballgame. Suddenly, Illinois’ shooters couldn’t find any space. After going underneath screens in the first half to deny the inside, the Wolverines’ defenders instead went over the screens to close out on shooters. As a result, Illini guards Jeanae Terry and Petra Holešínská — who each went 2-for-3 from three and scored eight points apiece in the first half — were held to a scoreless, 0-for-6 combined second half. The rest of the team followed suit, shooting an abysmal 1-for-12 from beyond the arc. “They came out lights out (early on), and our kids had to realize that they couldn’t help off the shooters,” Barnes Arico said. “We had to take away space and give up twos for threes at that point and really deny the reversal passes. … And then we did a great job in the second half of not allowing those threes.” Meanwhile, Michigan maintained its level of scoring. Sophomore forward Naz Hillmon — who was limited by an upper- body injury in Sunday’s loss at Rutgers — contributed to this effort, notching 12 second-half points after a quiet start to the game. Alongside Johnson’s continued scoring and Dilk’s passing, the Wolverines got back to their lethal high-low attack that was missing Sunday, best exemplified by a well-worked fourth-quarter sequence that stretched their lead to nine. “I remember it was after a timeout, and (junior forward Hailey Brown) threw me a pass I had to get up and get,” Dilk said. “And flash in the middle was open the whole game, and (Johnson) made the right read, she flashed in and hit the high-low to Naz who sealed the player off and hit that huge bucket for us.” That bucket, of course, didn’t win Michigan the game. It made up just two points in a 21-point victory over an inferior opponent. But considering how the Wolverines looked Sunday against Rutgers, it’s definitely a positive sign. It shows they’ve moved on from their most disastrous outing all season and are back to doing what they’re expected to do. Even if that’s just blowing out a bottom-tier Big Ten team. In a game that wasn’t supposed to be much of a challenge, the Michigan women’s basketball team found itself in an early scare. Powered by a first quarter in which it shot 11-for-16 from the floor and 6-for-8 from 3-point range, Illinois led the Wolverinesfor much of the first half. Michigan didn’t take a lead until 44 seconds remaining in the half, but a coast- to-coast layup by Fighting Illini guard Brandi Beasley as time expired put Illinois back on top by one entering halftime. But that was the last time Illinois led, as the Wolverines (17-9 overall, 8-7 Big Ten) held off the Illini (11- 15, 2-13) for a 80-59 victory. Early in the third quarter, sophomore forward Naz Hillmon — who scored just three points in the first half — got going. After suffering an upper body injury in the Feb. 13 loss against Northwestern, Hillmon struggled Sunday against Rutgers, clearly less than full strength. She scored the Wolverines’ next six points and finished with 15 points and 10 rebounds, quelling any concerns the injury would be a lingering issue. “She didn’t have a tremendous statline in the first half, but just her presence out there was great,” Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico said. “And then second half, we tried to go to her a little bit more and she kind of got back into her groove.” The Wolverines’ defense stayed strong throughout the third quarter. Despite giving up 42 points in the first half, Michigan didn’t play particularly poorly — the Illini just kept making improbable shots. Without Illinois knocking down an uncharacteristically high percentage of those shots, the Wolverines held the Illini to just six points in the third quarter. “We decided ‘Let’s just take the ball, get the ball out of their hands,’ ” senior guard Akienreh Johnson said. “ ‘Let’s deny the next pass. Let’s mess up their offense, get them a little rattled so that once they do get that wide open shot they’re shaken up so much that they can’t make it.’ ” Michigan took a nine-point lead into the fourth quarter, powered by eight third-quarter points from Hillmon and six from Johnson, who finished with 22 points. In the fourth quarter, the Wolverines continued to score at a pace Illinois couldn’t keep up with, outscoring the Illini 23-11 in the quarter. Despite a brief scrum between junior forward Hailey Brown and Illinois forward Ali Andrews with three minutes remaining in the game that resulted in Brown getting disqualified, Michigan cruised past the Illini. After a hot Illinois start, the Wolverines got their offense going — Johnson and sophomore guard Amy Dilk led the way with seven points each — but the Illini continued to knock down improbable shots, including multiple 