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Notes
*-Tai Webster finished with a career-high five steals, topping his previous best of four set on two other occasions. It is the most steals by a Husker since Brandon Richardson had seven against Ohio State on Jan. 3, 2012. Webster also reached double figures for the third straight game with 12 points off the bench.
*-Nebraska put four players in double figures, marking the eighth time this year that NU had at least four players in double figures.
*-Freshman Glynn Watson Jr. finished with 15 points, his fourth straight game in double figures
*-Nebraska committed 10 turnovers, the third straight game NU has had 10 turnovers or less
*-Michigan snaps Nebraska’s four-game win streak with the win today. Michigan shot 56 percent which was a season-high against NU. It marked just the fifth time in the last 65 contests that an opponent shot over 50 percent against Nebraska.
*-Michigan has won the last eight meetings, including all six since Nebraska joined the Big Ten.
Tim Miles
On what led to the loss
“I would say the start of each half is what really hurt us. They go nine possessions to start the game and get 18 points. Now, just remember this, our goal is less than one point per possession. So, they’re at nine (points per possession), we need ten straight stops to get back under one point per possession. Second half, it’s nine possessions, 21 points. Now you need 13 straight stops. You’re not going to get 23 straight stops against Michigan. We even talked amongst ourselves as coaches at halftime about (switching) our matchups. We didn’t like them. If I have a regret, it’s that. We also talked about handling the middle screen-and-roll a little differently, which we did, and what you saw there at the end, is when we started trapping it with two people on the ball. (Michigan guard Derrick) Walton is so good still being able to deliver a pass. A lot of people can’t do that. But we don’t have the length we used to, either, and so he’d deliver the ball and our ‘help’ man wasn’t in enough. What happened was, our guy was in, and then we made a sub, and then our sub didn’t quite get in and gave up a couple, and you don’t have the timeouts you used to, so you’re screaming at them while everybody else is screaming at the refs, and you’re trying to get them on the line between the ball and the post defender. So your positioning is in, but you’re playing it out. Anytime they did that, (Michigan) turned it over. They had three turnovers, but I bet we had four or five layups, so the risks didn’t pay off and there was no reward. We lost on that end.”
On how Nebraska was able to get back in the game
“I think our kids showed a lot of heart. They fought back. Unfortunately, we’ve lost a lot of games at home this year and they hate that. They want to do well for our fans and they want to win games. I think they just absolutely played with a lot of heart, because it wasn’t our best night. We were a little flat early. We didn’t share the ball. We didn’t get our offensive space where it should be, and then defensively, you can’t give up everything. We gave up 11 3’s, and then their centers got 20 points and they got 40 percent of their missed shots. They got eight offensive rebounds on 22 misses. That’s losing basketball.”
On responding to Wednesday night’s victory
“Anytime you play a team with as much skill and ability to execute like Michigan, you’ve got a lot of fear that could come to fruition. We’d addressed it with them in a real ‘matter-of-fact’ way, but I also don’t believe in the old scare tactic of ‘you guys are going to lose,’ that trick. I don’t know if that works with this generation, but I think it’s a different position for our team to be in. Michigan understands that we’d tie them in the standings if they lose and this is the only time we play them. So this is like a must-win, and an experienced team knows that. We talked about it with our guys where they’d be in the standings if they’d win and where they’d be if they lost. Michigan played really well. I think you have to complement them on how well they shot the ball early in each half, too, because that really got you skittish.”
On the crowd
“I remember a sports writer telling me when I took this job, he said, ‘You’re going to love Nebraska because, for a BCS-level job, you’re not going to find better fans that are more fair and will support a team better,’ and if you look across the board at Nebraska athletics, our fans are tremendous, and they were awesome tonight. I wish we could’ve given them something to cheer about instead of just howl about. They were awesome. You just can’t say enough about Pinnacle Bank Arena, the venue, the environment. The fan support was really cool tonight. Of course, it was for an important cause, too. A lot of people out supporting that. I don’t know how they did with the swabs, but I’m sure they added to the registry a great deal, and that’s about saving lives. That’s a bigger thing than a basketball game.”
