Michigan's lethal 4-5 ball screen: From lunch in New Haven to 'cheat code'

Michigan Wolverines basketball has found something with its 4-5 ball screen with junior forward/center Danny Wolf and graduate center Vladislav Goldin. The Maize and Blue are one of the very few teams in college basketball to start multiple seven-footers, and the pair is playing really well together as of late.

There are two keys to the dual success of Wolf and Goldin. First, Wolf has become one of the top playmakers in the Big Ten. He’s shooting 69.5 percent on twos and 35.1 percent on threes, but also has a unique ability to handle the ball at his size. His 23.7-percent assist rate not only leads the Wolverines but is the highest among any Big Ten play taller than 6-foot-7.

Secondly, Goldin’s finishing ability is a huge key. Goldin, who stands 7-foot-1, is shooting 73.6 percent on 8.6 shots at the rim per game.

Wolf and Goldin starring together has worked thus far for Michigan, but it took some time for the two to get comfortable together.

“After the Wake Forest game, when we weren’t playing very well and those guys were in each other’s way a lot, and we were just down on the floor, a couple of us coaches working out some players individually,” Michigan head coach Dusty May said on the ‘Inside Michigan Basketball’ radio show. “They were both in the gym. I think we pulled [freshman guard] Phat Phat [Brooks] and [graduate guard] Jace [Howard] or whoever together and formed a group.

“We said, ‘Alright, let’s find some rhythm. Let’s really look at this when the stakes aren’t high and the intensity isn’t escalated, and let’s see how we can play off of each other better.’ So it started from that moment, and it’s turned into something that’s continued to grow.

“But as we see different looks, different coverages, that’s where we see their basketball IQ really coming into play, where they’re able to make those reads on the fly.”

With Wolf and Goldin on the floor together, Michigan is plus-37.7 points per 100 possessions (points scored minus points allowed), which ranks in the 99th percentile nationally for any combination.

It’s come a long way. The idea of playing Wolf and Goldin together began in the spring, when May had become Michigan’s head coach and Wolf, a Yale transfer, was looking for a new home.

“When Coach May came and saw me in New Haven for lunch, right when he got the job and I entered the portal,” Wolf said of his first conversations about playing with Goldin, who was a star for May at Florida Atlantic. “We had lunch for an hour and a half, and for about an hour, we were talking about how we envisioned me in the program. I had a lot of questions about Vlad, obviously, and one of the main things was just how are we gonna play together and just how he is as a person. 

“I didn’t know who else he was gonna bring, and he said that Vlad is so easy to play with, no matter who is around him, just given how unselfish he is. The only thing he cares about is winning, and from the first day I met him, I could see how that was very evident.

“The coaches believed in us, and we really worked at it in the summer and early in the season. Of course, there were ups and downs, as any new challenge is gonna bring. But we kinda stuck with it, and here we are. But there’s still so much more that we can prove and get better at — and I’m just excited for what’s to come.”

Michigan is 11-3 overall and 3-0 in Big Ten play, but the Wolverines still have a lot to work on. The Wolverines need more from their bench and for the guards to be more consistent. But the big men have carried the team at key points, and the 4-5 ball screen has become a “cheat code,” according to May.

“If Vlad doesn’t set the proper angles, it’s not very effective and it bogs you down and there’s no rhythm to the game,” May explained. “So we’ve done a lot to really just try to focus on the details and then let those guys play with some creativity.

“… We’ve had to do some different things. For example, I believe it was Purdue Fort Wayne … each week, we’ve been kinda anticipating, alright, how do we think this team will play it, based on their personnel and coverages?

“And with Purdue Fort Wayne, we simply thought they’d put a small guard under Danny and get underneath him, and then put their power forward and big guy on someone else. They did that, so we guessed right. First play of the game, we had [graduate guard] Nimari [Burnett] get involved; he had the power forward on him. He sets a screen, which forced the switch back to the power forward and center combination, and we get two easy baskets.

“Fortunately, our guys see those things, but just like UCLA tomorrow, we’re gonna have to find ways to anticipate what they do — there are gonna be a few different things we see — and then find ways to counter those. It might be Vlad where teams start overreacting and we start spraying it out and getting more threes off of it.”

The possibilities seem endless for a Michigan team that has been led by the two bigs.