3-pointers while heavily defended. They led 28-24 after the first quarter, backed by two 3-pointers apiece from Andrews and guards Petra Holesínská and Jeanae Terry. But Andrews picked up her second foul early in the second quarter and had to sit, while Holešínská and Terry both cooled down. After combining for 20 points in the first half, the trio scored just six the rest of the way. Michigan, on the other hand, got hot from deep, knocking down 3-of-6 — two from Brown, who scored 11 points in the first half. “When (Brown) hits 3-pointers, it gives her the confidence to play a little harder, play on the defensive end,” Johnson said. “We knew that the next rotation they were going to be out denying Hailey or out denying shooters and we were going to have an easy post touch.” It wasn’t easy from the start, but a strong all-around offensive performance and a resurgent Hillmon led the Wolverines to a comfortable win. Back to basics Michigan easily beats Illinois, 80-59, behind full-strength Hillmon and 22 points from Johnson A lmost exactly three months after Michigan went to East Lansing in November and got shut out, 3-0, by Michigan State, the Wolverines went back to Munn Ice Arena and wrote a very different story. They won, 5-1, and followed that win up with a 4-1 win over the Spartans in Detroit on Monday to complete the sweep. “We looked at the tape when we played them here earlier this year,” Michigan coach Mel Pear- son said Friday night. “It’s like a horror movie. We were so bad. And nothing against them, but we were just so bad, and we played so much better (tonight).” On Nov. 16 after Michigan lost in East Lansing, the Wolverines were six games into Big Ten play and had only one point in the con- ference standings. Before Michi- gan got its first Big Ten win, it went 0-6-1 through its first seven conference games. The picture for the Wolverines couldn’t be more different now. After starting out firmly in last place in the Big Ten, Michigan is now in third place and just three points behind Penn State and Minnesota, which are tied for the lead. If — emphasis on if — the Wolverines sweep Notre Dame and Minnesota to close the regu- lar season, they’ll win the Big Ten regular season title. In that first series against Michigan State, Pearson saw his team struggle in nearly every aspect of the game. The Wolver- ines blew a 3-1 lead on the Thurs- day night to lose, 4-3, and couldn’t put the puck past goaltender John Lethemon on the Saturday. Wednesday in the offices at Yost Ice Arena, Pearson reeled off a laundry list of things that went wrong for Michigan in November. “Just our overall compete level,” Pearson said. “Our execu- tion of passing and plays. I’m maybe being overcritical, but we’re so much better in those areas now for the most part. … Just our awareness, our alertness. Just our compete level. Just our execution. Skating. Breaking the puck out. “...We’re a lot different team. We’re playing a lot better. But we were way off early.” Some of this resurgence has been keyed by Michigan playing with, for the most part, a healthy lineup. Michigan had five play- ers miss at least one game in the 12-game span between the begin- ning of the season on Oct. 11 and the second game against the Spar- tans in November for a total of 11 man games lost to injury. Three players have missed a total of four games in the 18 games since. Freshman forward Eric Ciccolini has also been lost for the rest of the season, but his 11 points in 26 games is an easier loss to absorb than, for example, senior forward Jake Slaker, who has 23 points in 17 games since scoring his first goal on Nov. 23. But it isn’t just having healthy players that’s enabled Michigan to find success and turn things completely around after getting swept by Michigan State early in the year. The Wolverines spent months working in practice to crisp things up, and now that the offense has started to come, the confidence has followed. It’s somewhat of a self-fulfilling prophecy. When the puck isn’t going in the net, your confidence drops, and then your next shots become even less likely to find twine. The opposite is true when a player is able to break out of a slump and start lighting the lamp. “I just think things are starting to click,” sophomore defenseman Nick Blankenburg said. “I think we’re starting to figure out the way we need to play, and I think everyone’s playing to their style and everyone’s doing what they need to do to help the team win.” And Michigan is also dem- onstrating a full commitment to team defense in a way it didn’t always early in the year. In Mon- day night’s win, the Wolverines blocked 30 shots — nearly double their average of 15.1 blocks per game. “It’s something