Michigan Basketball: Wolverines Desperate For A Home Win vs. Illinois
ANN ARBOR, MI — It’s a battle between a 6-2 Big Ten team with two key road wins and a 2-5 team that’s lost three straight in Ann Arbor Saturday. Heading into the season, most would have guessed Michigan would be the first team, Illinois the second.
They’d have been wrong, of course. The Fighting Illini have won at Wisconsin and Purdue and held serve at home, and they appear to be a legit Big Ten title contender. U-M is reeling without Isaiah Livers, coming off a home loss to Penn State.
The Wolverines will drop to 2-6 if they don’t play better in this meeting than they did the first time they played at Illinois, especially on the glass. The Illini dominated the offensive boards and pulled away late.
“Illinois is an excellent rebounding team,” Howard said. “They’re not a good rebounding team … they’re an excellent rebounding team. Being first in the Big Ten in rebounding … is a point of emphasis [for us], not only throughout our game plan, but throughout the season.
“Going back to Illinois’ last game, with Purdue they were 20-8 in the first half, winning the rebounding differential. That’s big for us that we’re definitely going to have to limit them to a one-shot opportunity as well as limiting their second-chance points.”
Freshman big man Kofi Cockburn has been better than advertised in leading the charge. He notched 19 points against Michigan in the first meeting and is averaging 15 points and 9.7 rebounds per game overall.
“Kofi is having a great year,” Howard said. “He’s a very strong, physical big. He scores a lot of his points in the paint on the low block. We’ve just got to make him work harder, not get any easy post touches. When he does touch it, we’ll do our best to try to defend it and make his shot tough.”
That starts with communication on defense, he continued. Howard was miffed with the defense against Penn State, but he was pleased with the way his guys came back to practice the following day.
“I didn’t come in second-guessing it or worried about our guys’ level of focus, getting ready to come in having a solution-based practice,” he said. “They were locked in, all in. They were locked in … and they’re still locked in.”
It started with senior point guard Zavier Simpson. Simpson took 23 shots against PSU, making eight, but Howard was okay with it. He does want more guys to follow Simpson’s lead on both ends of the floor, however.
“Your leader is always going to be the guy holding people accountable,” he said. “Not only communicating everything as far as holding guys accountable, but doing exactly what he’s telling his teammates to do.”
NOTES
Howard said he wants his struggling shooters to continue to put the ball up when they have an open shot.
“I played basketball before, as you all know. I know how to communicate with our guys when I see a player is not his normal self or if I see there’s a possibility where guys are losing confidence,” he said. “I have a great temper — that’s what I’m best at, at reading people. We’ve had our conversations.
"Our group knows that our confidence comes first from the coach, and I believe in each and every guy on that team, even guys that didn’t get a chance to play. It’s not like I didn’t trust them in that moment. The situation within the game and how the game was flowing called seven guys to play at that point. But overall, my rotation will sometimes be seven, eight, nine, ten — who knows, even eleven.”
There’s a better chance it will be less if junior Isaiah Livers returns. He was slated to come back vs. Penn State, but sat again with a groin injury.
“He’s getting better, I’ll say that,” Howard said, noting he wasn’t sure if Livers would play. “That’s all I’ve got to give.”
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