Mike Boynton: ‘Too early to say’ how good Michigan basketball will be defensively

If there’s been one thing gleaned about Michigan basketball’s defense under coach Dusty May, Mike Boynton and the staff through two games, it’s that the effort probably won’t be a problem. Teams can often show their hands a bit when missed shots affect players’ individual efforts defensively — that hasn’t been the case for the Wolverines in a win over Cleveland State and a 72-70 loss to Wake Forest. Whether they were lighting it up offensively vs. CSU or going through a lull against the Deacons, they continued to bring it on the defensive end. 

There were some breakdowns against Wake that allowed a comeback from 13 down, but overall, assistant coach Boynton said Thursday, he’s pleased with the progress. At the same time, he also admitted it’s too early to say what kind of defensive team this could be.

“There’s so much turnover everywhere. It used to be just a few teams took transfers, so it took a while to figure out [what everyone had],” Boynton said, shaking his head. “But everybody — and we’re obviously an example of it — we won’t know a lot about a lot of teams for probably about another month. Maybe December … ‘this is their identity is taking shape here.’ 

“But what I do like, from a length and a philosophical standpoint, there’s a path to being a really good defensive team.”

If they were small and had to expend a lot of energy pressing, for example, he’d be concerned. But both in transition and halfcourt, the pieces are there. TCU will probably prefer the latter Friday night, Boynton noted, which could make for an “entertaining game” with the way U-M likes to run, he said with a grin. 

Michigan defense making progress

May turned to Boynton early given his assistant’s history of producing good defensive teams, and there have been some good early results. The buy-in has been there, evident from the way they got after it in the opener against CSU, and he expects that to continue. 

“There’s a lot to improve on, but we’ve made significant progress from the time we got here,” Boynton said. “A lot of it is just accountability, trusting each other … understanding each other’s strengths, where we can expect some guys will have weaknesses. 

“But overall, through two games I’ve been pretty pleased with our effort on the defensive end. Obviously, we had some turnovers that led to some easy baskets, but for the most part Sunday against Wake, our defense sort of held the line. We had some offensive issues particularly late we need to clean up. Our defense has a long way to go, but like the progress we made since June.”

They do need to be better on the defensive glass, though, and he’s well aware. There were far too many second-chance opportunities in the first two games, and May noted even before the season they were going to have to improve there. 

There’s still work to do, Boynton acknowledged. 

“It’s an area we’ve got to continue to emphasize,” he said. “I looked it up today — we have the sixth tallest team in the country according to kenpom. Not that height necessarily correlates to rebounding always, because sometimes smaller guys just have a better knack for finding the ball. But it should be a strength of this team. The composite size we have, even guys like Roddy Gayle can be a better rebounder for us than he’s been so far. Sam Walters can stick his nose in there. He’s not the strongest kid, but he can stick his nose in a little more. Nimari [Burnett], guys like that. 

“Everybody points to our bigs, but a lot of time with height, teams are sending one or two guys and they’re in a battle with another body, don’t always have the freedom to release and get the ball. That’s where our guards have to continue to be better.”

They’ll continue to preach it, Boynton said. The best rebounders are usually the ones who have an innate talent for it. But concepts can be taught, he added, and they’ll continue to do it. How much they improve there will likely determine the direction of the season, and it starts Friday night against TXCU.