LOS ANGELES, CA — It’s tough to find something to say about head coach John Beilein’s Michigan basketball team that hasn’t already been said or written.
High character kids … check.
Brilliantly coached offensively … check.
Elite program …
Well, that’s where many stop short.
Contrary to popular belief, Michigan has a proud basketball tradition, with Finals appearances in the 1960s, ‘70s, ‘80s and ‘90s, as well as one in 2013. It’s one of the reasons Beilein took the job at Michigan, remembering the Cazzie Russell/Bill Buntin days and envisioning what he could do with the resources a school like Michigan could provide.
And then he saw Crisler Arena.
Beilein had to work hard to help change the culture of a program that had always played second fiddle to football, grinding diligently to speed up renovations to turn Crisler into the elite facility it is today.
“We’re the leaders and best in everything else,” he told the higher-ups in Ann Arbor. “We should be the leaders and best in basketball, too.”
He meant it as it pertained to resources, but he’s proven over the last several years he’s second to nobody when it comes to building a program. He’s the cleanest coach in college basketball, according to his peers, his players graduate, they get better … and now they’ll play Saturday for the right to go to San Antonio for the Final Four.
“We have a great culture,” Beilein said in the hallway outside the Los Angeles Clippers locker room his players were using … that after joking, “I just might “ when asked if walk-on C.J. Baird might start Saturday.
Baird, a former manager, hit a long triple from the top of the key to put the icing on a 99-72 blowout win over Texas A&M.
He watched Baird for a second before turning his attention to the bench and watching his teammates go absolutely nuts in celebration.
It was a moment he said he’d never forget.
“You guys will remember some of the big plays,” he said. “I’ll remember that one and their reaction.”
He won’t likely forget this game, though. While Texas A&M did its chirping before the game, they couldn’t back it up.
“Unstoppable,” freshman point guard T.J. Starks said in the pregame … and Michigan sophomore Zavier Simpson proved he wasn’t in pressuring him into five turnovers and cutting the head off the snake of the offense.
“Unguardable” was the word big man Tyler Davis used for him and his big (and slow … SEC speed doesn’t translate to the hardwood, apparently) teammates, and while he scored his 24 points, many of them were conceded.
“We were up so much, we knew they weren’t going to beat us with twos,” Beilein said.
Michigan, meanwhile, stuck to its game plan of letting the play on the floor do the talking, with a little bit of trash talk thrown in when it started to get away from A&M early.
Most of it came from junior center Moe Wagner … and to be clear, he wasn’t yapping in German.
Their warm-up shirts, in fact, say ‘Do More — Say Less,’ and it wasn’t Beilein’s doing. The players came up with the slogan, he said, with some pride in his voice.
“It’s something that we recruit, a culture that we're united, and we really work at that,” he said of his team’s 21 assists on 39 made field goals. “We really value the assist as much as the shot. We talk as much about that.
“The other thing about getting assists, the pass has to be on time and on target. If you saw us early in the year, guys were catching the ball here and here … it's a thing they just have to work on to make sure that these guys can catch the ball and be ready to shoot it.”
It’s why they practice fundamentals over and over, and why the Wolverines rarely turn it over.
They also practice shooting, and when it’s good, it’s really good. The Wolverines made 10 triples in the first half alone on the way to a 14-for-24 performance … when they weren’t nailing them, the threat of the long ball opened the floor for senior Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman (24 points) and redshirt sophomore Charles Matthews (18).
“He’s come a long way,” Beilein said of Matthews. “I’ve told you guys, he was like Bambi on Ice … he told me, ‘Coach, I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to get this.’”
Like most of Beilein’s players, however, he’s continued to improve … slowly at times, but his perseverance is now paying off on the biggest of the big stages.
He started off at Kentucky dreaming of national titles, but now he’s got a legitimate shot to do it at Michigan, for a program that couldn’t be any different.
There’s no guarantee that the Wolverines will even make the Final Four, of course, but how a propos would it be for the program that does everything right to go all the way in a year in which college basketball has been exposed for the cesspool it really is?
Regardless of what happens the rest of the way, though, the 2017-18 squad will go down as Elite, and not just because of the Sweet 16 win Thursday that sent them to the round of eight.
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