The college basketball season is a long journey that involves a variety of obstacles to overcome, some self-inflicted, some unforeseeable. The Michigan Wolverines did enough Wednesday night (Thursday morning) against Washington to move on from that initial loss and are in position to return home from the West Coast unscathed.
That does require getting a win over the Oregon Ducks on Saturday. Oregon has been terrible this season, starting 1-5 in conference play and nearly the bottom of the Kenpom top
100. Call it a failed attempt to ford the river (which sounds much more pleasant than suffering from dysentery), but either way, it has not been pretty this season. Michigan is the heavy favorite and needs to take care of business this weekend.
No. 4 Michigan (15-1, 5-1) at Oregon (8-9, 1-5)
Date & Time: Saturday, Jan. 17, 4 p.m. ET
Location: Matthew Knight Arena, Eugene, OR
TV/Streaming: NBC
Last season, the teams met in somewhat similar contexts to this year. Michigan was 8-2 in Big Ten play and the victory over the Ducks at Crisler was the third of six straight. Meanwhile, the visitors entered on a three-game losing streak and then dropped both contests in the state of Michigan. Still, the game was closer than needed — surprise! — with a 14-point lead becoming a two-point margin in the final minute.
Two Stats to Watch
Michigan 3PT Shooting: 34.0% (7th B1G)
Over the last four games, Michigan is shooting just 25.7% from three, which is much lower than its season average. It does feel like long-range shooting is more of a ceiling-raising bonus than fundamental need given the consistently strong scoring in the paint that is very reliable, but it is a little concerning to see the efforts from behind the arc falling off so steeply.
Despite mediocre overall defensive numbers (13th in conference play), Oregon has actually been pretty good defending twos, allowing the fourth-lowest percentage in the league. Meanwhile, the numbers are flipped from three, and over the past three games opponents have hit 40.3% of their attempts, including a 17-for-36 deluge from Nebraska on Tuesday.
It would seem like the recipe here sets up for the Wolverines to get back on track a bit from behind the arc. The big one would be Yaxel Lendeborg who has made just 22.7% since Christmas (yes, health probably plays a factor here). Nimari Burnett is the other player who could get back on track after making just 27.8% of his attempts during the team’s four-game slump.
Oregon Offensive Pace: 19.4 sec (18th B1G)
The Ducks are dead last in pace during conference play, using up more clock than anyone with the ball. Unfortunately, this is yielding very little offense, as the shooting and scoring sit near the bottom of the league, while the assist rate does not seem to be benefitting from this methodical offense. Additionally, no team is suffering from more steals, which is a curious component to the longer possession length too.
Nate Bittle and Jackson Shelstad are one-two in scoring again, but it is quite possible both miss this one. This is an oddly similar situation to the Penn State game, where leading scorer/everything-doer Kayden Mingo was surprisingly absent from that contest. It did not seem to make a difference at the time, but still it is hard to see how missing both of these lineup staples would not be a tough pill for Oregon to swallow.
The Michigan defense has had some questionable moments over the past few games, but the start of Wednesday’s contest was a good reminder of what the previous 12ish games looked like. The Wolverines can make life absolutely miserable (as long as threes are not falling at will), forcing opponents into midrange jumpers and off-balance looks. I expect to see a healthy number of steals and a very frustrated Oregon offense that takes up a lot of clock yet still finds suboptimal shots.
