The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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MICHIGAN BASKETBALL thing Bo said all the time: sudden change," Beilein noted. "All of a sud- den, things changed." They changed at the end, when the Wolverines ramped up their defense. But they also changed at the begin- ning, when senior captain Zack Novak sat out nearly the entire first half in foul trouble. That's the sort of adversity requiring Novak-like toughness, even without the captain on the court. "One of the big changes was, where is number zero?" Beilein noted. "He's going to sit for 17 minutes in the first half. We adapted. We adapted and played through." STATS REVEAL MICHIGAN'S EMPHASIS ON DEFENSE John Beilein teams are known for their three-point prowess, but this group of Wolverines has been up and down from beyond the arc. U-M has also stressed great effort at the defen- sive end of the floor, and that's show- ing up in some of Michigan's numbers through Jan. 15. While the Wolverines featured no better than the No. 8 scoring offense in the Big Ten (69.3 points per game), they were giving up the third-least points (60.7) on average of any team in the league. That made for a scoring margin of plus-8.6, sixth best in the conference. Michigan sat in the middle of the pack in free throw shooting, again sixth at 70.8 percent. Its 46.1 per- cent overall shooting was fifth in the league, behind league leaders Indiana and Ohio State (49.7 percent). Mean- while, U-M's three-point shooting Five Questions With Assistant Coach Bacari Alexander The Wolverine: What's your assessment of this team on defense so far? Alexander: "One of the things, as we grow the program, that Coach [John] Beilein and the entire staff has concentrated on specifically is defense and rebounding. We know throughout Big Ten history, the teams that are able to cut down the nets at the end of the regular season are up near the top in field goal percentage defense, rebounding differential, things of that nature. "It's something that we preach every day. It's starting to become the mantra, who we are. "We all know you can't hang your hat on made three-pointers or a hot hand every night. There are nights where you're going to have to grind. I think our young people are embracing that challenge." The Wolverine: Why has Trey Burke generally not looked like the typical freshman, and in what ways does he? Alexander: "A lot of times, young people benefit from great coaching environ- ments prior to coming to college. Columbus Northland is one of the storied pro- grams in our country over the past couple of years here, being the national cham- pion when he was younger. They were at the top of the state of Ohio in his senior year. "But the other thing about his youth that he shows, each game brings a different challenge — defensively, offensively, schematically, in terms of what teams do to slow us down. That's the part where in certain situations, Trey may not make that sound decision that you might expect him to, only because you don't know until you know. He hasn't been in those situations. "His freshman mistakes come from a lack of exposure to the collegiate game. But I tell you, he has us fooled in terms of his maturity." The Wolverine: What did this team learn from a tough, close loss in its first Big Ten road game at Indiana? Alexander: "It lets you know that if you're willing to defend, and you're willing to rebound, two things take place. One, you're able to get field goal percentages down, which gives us rebounding opportunities, which gets us out in transition. The other thing is crashing the glass, which gets us extra possessions. "The Indiana game showed us you can overcome poor shooting by getting extra possessions, and that's by giving extra effort. We learned a great deal from that. "We also learned the fans can't come on the court and play the game. Even though the atmosphere is very electric, and they do a great job down there in Hoosier coun- try, our guys, once recalibrated to the atmosphere, played a tremendous second half. We outscored them in the second half." The Wolverine: How will Jordan Morgan take the jump that allows him to avoid early foul trouble? Alexander: "Seeing plays as they develop. That comes through film, and it comes through experience. I remind myself that even though he's a third- year player in Coach Beilein's program, he's a second-year player on the court, in terms of real time in games. "There's a concept we like to use, called air time — the ability to see what's going to happen next, as the ball is moving from point A to point B. Whether that be a block-out scenario, a screening action … our ability to see those plays develop a little quicker will get fouls down in a hurry. That's an area of development that we're going to continue to concentrate on with Jordan Morgan. "It's also pace of play. You see where he's moving a little too fast, Redshirt sophomore Jordan Morgan averaged 7.1 points and 5.7 rebounds in U-M's first 18 games, but committed 43 fouls that limited his playing time to 23.1 minutes per contest. PHOTO BY LON HORWEDEL which leads to lack of finishes. When he's able to slow the game down to a better pace, he gets some easier scores. It's learning how to curb the excitement and find the poise necessary to see plays developing and play his game at the same time. That's the marriage we're looking for with J-Mo." The Wolverine: When you look at this year's captains and how they're handling themselves, what are your thoughts? Alexander: "Zack Novak and Stu Douglass can come to me for anything, for the rest of their lives." — John Borton FEBRUARY 2012 THE WOLVERINE 55