Michigan 57, Wisconsin 68: Good 20, not quite 40

Unlike Wednesday night against Northwestern, Michigan came out firing in Madison.

Zak Irvin, in particular, led the charge with seven early points as Michigan jumped out to a 9-2 lead and the offense organically generated open looks.

Also unlike the last game, Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman didn't get on the board until four minutes had elapsed in the second half.

The most obvious point of divergence from the last game: the final score. Michigan played a strong first 20, but couldn't follow up on that first-half effort, as the Wolverines (20-10, 10-7) fell 68-57 in Madison.

Irvin led the way with 14 points. Abdur-Rahkman, Duncan Robinson and Ricky Doyle each added 10 apiece.

Bronson Koenig led UW with 19, while Nigel Hayes (16), Ethan Happ (12), and Vitto Brown (14) also made big contributions.

Michigan attempted just 13 3-pointers in the game (making 5 of them), while the Badgers shot 21 -- I'm not sure how many times Michigan has been out-attempted from beyond the arc this season, but it played a role in the result tonight, as Michigan just doesn't have enough juice inside the paint to win against solid competition (which UW most definitely has been since we flipped over to 2016).

With the win, the Badgers have now won 10 of 11 and move into the top four in the conference standings, an improbable sentence given their early-season struggles.

The Wolverines and Badgers raced to the half after a competitive 20 minutes, with the former up just one -- Michigan was 20 minutes away from just about locking up an NCAA Tournament berth.

But nothing comes that easy with this team.

Mark Donnal picked up his third foul in the first minute of the second half. Michigan played a relatively solid first half of defense -- Wisconsin was saved on a few scrambled possessions with fortuitous openings and late shot-clock shots -- but the Wolverines would need to get it going, as they were fortunate the Badgers missed good looks in the first.

It was all a matter of when the inevitable Badgers run would come. And with Michigan leading 40-39, the home team turned it on, going on an 8-0 run and energizing the Kohl Center crowd.

But as the half went on, Michigan began to miss open looks of its own, killing its comeback effort. Derrick Walton missed an uncontested layup in transition and a possession later Irvin missed a somewhat contested layup after a Walton steal.

That's about all there was to say about this one. Michigan missed its opportunities to inch closer down the stretch -- and with Irvin pressing to make plays, turnovers followed -- while the Badgers made key shots to keep the Wolverines at bay.

The silver linings? Irvin had a strong first half, hunting his shots and making them, before fading in the second. In addition, Doyle made an impact on the game with 10 points (5-for-5), including a thunderous alley-oop dunk and a strong finish at the rim through contact, not to mention a nice catch and finish on a tricky arcing feed from Abdur-Rahkman. It isn't much, but Doyle's performance is a nice little footnote on what was otherwise not a great night for the visiting Wolverines.

Now, Michigan turns to its regular-season finale against an ailing Iowa team, which lost tonight against Ohio State in Columbus. The loss, Iowa's fourth in their last five games, pushes the Hawkeyes out of the top four, for the moment, due to a tiebreaker with the Badgers.

Fortunately for Michigan, a win against Iowa would be a win against a ranked team, ailing one or not.

A loss at home and Michigan will head to the conference tournament with a far greater mental weight than it would otherwise have.

Michigan 70, Purdue 87: Too Tall

NB: Missed about the first 17 minutes of this one (6 p.m. CT starts, I'm not a fan of you). 

Riding high off of two Big Ten wins by double-digit margins, the Wolverines headed to West Lafayette, where two towers stood.

Despite a career night from Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman (25 points, 10-of-16), the Wolverines couldn't find that extra gear to make it a one-bucket game in the second half, falling to 12-4 (2-1) on the season.

In addition to facing a tough Purdue team on the road, the Boilermakers roster is one that one that strikes against Michigan's biggest weakness: the interior. Mark Donnal's success in the Illinois and Penn State games was not likely to repeated against Purdue's A.J. Hammons and Isaac Haas.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, it wasn't, as Donnal scored three points on two attempts in the first half (he finished with 7), and picked up his second foul with just under eight minutes to play in the first half.

And after a somewhat quiet first half, Hammons did Michigan in in the second, finishing with 17 points on 7-of-10 shooting and a quartet of no-sir blocks (4 blocks).

