1/3/2021 – Michigan 85, Northwestern 66 – 9-0, 4-0 Big Ten The Book™ is one of the most durable sports clichés because it has the dual advantages of being accurate and exciting. Very good players with exploitable flaws exist. Coaches who can see just as clearly as anyone else that the regular stuff isn't working can tinker up weird stuff to go after those flaws. When it works, the very good player gets blown up. You can see why, even as a schmoe watching from home. Expectations get upset. Question marks about the future abound. The player has been Booked, and all opponents going forward will throw The Book™ at him until he finds a way around it. If he finds a way around it. The canonical Booking also results in a paradigm-shifting upset. I probably do not have to tell you, the Michigan fan, this. The football program is currently in its throes of misery largely because they got hit with an all-time Booking in the 2018 Ohio State game. Michigan entered with the #1 defense
Big Ten Dominates KenPom Rankings Heading Into March Madness
By Zach Brunner | Mar 15, 2021, 12:24 PM EDT
Big Ten dominates the 2021 Pomeroy Rankings. | Justin Casterline/Getty Images
The NCAA Tournament bracket has been set, and now fans across the country research in their pursuit of creating the perfect bracket. One of the most popular research tools over the past several years has been Pomeroy Rankings more commonly known as KenPom .
When checking out the 2021 Pomeroy Rankings, it becomes evident that the Big Ten has dominated college basketball this season.
Pre-tournament numbers are final, and the Big Ten finished with six of the top 13 KenPom teams. Which of course is ridiculous. pic.twitter.com/QLf4Xz52CH John Gasaway (@JohnGasaway) March 15, 2021
The Mines Of Midrange
2/18/2021 – Michigan 71, Rutgers 64 – 15-1, 10-1 Big Ten
Here s a famous tweet.
I.worked on this story for a year.and.he just.he tweeted it out.
This is how your author felt when last night s broadcast began with the announcers relaying Steve Pikiell s take on the game, which was we re going to jack up a bunch of heavily contested off-the-dribble twos and see how it goes. The announcers said it a little differently, leaving out the heavily contested jacks so they could euphemistically refer to this behavior as shooting in the midrange.
There s midrange and then there s midrange. There s Franz Wagner midrange where he s using his crazy gumby arms to get up layups from outside the paint, and there s Rutgers midrange that comes from just inside the three-point line with several angry gnomes climbing all over the shooter. When those latter go down at the rate they did in the first ten minutes of the game there s a lot of heavy sighing and maybe the occa