Around last month, anyone who watched Ohio State has been asking the same question: Exactly how good is this team?
It is a group without a real superstar – although EJ Liddell is getting closer and closer to the game – originally chosen to end up in the middle of the Big Ten before the start of the season, who bought into the day-to-day approach of coach Chris Holtmann, who has consistently improved over the season and has a list of players who know how to succeed in their respective roles. Over the past month and a half, the Buckeyes have traveled a 10-1 stretch – with the only defect being a two-point loss to Purdue – for a ranking of the top five while defeating the top ten contenders in Illinois, Iowa and Wisconsin by along the way.
The simple answer to the question of the roof of this group was simple: no one knows yet. This team seems to be improving with each passing week, while gaining quality after victory.
| Who | Where | When | TV |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Michigan (15-1, 10-1) |
Columbus, Ohio (Schottenstein Center) |
1 pm |
ESPN |
But on Sunday afternoon, sport will have its clearest response to date.
Arguably the biggest game of the college basketball season to date, the No. 4 Buckeyes will host No. 3 Michigan at the Schottenstein Center in a highly anticipated showdown between two rivals currently projected as No. 1 seeds in the NCAA Tournament. The Wolverines, with 15-1, are in first place in the classification of the Big Ten, and the recent heating of the state of Ohio improved its general record to 18-4.
This will be the first Ohio State-Michigan game played with both teams ranked in the top five in the Associated Press poll of the top 25.
“Play against the best and win the best,” said point guard CJ Walker. “This is what we want to do”.
And that’s what they’ll have a chance to do at 1pm on ESPN.
Michigan has so far earned a reputation as the third best college basketball team, behind No. 1 Gonzaga and No. 2 Baylor. In other words, most see coach Juwan Howard’s group as the best college basketball Tier 2 team this season. He did this by bringing together a well-rounded squad with veterans like Isaiah Livers and Mike Smith, pairing with senior students from Hunter Dickinson and Franz Wagner, creating an unexpected national title contender.
The Wolverines won their first 11 games of the season, including a 77-54 decimation of the Badgers at home, before losing 75-57 to Minnesota in Minneapolis in mid-January. They followed that defeat by defeating Maryland and Purdue before the sports department paused all sports in response to positive tests – not among those in the basketball program – for a variant of the coronavirus.
A three-week break in the hoops ended a week ago when Michigan beat Wisconsin on the road by eight before capturing a 71-64 victory against Rutgers on Thursday. Holtmann said he has not seen a “tremendous drop” in the Wolverines’ game since returning to the court.
“They will be the same, I’m sure,” said Holtmann. “They honestly don’t seem to be losing track of how well they were playing before.”
But here’s something important to note: Michigan has yet to play with a Ohio state-level team.
His most impressive victories were against No. 21 Wisconsin, No. 24 Purdue and No. 25 Rutgers. He has yet to face any of the top three teams from the Big Ten (Ohio State, Illinois, Iowa), and his main out-of-conference victory came at home against Toledo, a MAC team that impressed with a record 18-6, but lost to Ball State, Bowling Green, Bradley and Akron. Using the adjusted efficiency, the best attack that the Wolverines defended was Toledo (15th nationally) and Penn State (23rd nationally), and with all due respect to the Rockets and Nittany Lions, they don’t come close to the threat posed by the Buckeyes (3rd nationally) ).
On Sunday afternoon, both Ohio and Michigan will try to show themselves as the Big Ten class.
Three things to watch
Most complete opponent so far
The one thing that stands out the most in Michigan is also quite obvious. Man, man, this Wolverine team is complete.
The state of Ohio relies heavily on one end of the court, with its attack in third place in adjusted efficiency and defense reaching 62nd. Michigan, on the other hand, has the seventh best attack and the seventh best defensive, according to KenPom’s adjusted efficiency. Its effective shot percentage of 56.6 is in tenth place in the country, and opponents have achieved an effective shot percentage of 43.1%, the second lowest mark nationally.
This is a team with a 2.10 m freshman pivot on Dickinson – his top scorer (14.6) and rebound (7.8) – who controlled the paint on both ends, length and size on the wing with double-digit scorers in Wagner (12.6 points, 6.8 rebounds) and Livers (14.5 points, 6.1 rebounds), veteran guards in Smith, Eli Brooks and Chaundee Brown and reserves like Austin Davis and Brandon Johns to complete the regular rotation Howard of eight guys who averaged at least 10 minutes per game.
“They have a ton of weapons,” said Holtmann.
Illinois comes close, but no Ohio State team has faced up to this point represents the challenge that Michigan will face at both ends of the court.
How does the state of Ohio stop the man in the middle?
Three of Ohio’s four defeats had a central theme: a great man thriving in office. Liam Robbins of Minnesota did this once, and Trevion Williams of Purdue got the better of the Buckeyes twice.
Dickinson, along with the weapons that surround him, will test Ohio’s undersized but productive attack court in a similar way.
“Hunter really provided them, he is a big size,” said Holtmann. “He is 7-2 and has a very good length.”
The Wolverines are classified as the country’s No. 1 post-up team for points for possession of the ball, for Synergy, mainly due to Dickinson’s efficiency near the basket. To defend it, the state of Ohio will again rely on its advanced trio of Kyle Young (1.80 m, 225 pounds), EJ Liddell (1.80 m, 240 pounds) and Zed Key (1.80 m, 245 kg) pounds), but you will probably have to help them with some double teams. Making Michigan especially dangerous here is the presence of high-profile 3-point snipers in Smith (48.6 percent), Livers (43.5 percent), Brown (38.6 percent) and Wagner (36.5 percent) percent), which make it difficult to sell to stop a particular thing.
On the other hand, Dickinson proved to be an effective rim protector, using his 7ft-2, 255 pound frame and long arms to his advantage. It averages 1.6 blocks per game with the third highest block rate in the Big Ten game (6.1%).
If there’s a guy in the Michigan squad to call, it’s Dickinson. His rare size and length made him a tough fight as a freshman, and it will be Ohio State that will have the next chance against him.
Many riding on the Ohio state offensive, finding their place
The combination of Dickinson’s size in the middle, athleticism and versatility of larger-than-normal wings and veteran guards make Michigan’s defense one of the most difficult to penetrate in the country.
“This is an elite defensive team, too,” said Holtmann. “They are phenomenal, just phenomenal in that sense. They are big, they are long, they are physical. ”
However, it is difficult to imagine the victory of the State of Ohio, unless, in one way or another, it has another outstanding offensive performance.
This is a team that won due to their attack, and is built to be one that continues to depend more heavily on that aspect of their game than on the lower-ranked defense of Holtmann’s term in Ohio. Four times this season, he gave up at least 80 points and won each of those matches due to an explosive attack. In the four losses of the season of this team, it had between 60 and 70 points.
The Buckeyes will carry out a large part of their attack through Liddell, the constantly improving and high-scoring striker who lost at least 20 points in five of the last nine games, while kicking 12 to 26 in 3 during that period. Lately, he looks like an All-Big Ten guy from the main team and will have to continue his series of outstanding performances on Sunday. Duane Washington Jr., a Michigan native from a 21-point game, will also be counted for a punch in the defense zone.
As has been the case throughout the season, the state of Ohio will rely on a number of others to position itself alongside its two top scorers. With Justin Ahrens, CJ Walker, Justice Sueing, Kyle Young, Seth Towns and Zed Key in tow, Holtmann will have no shortage of options.
Prediction: Ohio State 85, Michigan 82