Highlights From A Zoom Call Ft. John Beilein, Spike Albrecht & Nik Stauskas

Former Michigan Wolverines basketball head coach John Beilein and former standouts Spike Albrecht and Nik Stauskas joined Big Ten Network's Alex Roux for a Zoom call to reminisce on some of their signature moments together at U-M. They watched several games from the 2013 and 2014 seasons and discussed together.

We put together some of the highlights from their dialogue.

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Albrecht scores 17 points in the first half of the title game.

Did you know Spike had it in him?

Beilein: No. Hey Nik, don’t tell a lie, now. Don’t tell a lie.

Stauskas: I mean, I love Spike and we all knew Spike could hoop, but for our team, especially that year, Spike wasn’t a scorer. He was a guy who … we could definitely count on Spike to knock down shots when he was open, but he was a high I.Q. floor general out there, who was running the offense, getting guys shots, scoring when he needed to. But, we had Trey Burke, who was national player of the year that year, and Timmy [Hardaway Jr.] — two guards who were really scorers. That wasn’t Spike’s role. We definitely knew he was a high-level, really skilled guy, and I think for any player, you knock down two or three threes when you enter a game, you start to get comfortable. I think, just with the atmosphere and with the season we had and everything, I think Spike just made the most of it, took advantage and ran with it.

***

National player of the year Trey Burke sits much of the first half due to foul trouble, giving Albrecht an opportunity on the biggest stage.

Albrecht: Coach B, I got a question for you. If you could go back and do it again, would you have brought Trey back in in that first half, given what you know now?

Beilein: No, no. If you look at that game, if you had come out and had trouble … They had basically made up the lead in the last two or three minutes, and it was [Luke] Hancock. I don’t think you were ever on him. So, Trey would’ve never been on him. It was Hancock making three threes. It was nine points, just like that. My goodness, we wouldn’t have gotten 17 out of Trey in that game, so some people say we should’ve gotten them both in or whatever. We would’ve had to take Tim Hardaway, Caris LeVert, Glenn Robinson off the floor. No, I thought we were actually in pretty good position, seeing he had missed that much of the first half.

Stauskas hits a dagger step-back three to give Michigan a four-point lead with under a minute to go in Madison.

Beilein: The play before that, I ran for him … we were up like 10 late. Late. That was where we had lost on a halfcourt shot the year before. Maybe we were more, weren’t we guys?

Stauskas: Yeah, we were up like 15. We had complete control, but we lost it.

Beilein: All of the sudden, we had a few special plays for Nik. We drew one up, but he didn’t shoot it. So, they went down and scored. And then, I called a timeout. I cursed him out in the timeout and said, ‘If you don’t want to make the play, then to hell with you. Come on out.’ And then he sort of said, ‘Give me the ball. I’ll make the play.’ And then he killed it.

Albrecht: You killed that, Coach B.

Stauskas: That’s exactly what happened, because the play before, I was open for the same kind of pull-up jumper and I jumped, and as I jumped, I kind of hesitated and passed it off. I think I almost turned it over.

Beilein: Good point.

Stauskas: And I remember when I came back to the bench, you were like, ‘If you don’t want the ball just let me know. I’ll give it to someone else.’ And I was like, ‘No I want the ball.’

And that’s why when you play this clip, when it zooms in on my face after, I’m like, ‘I want this s**t.’

Michigan State's Gary Harris scores over Albrecht.

Albrecht: What am I doing guarding Gary Harris here? How’d that happen?

Beilein: Fire the coach. That’s stupid.

*laughs*

Albrecht: There had to be a switch there. There’s no way I would’ve been guarding that dude.

Beilein: I know I didn’t put you on him.

***

Caris LeVert drains a three at the first half buzzer to pull the Wolverines within two of the Spartans.

Beilein: End of the first half. This was huge. They’re up by five.

Albrecht: C-Love!

Stauskas: He turned around! He turned around before it even went in.

Beilein: You know, Duncan [Robinson] did the exact same thing to Michigan State the next year or the year after. Exact same shot, that amount of time, same spot.

He turns and looks at the Michigan State bench a little bit. That was good.

Stauskas: I love it.

***

Stauskas finds Glenn Robinson III underneath for a smooth finish.

Stauskas: I mean, G was an incredible finisher under the basket.

Beilein: Good snap pass there, too. Watch the snap, right there. Snap.

Stauskas: Man, we really did work on those passes, though.

Beilein: We did work on those passes. I was trying to do ‘em more in the NBA. It didn’t work so well.

*laughs*

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