Even so, the Wolverines (once again without Caris LeVert) led 23-19 with 5:32 left in the half.

That is, until Purdue put the pedal to the metal and scored 12 straight, eventually heading into the half up 35-28.

Michigan did an okay job containing Hammons on paper in the first half (6 points, 4 rebounds), and the Boilermakers rebounded "just" 26 percent of their misses (which isn't bad for Michigan given the personnel mismatch).

Purdue's defense, however, was stifling, as it often is. Michigan shot just 32.3 percent from the field in the first half, while Derrick Walton and Zak Irvin went a combined 2-of-9 from the floor.

Given the mismatch inside, this was another classic "can Michigan outshoot its opponent from downtown" game. The Wolverines shot 35.7 percent from three in the first 20 minutes (5-of-14) -- they'd have to be even better in the second to have a chance.

In fact, they were, finishing 40.7 percent for the game, which is pretty good. But it wasn't enough, as Hammons and Co. locked Michigan down when they needed to. Rapheal Davis negated everyone he checked and Hammons blocked or altered a number of forays to the basket.

In the first chunk of the second half, Hammons exploited single coverage on the rare occasion he got it, then deftly found the open man on the outside when Michigan double- or triple-teamed him.

The Boilers extended the lead to 11, at which point it seemed things could get out of hand. But with the aid of Abdur-Rahkman's confident playmaking and an array of tough shots tossed off of the glass with geometrical expertise, the Wolverines stayed in it.

About halfway through the second half, the announcers kept remarking how it didn't feel like a 5-point game ... and really, it didn't.

A key moment late -- Donnal bobbles a pass/gets stripped by Davis going toward the basket, Purdue heads the other way with speed, rotates the ball and Davis splashes a corner triple to up the lead to nine with eight minutes left.

That, however, was just one of several similar sequences in the final 10 minutes. Michigan gets an opening, doesn't take advantage and Purdue makes them pay.

Michigan did begin to trouble the Boilermakers with pressure in the final 10 minutes, pressure which flummoxed Purdue against Iowa, too. It worked, as the Wolverines were able to turn some Purdue turnovers into points.

Every time Michigan got it down to six or seven, however, the Boilers had an answer. And when Hammons hit a triple with about three minutes left to up Purdue's lead to 16 -- making another 12-0 run for Purdue -- that was all she wrote.

Michigan was never able to crack through that 5-point deficit marker, in a game that was simultaneously, paradoxically, not as close it looks on paper, yet closer than it looks on paper.

With LeVert out and this being a road game against a pretty good team, I don't think anyone expected a win tonight. But Michigan can't use that as an excuse, particularly with upcoming matchups against Maryland and at Iowa. Michigan needs to rack up some quality wins (especially on the road) -- the next two games will provide that opportunity.

Michigan will hope that LeVert gets better soon, but, more importantly, it'll need players not named Abdur-Rahkman to bring it, too.

Fortunately for John Beilein and Co., they won't have to face that Purdue frontcourt again until Feb. 13.

Michigan 79, Penn State 56: Donnal doing work

The Michigan basketball team saw what Jim Harbaugh's squad did in Orlando yesterday and took its best shot to top it.

And shoot away they did, burying the visiting Penn State Nittany Lions in a flurry of threes en route to the Wolverines' second-straight double-digit win to kick off Big Ten play.

Michigan finished 14-of-25 from beyond the arc (56%) with sharpshooter Duncan Robinson finishing "just" 3-of-8 from downtown.

The defensively tough Nittany Lions had no answer for Michigan, leaving shooters open throughout the first half, which concluded with Michigan carrying a 49-28 lead.

Of course, the story of the young conference season is Mark Donnal, who has struggled mightily on both ends of the floor in his career to date.

But after a holiday season spent meditating in Dagobah, Donnal has emerged a different player.

Against Illinois on Wednesday in Champaign, Donnal filled it up, scoring 28 points on 11-of-15 shooting, plus 9 rebounds, 3 blocks and 2 steals. Naturally, against an Illinois team without a strong frontcourt presence, one could have reasonably considered his career performance a fluke.

Today provided additional data to the contrary -- Michigan might have something in Donnal, a something John Beilein must have seen when he recruited him to Ann Arbor.

