Chris Collins: Michigan ‘came in here very determined’

Michigan played one of its best games of the year in a 68-51 pasting of Northwestern in Evanston, Ill. Thursday, and hard work was the recipe. The Wolverines didn’t shoot well in the first half, but they got after it on both ends of the floor for 40 minutes — something they’ve done sporadically this year — in running the Wildcats out of their gym. 

For the second time in weeks, and the 7^th time in a row, Northwestern coach Chris Collins was left to explain a loss to Michigan in his postgame press conference. He made no excuses, even though his team was playing its 5^th game in 11 days.

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“Give Michigan credit. They came in here very detirmined. I thought they had a lot of energy,” he said. “They were fresh, hungry. I thought they did a lot of good things, especially the second half. 

“All things considered, I didn’t think we played very well in the first half, and we were only down one, so we were trying to be positive there about hey … let’s get ourselves back on track, play a little bit better here in the second half, and we can maybe find a way to dig this one out.”

It wasn’t meant to be. The Wildcats scored the first 4 points of the half to take a 3-point lead, but the Wolverines responded quickly. By the 11:24 mark of the second half, U-M had a 15-point lead and was in full control.

“From there, it just kind of went downhill,” Collins continued of the first minutes of the second half. “Mentally … I think we made a lot of mental mistakes tonight. And again, we were ready to play; we were excited. It’s not an excuse, but we really haven’t had a practice in two weeks. Sometimes when it really rears its ugly head, you can have what you call game slippage. When you don’t have a practice, you’re relying on the guys to continue with the principles and things you normally can do every day.

“But this was a disappointing loss. Anytime you lose on your home floor in the conference it’s disappointing, because road wins are hard to come by. What I told the guys … if you drop one at home, you’ve got to find one on the road …”

Northwestern simply didn’t get enough scoring, and Michigan had plenty to do with it. The Wildcats shot 37.5 percent from the floor, including 15.8 percent from long range (3-for-19). U-M got 8 fast break points, the amount they’d had in the last 4 games combined, and were active defensively. 

“Michigan played well. I thought they were ready to go,” Collins said. “I thought they were really focused and determined for the game. I thought Kobe Bufkin (15 points, 12 rebounds, 8 assists) was fantastic. Because at the end of the day, if you make Hunter Dickinson take 16 shots to get 19 points, you’ve done a pretty good job. And he only had three rebounds. So, it wasn’t like he was a dominant force in the game. 

“I thought Bufkin was really good, and give credit to Joey Baker, as well, coming off the bench and giving them 14 big points in 14 minutes.”

Collins also lamented Michigan’s work on the offensive glass, including 11 offensive rebounds in the first half. 

Simply put, it looked as though one team came out on a mission and took it. This time it was Michigan. 

“Tonight, for whatever reason, we were a step slow,” Collins said. “I thought they were quicker to the ball. A lot of the 50-50 balls the got, loose balls, you saw it on the offensive boards. They really hurt us early. Eleven offensive rebounds in the first half … that hasn’t been indicative of us. 

“We never really put any game pressure on them in the second half. I was hoping we could make a run there, and we could just never really find it. We couldn’t string those buckets together, couldn’t get the stops to kind of get it to 8, 6, where the crowd could get into the game. Credit Michigan, because they kept us at distance that whole second half.”