Andrew White III and Glynn Watson Jr.
On Michigan’s offense:
White: They executed really well. We gave them some momentum in the first half. A few of those mistakes were mine and when you have a team like that that’s a rhythm offensive team you can’t let them get rolling and that was kind of our emphasis all week was to not let them have a hot start because that’s not the kind of team you want to play and try to dig yourself out of a hole. We were well aware of what we were getting into if we let them get going early and myself and some others didn’t do a good job of stopping that from happening.
Watson: I think it was mostly our defense execution. We let them get open shots, they had us in rotation a lot. Most of the things we worked on during the week we just didn’t execute right. Other than that, they made some good shots and a couple tough shots.
When you guys are down 18, how do you stay in the game?
White: We just fought, we knew we were better than what we were playing before and I think everybody just wanted to do their part to get us back into the game. I know that’s what I felt personally since I was kind of responsible for getting us into that hole. So, just myself and I’m sure everybody else just tried to dig in and get a little run going because when you're playing at home you're just a couple stops and a couple buckets away from getting the crowd going and getting your teammates and the bench going and you can't ever give up on the game regardless of what the score is. I think we did a good job of that, but like I said once you get into a hole it’s hard to dig yourself out.
Did you make an effort to be more aggressive in the 2nd half?
White: I think I played pretty much my normal game. I just kinda play off of guys, and I try not to force too many things. In the second half I just knew we needed something on both ends of the court so I just tried to tighten my game on not just offense but defense and rebounding also. On offense, my teammates did a good job of getting me the ball and putting me in a position to help us get going but like I said defense was really what we needed to do to get back in the game so I think that was more of a group effort more so than just the little run of points I had early in the second half.
Were nerves part of it?
Watson: I don’t think so, I think everybody is used to it by now, we’re in the Big 10 play, it should be normal. I think we just didn’t execute on defense, it wasn’t really about us being nervous.
How difficult is it as a team to be locked in?
White: When they would reverse it to our group they had guys that could play on the perimeter and they had guys who were hard rollers to the rim so I think they had good versatility just because they put pressure on the rim and to stop that you have to build your defense from the inside out. Being that they hit a couple shots early and spread our defense out a little bit it was kind of pick your poison because now the lane is open and guys are getting open shots so I think that was just them doing a good job executing their stuff and I think their perimeter game is what opened up their pick and roll and shots near the rim.
Michigan Head Coach John Beilein
Opening Statement
“It was going to take a really great effort and a lot of courage to come in here and win today. Fortunately, we got off to a really good start, and I think that really helped us a great deal. A couple of the away games we’ve lost we got off to a really bad start. It wears on you fighting back or you lose your confidence. I like that early confidence. What I love about it is we stood the charge at the end of the first half and a couple of charges in the second half. I’m really proud of the way these kids responded to it. This is a great college atmosphere at Nebraska. This is a great place to play and we’re really appreciative of the opportunity.”
On Duncan Robinson’s inside scoring
“What he’s realizing now is people are going to play him a certain way and his movement without the ball is going to be really important. He’s learning all the video and all the synergy. People are going to sit on different ways, and he’s got to do more than just stand and wait for people to get him open.”
On how Nebraska stayed in the game
“If you’ve been watching college basketball for the shorter shot clock, the leads aren’t safe. It can go so quickly. 18 can get to 12 quickly then you answer with two more threes and it’s six. We also had a couple turnovers there that were very costly as well and we fouled guys in transition. It just happens. I know that when I’m watching a game on TV or my phone, I say ‘wow they’re up by 18, it’s over.’ You feel that as a spectator. You don’t feel that as a coach. The opponent that’s down probably feels that way but that’s not surprising. We really work on understanding runs in the game.”