Wolverine Watch: Free Can Be Extremely Costly

Any election year comes with promises of free this and free that, along with the rejoinder that ultimately, nothing is free.

That’s especially true in college basketball regarding free throws. They can always be costly, but at tournament time, their expense often involves packing up and going home.

It’s a worry for Juwan Howard and Michigan basketball, in the lead up to hoped-for runs in the Big Ten and NCAA Tournaments. While free throw shooting wasn’t on the talking-point front burner after U-M’s 81-74 home loss to Wisconsin, maybe it should have been.

Of course, that one featured more sources of worry than a blindfolded hike through the Everglades. Charity work concerns got lost in a swamp of shortfalls, such as…

• Junior guard Eli Brooks sitting this one out with a broken nose, removing Michigan’s best on-ball defender.

• Brooks’ absence exacerbating U-M’s no-show defensive effort, involving the Badgers’ conga line to layups.

• The Wolverines’ own talk about “effort” and “playing soft” in a game that could have enhanced their Big Ten and NCAA seeding.

But despite it all — Michigan’s stumble out of the gate, its 10-point halftime deficit, and the 14-point holes it dug in both halves — the Wolverines clawed back to within three points with 26 seconds remaining.

At that point, an all-too-familiar scene unfolded.

Senior point guard Zavier Simpson — who played an otherwise masterful game, piling up 32 points with six assists and a single turnover in nearly 37 minutes — could have drawn U-M within two by making a second free throw.

He didn’t, this after missing the front end of a 1-and-1 with Michigan down six with 1:16 remaining.

Seconds after Simpson’s miss, sophomore Brandon Johns Jr. stepped to the line. His one-and-one with 23 seconds left could have drawn the Wolverines within one.

He misfired on the first, and Michigan never scored again.

“Yeah, that was rough,” Howard said afterward. “That was hard to see. But our guys went up there, and I trusted that it was going to go in. The ball didn’t bounce in, so we had to go down and get a stop.”

They didn’t, and the head coach returned to talking about his basketball insomnia.

“It’s going to be a rough night, for not only myself but for the players, too,” he said. “We knew we had a chance, competing from being down 10 points at the half. We had to spend a lot of energy in the second half, to try to get in it.

“We didn’t get in there and knock them down, unfortunately. We’ll be back in practice, working of free throws like always.”

Sophomore guard David DeJulius noted this particular aspect of the game lacks no emphasis among the Wolverines.

“It’s very important,” DeJulius said. “We’ve just got to hit free throws. The coaches do a great job. We shoot a lot of free throws in practice. Guys get in extra work at the free throw line. We just have to stay mentally strong and knock down our free throws.”

“No matter what — late game or throughout the game — yes, I know that we’re not going to always shoot 100 percent from the free throw line,” Howard acknowledged. “But we have a chance when we go up there to the line.

“As much as we attack the basket, it’s our job to go up there and finish it, by knocking our free throws down. Unfortunately, they didn’t go in.”

Michigan isn’t a terrible free throw shooting team, by any means. Coming out of the Wisconsin loss, it stood eighth in the 14-team Big Ten at 71.3 percent. Junior forward Isaiah Livers is hitting them at 95.3 percent, with a perfect 31-for-31 in Big Ten play.

But the Wolverines have picked some bad times for misses, in an area of the game that can deliver losses quicker than a Tom Izzo sideline tantrum.

The Wolverines led Illinois at home earlier this year, 62-60 in the final two minutes. But junior center Austin Davis missed the front end of a 1-and-1, 81.3-percent free throw shooter freshman Franz Wagner missed two front ends, and the Wolverines lost, 64-62.

Instead of Michigan putting the ball in its point guard’s hands at the end of games, Simpson is inbounding the ball, hopefully to Livers. Not a bad move, given Simpson’s 59.6-percent mark at the line.

Jeff Schiller, a regular contributor to TheWolverine.com. points out the issue isn’t one unique to Michigan.

“That’s a legitimate concern for everybody,” Schiller noted, on a recent podcast. “I watched Minnesota absolutely tank a game to Maryland, with two guys on the line who were 75-percent free throw shooters, [Marcus] Carr and [Gabe] Kalscheur. Both of them nearly missed the rim.

“I watched Michigan, back against Illinois, lose a game at the end with Franz Wagner missing two free throws badly, and he’s almost an 85-percent free throw shooter.

“I watched Maryland nearly lose to Nebraska with Anthony Cowan — who is one of the better free throw shooters in Big Ten history — missing a couple of front ends of one-and-ones.

“It seems like, at the end of games at this point, a lot of people are getting very tight. That said, yes, it concerns me.

“It is nice to have Isaiah Livers on the court and big enough to get the ball. But X [Simpson] has got to make free throws at the end of games. That’s a concern.”

It’s the kind of concern that ends tournament runs, quickly, lethally, and without mercy. The Wolverines have a few areas to shore up before tourney time. This one might be the most persistent, and alarming.

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