MBB: Michigan 81, Duke 73 Post-Game Thread

[RockyMtDevil]

You are dead on, we know what to do but sometimes we just can't do anything about it because we have only two athletes who can break anyone down and make something happen if shots aren't falling.

We are not the number 4 team in the country, if we are, then there are some really bad teams out there.

[nyr484]

Fact: This is Duke's worst 3 point shooting team in years.
Fact: Until today's game, Duke is averaging less 3 point shots taken than any other Duke team this decade.

What does this mean? We need to attack the basket more. We have not been taking many 3's, and have not been hitting a high percentage, but we have been winning games by attacking the basket and getting to the free throw line (along with hitting an ok percentage of 3's). I'm not saying we shouldn't take open 3's. We should. But, there were at least 5 or 6 possessions today (maybe more) where we settled for contested jumpers. We were not getting to the line, and we lost. Solution to Duke's problems: Take it to the hoop!

[Duke79UNLV77]

most of the 3's were tempting, but we did settle too much. bilas noted many times how good things happened when we got into the middle of the zone through a slash cut and post or a fake and dribble penetration. too often we just passed around the perimeter. we also didn't push the tempo enough.

we need to accept and work with the fact that singler, scheyer, pocius, e will, hendo, and mcclure are not great 3 point shooters. look at the season and career percentages for everyone of these players. paulus can be a great 3 point shooter but isn't right now.

most of these guys can take some 3's, but are more dangerous attacking. scheyer and singler made good things happen when they drove or cut to the hoop. and, no, mich was not in man defense for most of our great 2-point shooting.

[Jumbo]

Actually there were plenty of inside shots against the 1-3-1. Bilas described very well how to exploit the gap behind the point man. Duke did it more than once.

There are ways to exploit every defense ... especially if the defense doesn't play well. How about giving Michigan credit for actually preventing Duke from getting in those gaps (which the Wolverines did quite well)?

[footballfan2]

At this point, I would rather lose to Xavier than not get a significant increase in minutes for Elliot Williams and Miles Plumlee. K shortens his rotation in every close game, and it will be a detriment to our depth in March. I understand that he played 11 players today, but at least 3 of them (Williams, Plumlee, Pocius) needed double the minutes, and those players needed to play more in the second half, or at least make an appearance.

I refuse to believe that an All-American guard and mobile big man can't make positive contributions with more minutes than they've been getting. I think K needs to give these kids more time on the floor to assert themselves and play through some of their mistakes. We have seen Elliot get the yank after a turnover or missed assignment after 2 minutes WAY too often. How are you going to see if they can contribute in scant minutes, giving them NO margin for error? I understand K sees them in practice every day, and perhaps they're not earning PT in practice. But I doubt that. It's going to be frustrating if Singler collapses in the postseason again because he plays 38 minutes a game. I just think K has no patience for certain players making mistakes, and leans heavily on his starters. I believe this is a flaw in his coaching style, and it could definitely hurt us in March.

I have not seen anything very Elliott Williams that would warrant extra playing time. His outside shooting is horrific. He has bad rotation. Unless Singler and Henderson decide to stay after this year... this has to be Duke's year to go very deep in the NCAA Tournament. I have no problems playing our more veteran players this year.

[Kedsy]

When Duke started out by making 10% from behind the line over the first 12 minutes, was the correct play to take 25 more?

They say that shooters get out of a shooting slump by shooting some more. Unless they were taking bad shots (which I don't think they were) or there was something wrong with their form (which I didn't notice) they should have kept shooting. Making a few would have been nice, of course, but that wasn't your question.

[dukemsu]

I see the depth conversation creeping its way back in. Not sure a system like Michigan's is one you want to play Williams and Plumlee major minutes against, particularly defensively. Might have seen even more layups.

Just an opinion.

dukemsu

[DevilCastDownfromDurham]

I don't know if "this one's on K", but it did seem like Coach K, and even the staff to some extent, seemed very passive on the bench... Reminded me of the game at Wake Forest (was it last year?). There, where Coach K wore a yellow tie in memory of Skip Prosser... he also seemed quite passive...

Duke, as team, was not prepared for the zone beyond shooting the 3. I suppose based on the percentages that was all we could be expected to need, but I think other options (G and Nolan collapsing the D and kicking, interior passing from big to big, etc) should have been prepared as well. It's not like the zone was some crazy, last-minute addition for Michigan's gameplan.

More importantly, Duke, as a team, came out with less emotion. That's somewhat understandable given the relative importance of the game for the two teams, but K is paid millions of dollars to be a master motivator. If 1-2 players had come out flat and been flummoxed by a simple zone, I'd blame the kids. Since Duke, as team, was unprepared for the game, I'm blaming the guy who is paid to prepare the team. That's K and the staff.

Maybe egos were running high and guys were reading their press clippings so K decided this would be a "teaching loss." Maybe K just got distracted by other things and didn't have his A-game for this one (he's human too and it's been a looong road for him with Duke and USA). I have no idea. But it was clear that one coach had his team ready to execute at a much higher level than the other today. Next play for K and the staff as well.

[ForeverBlowingBubbles]

You don't go one-on-one against a 1-3-1 zone. That would be, in a word, pointless. You beat it with good passing and then (hopefully) you knock down a reasonable percentage of the easy, wide-open threes it gives up in the corner.

So it doesn't help if you can beat one man off the dribble and force some of the zone to collapse around that player? That was my point. None of our guards could penetrate past anyone. Scheyer succeeded because he was creative with the ball and able to get some seperation from his man - Smith, Henderson, and Singler looked extremely tenative and not sure what to do with the ball a number of times.