The redshirt sophomore pitched in 16 points on 7-of-10 from the field (his first miss coming with about three minutes left in the game).

Against PSU, however, he did his work exclusively at the rim, converting deftly at the hoop when dished to on the roll. For Michigan bigs, even simply catching the pass is a step in the right direction, as others, namely Ricky Doyle, have struggled in that department. Even Donnal, when catching near the rim in the past, often seemed overwhelmed, sometimes even unwilling to go up with the shot.

Whatever happened between the end of nonconference play and the Dec. 30 trip to Champaign, it worked for Donnal, and it'll work well for Michigan if he keeps it going.

Penn State is not going dancing this year, but to blow a team out that gave No. 4 Maryland a tough time just a few days ago makes for an encouraging result.

Oh, and the Wolverines did all this without Caris LeVert, who sat out after getting his ankle stepped on late in the Illinois game.

Zak Irvin made up for LeVert's absence by providing the assist-making ability he flashed in the later stages of last season. In addition to 16 points, Irvin tallied a team-high 7 assists. While Beilein said Irvin likely won't be 100 percent this season, he's looking far closer to it than he did previously.

That said, that statement is made true largely by the fact that his outside shot, his bread and butter with which he's struggled early in the season, has started to fall of late. Break out the bread and the Land O'Lakes butter, because Irvin is cooking again. In two Big Ten games, Irvin is 6-of-11 from three (he's 22% for the season). Expect that season figure to rise.

The only Wolverine with a down afternoon was point guard Derrick Walton, who went 2-of-6 from the field and turned it over six times. Hey, it happens.

Elsewhere, Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman pitched in 14 points, while Robinson added 6 assists to his 9 points. Aubrey Dawkins scored 13 on 5-of-5 shooting (3-of-3 from beyond the arc).

Aside from Walton's off day and Michigan's brief trouble with Penn State's 2-3 zone in the second half, this was just about as close to perfect of a performance as one could ask for to start the calendar year.

With the win, Michigan moved to 12-3 (2-0) on the season. Next up? Michigan heads to West Lafayette on Thursday to take on a Purdue team featuring a pair of imposing twin towers in Isaac Haas and A.J. Hammons.

If Michigan is to avoid the fate it met against Xavier, UConn and SMU, it'll need another team-wide effort to have a shot at a victory.

And I never thought I'd write this, but that effort might start, and end, with one Mark Donnal.

Miscellaneous Minutiae, 6/19/2012

Initiate Week 3 of Operation Don't Talk About Playoffs/Realignment/General College Football Bureaucratic Tomfoolery. Let's see if I can succeed in not passive-agressively hinting that the SEC should secede and leave the rest of us alone falling into the trap that is "thinking that any meaningful discussion about these topics can be had."


This is where we talk about "The Michigan Difference" sans irony. Regardless of how you feel about the recent uptick in "ban college football" sentiment, one thing is obvious: head injuries and head trauma are serious things which demand serious attention. It is of course not entirely clear what the scope of head injuries may be, especially in light of the tragic suicides of football players (such as Dave Duerson, Junior Seau, and UPenn's Owen Thomas)...of course, correlation is not causation. However, I would argue that it is much better to express so called "undue" concern over something such as this as opposed to a paucity of it. Nonchalantly tsk-tsking at those who might want to worry about this sort of thing--even those who perhaps inaccurately want to ascribe a causal relationship between concussions and depression, suicide, etc.--does not make that person more of a man.

Saving you any further pontification, it's important to note that various entities are taking this issue seriously. Of course, Michigan seems to be one such entity that is leading the way in concussion research:

Michigan is the only Big Ten football team with a full-time staffer dedicated to head injuries. Kutcher, who was hired by the university's medical school in 2003 and began working as a part-time volunteer with the athletic department shortly after that, said he isn't aware of another FBS team that employs someone such as himself.

That has helped propel the Wolverines to the frontier of concussion research, protocol and prevention.

"Leaders and best" and whatnot. As gratifying as success on the football field is, it's things like this that make you truly proud of the U. One of the more topical points in the article touches on concussion prevention:

Michigan also is working to prevent concussions from happening in the first place. That starts with outfitting players with proper equipment, such as a well-fit helmet.

