Nebraska Recap

Michigan was able to pull out a closer than expected victory over Nebraska on Wednesday night.  While the game left a bad taste in most fans’ mouth it accomplished the main goal, another victory closer to securing a number 1 seed.  The Big Ten conference is easily the toughest in the country, so every night will not result in a 28 point drubbing.  It did look like Michigan’s focus seemed to be on Ohio State instead of the team on the other end of the Crisler Center, but the Wolverines found themselves in an ugly dogfight and prevailed.  Just enjoy the feeling of being disappointed from a 15 point win.  We are only a year removed from struggling with mid-100 level RPI teams and each Big Ten victory seemed like a major feat. 

Nebraska had a game plan that will likely be replicated later in the season.  The Huskers slowed down the game to absolute crawl, and focused all of their efforts into stopping Michigan from getting transition baskets.  Nebraska also implemented some game theory and crossed fingers against the Wolverines.  During the high ball screens, Trey Burke’s defender went underneath the screen every time.  The purpose behind this strategy is to cut down Burke’s driving and passing lanes.  If Burke gets behind the point, Michigan’s offense really takes off.  The All-American shoots over 60% from inside the 3 point line, but the more important thing is he draws so much attention from the remaining 4 defenders.  It is here that the majority of the 7 assists per game come from.  The play to force Nebraska into fighting through the screen or switching would be to shoot them into it.  By going under the ball screen, Burke had open 3 point looks all night long.  For some reason, Michigan had its worst shooting night of the season.  The Husker coach said afterwards, we saw that they shot extremely well in the first two conference games so we thought they would have to come back to the mean at some point.  Lucky guess. 

I was impressed with Mitch McGary, but I might be a little biased since he is becoming one of my favorite players in all of college basketball.  It seems that the big man has slimmed down into appropriate playing weight, which has allowed him to play more minutes.  This will be a big boost as Michigan moves through the first gauntlet of the season if Horford is unavailable.  McGary is not going to fill the scoreboard, partially due to Michigan’s offensive system and Mitch just not being that type of player.  This doesn’t mean he isn’t productive.  At this point, big number 4 is one of the best rebounders in the entire country.  He brings energy off the bench and does a lot of things that stat sheets cannot reflect.  I am very excited to see McGary vs Mbakwe next Thursday night in Minnesota. 

Looking forward, though, the Big Ten conference is morphing into a skilled, athletic conference and not football on wood.  The top conference contenders will not likely be comfortable slowing the game down to 60 possessions.  Indiana, Ohio State, Minnesota, Illinois, Michigan State and Iowa are all better in transition than in half court.  I could see Izzo trying to take the air out of the ball when they visit Crisler, but State has had a tendency for unforced turnovers in half court sets.  This leaves the bottom of the conference to implement this strategy against Michigan to try to keep the game close where anything can happen at the end.  The Wolverines have enough talent to have an off night and still beat the bottom 4 league teams.