There was much much much more to this poor performance than our simple bad shooting percentage from behind the arc. Notably we failed to find other ways to score.

What are we going to do in the NCAA tournament when we are 3's arn't falling? Lose and just say yeah we were just unlucky (like the last 2 years)...

or would you expect this team to try and adapt and find other ways to put points on the board?

[Devilsfan]

We can regroup and get ready for Xavier and ACC play. I'm glad it happened on a day when there's good football on the old flat screen.

[bfree]

I have not seen anything very Elliott Williams that would warrant extra playing time. His outside shooting is horrific. He has bad rotation. Unless Singler and Henderson decide to stay after this year... this has to be Duke's year to go very deep in the NCAA Tournament. I have no problems playing our more veteran players this year.

Are we currently in the NCAA Tournament? And once we are, would you rather have an eight man rotation of upperclassmen or a ten man rotation of upperclassmen and experienced freshman? Even if it guaranteed a couple extra losses before the ACC tournament (which I don't think it necessarily does), I'd really like to see 12-15 minutes per game for Elliot and Miles. With Miles' minutes coming at the expense of Singler's and Elliot's coming at the expense of Scheyer's and McClure's.

[Oriole Way]

I have not seen anything very Elliott Williams that would warrant extra playing time. His outside shooting is horrific. He has bad rotation. Unless Singler and Henderson decide to stay after this year... this has to be Duke's year to go very deep in the NCAA Tournament. I have no problems playing our more veteran players this year.

His outside shot is the last reason I want him on the floor getting more minutes. The reason he could valuable to this team is his ability to penetrate and slash to the basket. We saw him do it a couple of times in New York against Southern Illinois. I really think he can add a dimension we sorely need, and which we could have used today.

I wouldn't be surprised if Elliot is hesitant to drive because, if he turns the ball over, he knows he will get yanked. That's why I want him getting more minutes and some margin for error, so he will let the game come to him a little more and so that he will be unafraid to make some plays.

[ForeverBlowingBubbles]

Would have been really neat to have a floor leader to calm the team down, break down the zone, and make good passes into the post. We remain a real PG away from being a reliably (instead of an intermittently) dominant team. I hope Nolan can find that in his game or that Wall or Knight can fill in that gap. We've got 2 very solid SG's playing very much out of position right now. Many nights we can shoot, score, or defend beyond that limitation, but it's come back to haunt us every year since CDu took his game to the Association.

we also are lacking a complete post player (discounting Kyle). The fact we could combine Lance, Zoubek, and McClure to make a nice post player isn't very efficient.

[Oriole Way]

I see the depth conversation creeping its way back in. Not sure a system like Michigan's is one you want to play Williams and Plumlee major minutes against, particularly defensively. Might have seen even more layups.

Just an opinion.

dukemsu

I disagree. So what if they would have allowed some layups? We would have lost the game either way. The bottom line is that they would have gotten minutes to develop and improve down the line. Experience against good competition is invaluable, as is a more rested Singler.

[footballfan2]

Honestly... who cares if you lose a game in December?

What is very concerning... to all of us... is that we finally see our weakness exposed. We all knew it was there, hoped it wasn't, but now see that it was true.

oh well.

[Oriole Way]

Are we currently in the NCAA Tournament? And once we are, would you rather have an eight man rotation of upperclassmen or a ten man rotation of upperclassmen and experienced freshman? Even if it guaranteed a couple extra losses before the ACC tournament (which I don't think it necessarily does), I'd really like to see 12-15 minutes per game for Elliot and Miles. With Miles' minutes coming at the expense of Singler's and Elliot's coming at the expense of Scheyer's and McClure's.

Definitely agree. As I pointed out earlier, I would like to see Paulus sit out the next game or two to get completely healthy, and give Williams his minutes.

[footballfan2]

I wouldn't be surprised if Elliot is hesitant to drive because, if he turns the ball over, he knows he will get yanked. That's why I want him getting more minutes and some margin for error, so he will let the game come to him a little more and so that he will be unafraid to make some plays.

Stud players don't worry about mistakes. If he worries so much... that's reason enough for me to not play him.

[Duke79UNLV77]

from jumbo:

"We tried to reverse the ball and dump it into Zoubek. Unfortunately, he's not a particularly adept scorer, so that didn't really work."

Z had 8 points in 14 minutes on 4-6 shooting. most efficient offensive player on the team today. yes, we should still take some 3's, but we settled too much. i mean e will says he really needs to work on his perimeter shot, and even he comes in and jacks 2 up right away. we did pretty well at penetrating the zone when we got away from just passing it around the perimeter. we needed more slash cuts, shot fakes and dribble penetration, and feeds to the post, and we needed to push tempo more.

[Devilsfan]

I hope we don't play the 1-3-1 against Davidson.

[Philadukie]

Lots to learn from in this game.

Well, I'm not sure there's much to learn from this game. Again, the point seems pretty simple, but if we shoot just a little better from 3 - in fact, not even good, just better - then the game would be different. Can you really teach that?

Yes, I'll concede there were some other mistakes, but I didn't see collossal mistakes that gave Michigan the game. I'm not sure film from this game will help.

I had a coach once who, after a particularly horrible loss, told us to just forget it. Leave it behind. We're not going to gain anything from re-hashing it. That might be an extreme coaching tactic, but I see this game like that.

Dwelling on this game in film, in practice, and in team discussion may, in fact, have an opposite effect. It could seriously impact confidence and create seeds of doubt.

I would say to the team: the shots didn't fall today. Forget it. Let's move on.