Quarterback Denard Robinson switched helmets before last season, for example. After meeting with equipment manager Jon Falk, Robinson, a dual-threat quarterback who has averaged 18.3 carries per game as a starter and is susceptible to withering collisions because of his speed, elected to swap his Riddell for a better-fitting -- and, in his case, safer -- Schutt.

 It is a little bit terrifying that we know so relatively little about concussions (and even the brain itself) in the year 2012, a year which carries vague notions of progress even while we are still in the dark with respect to so many pressing matters. It speaks to the ridiculous complexity of the thing we call a brain, the internal software that drives all of our actions and, throughout the average football game, finds itself rattling against the hard walls of the skull dozens of times. In any case, good on the U for helping to take the lead in this, because this is not an issue that will (or should) go away as long as "student-athletes" are not getting paid.

RIP Bob Chappuis. You already know about this by now, but Michigan great Bob Chappuis, of the 1947 "Mad Magicians," passed away last week. Chappuis's career was obviously before my time, but his exploits were truly something at which to marvel.

Odds are, you, like me, are not even close to being old enough to truly understand who Bob Chappuis was; sadly, most of us can only attempt to cobble together some sort of understanding in a second-hand nature, like attempting to explain a sunset to a blind man.

Acquired understanding is awkward and not nearly as satisfying as having been there, but it is something nonetheless. It is primarily for this reason that I think a site like MVictors is an unbelievable treasure as a source of historical recollection, one whose value cannot be understated. MVictors, like any other source of historical scholarship, attempts--and very obviously succeeds--to provide a colorful, well-defined, and edifying lifeline to the past, a past which the average fan may not have the ability with which to connect.

People will often discredit Michigan's accomplishments as a football program because "who cares about anything that happened before this point which I arbitrarily determined is the point at which things starter to matter or count." This people are not only extremely misguided, they are depriving themselves of a vast and tremendous history. Will this era of college football be rendered "meaningless" by the generations of the distant future? Assuming that college football will still be played well into the twilight of this century, I would hope that the answer is no. If that is in fact the case, then there is no reason to discredit or scoff at the college football world before 1950 (or whatever arbitrary date it is that people often to use). 

Bob Chappuis and many other Michigan football players of that era were not only multi-sport stars, they went and fought "over there," only to come back and keep playing football at a very high level. Think about how ridiculous and amazing and compelling that is. Think about how different things once were. The Michigan community has lost a by all accounts great football player and an even better man...RIP. 

Feldman on MSU's OL, Denard. Two points of interest from Feldman's recent mailbag. First, Feldman puts Denard at #5 on his Heisman list for 2012 (tied with Landry Jones), which, okay whatever. It's the Heisman. The more important point comes via his answer to a question regarding the Boise State-MSU game and their respective QB situations: 

The decided advantage goes to Michigan State. The reason: The Spartans return the much better defense. BSU has two starters returning on D. MSU has eight. The Spartans also are set up better to rely on their ground game with Le'Veon Bell and arguably the Big Ten's top O-line.

I mention this if for no other reason than to say man oh man how quickly perception changes sometimes. Remember how after last year's MSU-ND game we are all banking on the fact that the MSU offensive line was not very good? Well, not only did they push Michigan's front 7 around last year (despite the Spartans not really being a great rushing team most of the year), they seemed to get better as the year went on. I got to thinking about Feldman's "best in the Big Ten" assessment and it definitely holds water. 

 Michigan will have a solid if still undersized line; I feel pretty comfortable about the tackles but the guys on the interior present some question marks. Ohio State has to replace Adams, Brewster, and Shugarts, while also attempting to transition to Urban Meyer's power spread offense. Otherwise, Wisconsin seems like the primary competition for best OL in the conference. As always, I'm sure they will continue the tradition of gargantuan offensive linemen, even on the heels of the departures of standouts like Kevin Zeitler, Josh Oglesby, and Peter Konz. 

It's anybody's guess how good the Spartan OL will actually be, but, as a general note, it's pretty crazy how perception has shifted from "that OL is a complete and utter sieve" circa September 2011 to "hey, that OL might be the best in the conference" circa right about now. If anything, this is an example of how continuity and a certain lineup merely accumulating starts as a group can lead to marked improvement...not exactly earth-shattering news, I know. 