that we’re gonna have to do,” Blankenburg said. “I think when all the guys are putting their bodies on the line, you’re gonna keep seeing those games where we’re letting up one goal, two goals. That’s what we need is everybody to buy in to keep blocking shots.” At a basic level, blocking shots is a simple box-score demonstration of a team’s buy-in to the gameplan. If players are putting their bod- ies on the line to secure a win, it probably means that team is fully committed to the game plan and willing to do what it takes to win. When the Wolverines got shut out on Nov. 16, they blocked just three shots and 16 across the two games. This past weekend, they blocked 42. Things are a little different now. Johnson can be reached at bajohn@umich.edu or on Twitter @BaileyAJohnson_. Bottom third of lineup produces As freshman outfielder Clark Elliot stood on first base with one out in the top of the ninth last Friday against then-No. 1 Vanderbilt, fifth-year senior infielder Matthew Schmidt walked from the on-deck circle to the right-handed batter’s box as the go-ahead run. Two pitches later, every hitter’s favorite sound resonated throughout Salt River Fields in Scottsdale, Ariz. as Schmidt sent a 1-1 fastball from Vanderbilt junior right-hander Troy Brown skyward, launching the ball over the left field fence for his first career home run. “It was kind of a surreal experience,” Schmidt said. The Wolverines went on to win their College World Series rematch with Vanderbilt, 4-3, in large part thanks to Schmidt’s go-ahead blast. Given that Schmidt hit in the seven spot against the Commodores, the long ball wasn’t necessarily expected. It was indicative of the bottom third of the lineup’s production from the weekend. “One through nine we can all provide pop,” Schmidt said. “It doesn’t really matter if it comes from the three-hole or whatever position you are in the lineup. I think our team has a dynamic like that. It doesn’t really matter who it is, we can all provide pop like that.” Schmidt contributed two RBI when he barrelled up Troy Brown’s fastball, but this was far from the only strong swing from the bottom third of Michigan’s lineup. In fact, the Wolverines’ seven, eight and nine hitters accounted for nine of the 15 RBI Michigan accrued in its four games last weekend. It is always helpful for a team’s bottom third of the lineup to contribute to the offense, but Michigan’s current situation makes it particularly important. Much of the Wolverines’ production from the 2019 season — 129 RBI to be exact — left the team when Jordan Brewer and Jimmy Kerr went to the minor leagues. And with junior centerfielder Jesse Franklin — the favorite to fill the cleanup spot — currently injured, the Wolverines are certainly thankful for any production their bottom third can bring to the table. Aside from Schmidt, freshman designated hitter and noted power threat Jimmy Obertop is another potential contributor. The promising freshman flashed his power stroke with a double against the Commodores and has repeatedly drawn praise from teammates and coaches alike. “I made the mistake of shoving Jesse Franklin up in the four-hole his freshman year — probably not smart on my part to put those kinds of expectations on a young kid,” Michigan coach Erik Bakich said. “We did that again to Jimmy Obertop against Vanderbilt in the fall game, put him in the four-hole — that was a nice four-strikeout game.” Bakich’s self-deprecating tone indicated that he doesn’t plan on moving the young slugger far away from his current place in the eighth slot in the immediate future. And as long as Obertop occupies the bottom third, Bakich thinks he will have a productive hitter in that slot. “I like the fact that he’s got big juice in his bat,” Bakich said. “He can hit a double or extra-base hit at any time, really put a charge into a ball, very mature approach for a young kid.” While the seventh, eighth and ninth slots are not where teams expect to see the bulk of their production, Michigan will take offense from whatever source it can. After all, the cleanup hitter isn’t always the one making the walk to the batter’s box with the game on the line. A buy-in and a turnaround BAILEY JOHNSON ALLISON ENGKVIST/Daily Michigan coach Mel Pearson noted his team’s turnaround since November. ALEC COHEN/Daily Fifth-year senior infielder Matthew Schmidt hit a go-ahead home run to pull Michigan past Vanderbilt last weekend. JACOB COHEN Daily Sports Writer JACK KINGSLEY Daily Sports Writer BRENDAN ROOSE Daily Sports Writer MILES MACKLIN/Daily Sophomore center Naz Hillmon put up 15 points and 10 rebounds, quelling any concerns about her injury. Second half, we tried to go to (Hillmon) a little bit more.