GBMW: Michigan Basketball -- Utah Preview

Posted at 8:00am -- 12/9/2009


Preview of Michigan AT Utah Basketball Game

After a rough two weeks, the University of Michigan Men’s team hits the road again and travels to beautiful Salt Lake City. This game is part of a package that brought the Utah football team to the Big House for the 2008 opener.

Both teams are licking wounds, some self-inflicted. Michigan comes in at 4-3 and Utah at 4-4. Michigan has played better opposition, but that is perhaps cosmetic as the team clearly has problem areas to improve upon. The Utes have beaten Illinois (another team that is a rocking boat) but have lost to Idaho, Seattle, and Weber State. All three of those aforementioned programs bring little comment from Midwesterners, but those junkies who stay up late and get unlimited sports packages know that all three are decent basketball programs. Utah plays well at home but is still a three-point dog.

Utah is coached by Jim Boylen, who has past ties to the MSU program. He is another consummate coach that has been around the pro and college scene for quite a while. He is very solid and the Utes last year finished in the top 25 and won 24 games.

This year the Utes are shooting around 43% from the field; a little low to be pulling in bunches of wins. But Utah is shooting 75% at the foul line and is shooting better than Michigan from beyond the arc.

Utah is well balanced but the player that may give Michigan the most trouble is 6’ 5” guard Carlon Brown. He can match up with Manny Harris at both ends of the court. Kim Tillie (6’ 11”) and Jay Watkins (6’7”) can give the Wolverines some trouble on the boards.

Michigan has some decisions to be made about rotation and offensive points of emphasis. The suspicion here is that Coach B. will keep at it until the wheels move or fall off the wagon. There is probably not the back-up personnel group available to be changing styles drastically.

Regardless, Michigan is going to have trouble winning games shooting 25 percent from three point land, especially when there is a liberal dose of long range firing going on.

Why so low with the percentage? The rotation is based on seven or eight players at the current time and legs get tired. The line was moved back last year and this does increase the effect known as tired-leg syndrome. The shots have a better chance at falling at the beginning of both halves. Teams are also gaming for the onslaught and are almost giving no thought to the inside game of Michigan. Also, the inside game for Michigan comes and goes like the wind.

Michigan did show some recent improvement in ball handling and foul shooting, but still playing against good teams with no real giddy up true point guard does not do the team well. Young Morris is a very serious student of the game and he is getting better. He controls himself and will likely turn it loose on Coach B’s command.

The zones are still easy meat for coaching tacticians, which Michigan has faced many this year. The subs are producing precious few points, with the occasional exception of Gibson.

And so, two decent teams with moderate concerns will square off Wednesday. Both teams need a win for the tournament resume. As a result the game should be fiercely contested and should be entertaining for fans loving to view good coaching style that translates to the floor.

Thank you for reading GBMW.

Written by Doc4blu

Go Blue -- Wear Maize!