Wolverines weren’t fundamentally sound against Wisconsin
When you try to break down what happened to Michigan basketball against Wisconsin, you see that a lot of the Wolverines issues were self-inflicted.
Beilein’s team are notorious for taking care of the basketball. It’s a core part of what has caused the team to be so successful over the years, yet, against the Badgers, the Wolverines didn’t treat the ball with care, basically from the opening tip.
Michigan's 54 points on 66 possessions (.82 PPP) was it worst offensive performance since scoring 46 points at South Carolina in November 2016. https://t.co/92eXm4wcWD
— Dylan Burkhardt (@umhoops) January 19, 2019
Simpson, Poole, Iggy and Livers all had three turnovers apiece. There were a lot of sloppy passes and a number of instances with Poole, Simpson, Iggy and Matthews, in which players dribbled themselves into a mistake or tried to force things and were eventually called for an offensive foul.
Matthews did a nice job of getting into the lane, as did Poole and Simpson, however, none of them was able to finish with any consistency. And when UM did get to the free throw line, it didn’t capitalize, connecting on just 5-of-11 attempts.
On top of all of that, Michigan just never found a rhythm offensively. Poole forced some bad shots and on the whole, there wasn’t a lot of movement. Simply put, the Wolverines didn’t look like a John Beilein coached team Saturday.