In other news: heroball is still stupid. I always feel ridiculously hypocritical when railing against the aesthetics-destroying monstrosity that is heroball, mostly because I grew up watching and celebrating the exploits of one Michael Jeffrey Jordan. Still, it is important to remember that even MJ passed the ball in key moments. It's okay, guys...LBJ passing the ball to an open Udonis Haslem for a 15-footer will not bring on the Apocalypse: 

Eight-year-old me: WOOO MJ YEAH SPACE JAM IS MY FAVORITE MOVIE EVERRRR WHAT NO WHY ARE YOU PASSING WHY WHY WH--AHHH STEVE KERR YOU ARE MY FAVORITE PLAYER OF ALL TIME I'M GOING TO GO PLAY WITH SOME POGS AND WATCH NICKELODEON NOW.

Anyway, the WSJ is the latest to take on the beast that is heroball, in light of the recent uptick in late game heroball situations:

A star who doesn't take charge in the final seconds can come under fire. During the      Eastern Conference finals, as Miami's LeBron James drove toward the basket with time expiring in a knotted Game 4 against Boston, he didn't shoot—passing the ball instead to teammate Udonis Haslem, who missed. After the Heat lost the game in overtime, James drew fire from fans and analysts because he hadn't taken the shot himself. Very few people seemed to care that James had three Boston defenders collapsing on him.

If my memory serves me correctly, you could argue that it was actually four defenders collapsing on LeBron, which makes all the pro-heroball squawking seem even more insane. In any case, as these late game win-it-or-lose-it situations seems to be on the rise, it will be interesting to see how players, coaches, fans, and the media evolve--or devolve--with respect to the viability or heroball. 


The most eye-popping stat in the article is the fact that LeBron has supposedly only taken a mere 18% of Miami's "clutch" shots this season; as a general point, it's amazing how perception and reality can often resemble a train run off its tracks. 


Northwestern basketball lands 2012 7-footer. Northwestern basketball recently acquired the commitment of Sudanese big man Chier Ajou. Lake The Posts writes: 

Ajou is a native of Sudan and is also the cousin of Bulls forward Luol Deng. Northwestern basketball fans have been smarting after a pair of basketball recruiting snags, namely the lack of admission of 2012 recruit and sharpshooter Mislav Brzoja and the parting of ways with 2013 recruit Milos Kostic. Ajou has had quite a tragic backstory according to the Chicago Tribune which reference the fact he lost and two brothers in the war in Sudan and his father past away as well (however those details are less clear) before moving to the US in 2008.

As expressed in the comments, there seems to be some concern as to whether or not Ajou will even qualify academically. In light of Northwestern's denial of Croatian guard Mislav Brzoja on academic grounds, this seems a bit odd (especially for a school like Northwestern). Brzoja supposedly had a 4.0 at Trader's Point Christian Academy in Indiana, but his cumulative GPA was already essentially torpedoed by less than stellar academic performance in his native Croatia. I don't much care for speculation regarding the grades of football or basketball recruits, particularly since so much misinformation often exists when it comes to this sort of thing. 


At the same time, Ajou's journey will be one to follow as an example of how a school that generally places academics above athletics goes about handling academically borderline prospects. As a general aside, I've noticed many Wildcat fans expressing the sentiment of late--on 

Northwestern blogs, message boards, etc.--that typically goes something along the lines of "see, even we sometimes admit borderline cases in spite of what our reputation would otherwise indicate." 

Schools like Northwestern are still a cut above almost everyone in the FBS when it comes to academic standards in athletics,* but it's interesting to see that this sort of thing even happens at NU. As someone who will be attending grad school at Northwestern this fall, it will be interesting to monitor the differences between Michigan and Northwestern when it comes to perception vs. reality vis-a-vis the stringency of academic standards in athletics.

*Yes, Michigan fans...I hate to break it to you, but we are not in Northwestern's league in this respect.

More? It's OSU week over at Maize n Brew. More good stuff about Mark Donnal on the heels of his performance at the NBPA camp (via UMHoops)...for some reason, I have a feeling that he's going to eventually replace JMo as the non-star Wolverine who I somewhat irrationally enjoy watching play the game.