Everything Dusty May said after Michigan's 86-61 win over Middle Tennessee

Opening Statement

Well, we’re pleased that we were able to separate a little bit in the second half and play much better basketball. I thought we did a nice job of taking what the game was giving us, we were getting the ball around the rim. They were putting two on the ball screens. I think the scout is out. So, we had great reps going against it. I think overall, we moved the ball a little bit better today.

We had better impulse control, where we had some home runs that we could have taken a shot at, and we pulled them back and ran offense much more tonight than we have been lately. So, we’re a work in progress. I’m very happy with our guys’ actual processes and routines on a daily basis. I think we’re getting better despite the stats not showing it right now. I think we’re definitely planting some seeds to play good ball soon, hopefully sooner than later. We’re happy with the direction we’re going. We’re not ecstatic of where we are with our performance right now. Just got to keep pushing forward.

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On how Yaxel Lendeborg impacted winning

I thought on the offensive end, he was awesome. Our guys did a better job of getting him in his spots. I thought St. John’s, we did a really good job of finding him in the flow. We weren’t stopping to get organized to look for him or run something for him. Tonight, I think just about every dead ball, we ran something for him, at least the intent was for him to create the advantage. It seems, off the top of my head, every time we ran something for him, something good happened.

Part of that is we haven’t done it, so the other teams haven’t scouted. That should be a good weapon going forward, especially with his unselfishness. I thought we generated paint touch threes for the most part with good shooters.

I felt like in the first half, they were all straight hitting the back of the rim. I think those shots are going to drop for us. We’re just trying to be a team that on the nights that they don’t, we can still find a way. So far, how many games have we played? Four. We’ve found a way to win four games, and three of them we haven’t shot well. Obviously, we haven’t been playing a low-level schedule. Wake Forest is a good ball club, at TCU. I watched them beat Texas Tech last year at home. They’re a good program, good team. We’re figuring ourselves out why we’re able to win. Sooner than later, we have to start playing more efficient offensive basketball.

On whether Lendeborg is an inside the arc kind of player now

Obviously, he can do a lot of things. He’s still improving daily. I thought he took the open threes that were there. I thought he took the mid-post options when they were there. I thought he got to a lot of 50-50 basketballs and came up with a majority of them. If you can go 80-20 or 75-25 on 50-50 basketballs, that’s pretty good.

He’s capable of even more. Defensively, we’re still making too many errors for what we can become. Obviously, our defense is pretty good now, but we still have a leap to make on that side of the ball. I do think our offense didn’t hurt our defense as frequently tonight as it has been lately.

On what went into a new starting lineup for the game and whether it’s solidified

We played the big lineup late, and it seemed like it was dominant defensively again. It seemed like it wasn’t quite… I don’t think there was any rhythm offensively. We have to fix some things. We know what the issues are. We have to get our guys to do it more frequently. No, not really. We’re going to tinker. I think Roddy Gayle has played as well as… a four-game sample size. Off the top of my head, he’s probably played as well as anyone in our program. He’s coming off the bench.

We’re just looking for rotations. We’re looking for guys that play well together. We wanted to see Morez with that first group tonight versus Adai, and Adai had missed a practice or so, so that went into the decision-making process. No, we’re not married to anything right now. We’re still looking for the right combinations and right rhythm, but it might be just a night-by-night basis with this team until we figure it out. It might be 15, 20 games before we do.

On whether he wants to have multiple double-digit rotations and Winters Grady possibly being the 10th man

Winters is in a tough spot because he is an elite shooter. Even the one he missed today, kind of fumbled it and shot it after a shot fake, and I thought it was going in. He’s going to have moments this year where I think he really impacts the team in real moments that are important.

We have three games in three days in Vegas, so I could see us in the near future going with a little bit longer, deeper rotation than we do, maybe in the first round of the Big Ten tournament or whatever the case. But he’s in a tough spot because that’s not easy to do. If you don’t know when you’re going to play, where you’re going to play, how much you’re going to play, it’s tough to stay ready, but it also shows how elite the guys that can do it are. But yeah, I think on any given night, we’re going to play eight or nine for sure. Yeah, absolutely. There’s no one that’s seen him shoot the basketball that would argue that he’s one of our better perimeter shooters. He’s elite at that. He’s a high, high level knockdown shooter.

On whether he envisioned LJ Cason’s impact

Just thinking back to when I fell in love with LJ, he was good with his AU team, and he played on a very, very good travel team. They were well coached. They were deep. He actually came off the bench, and so he was a good player. He played well, but then when we saw him with his high school team and he had a bigger role, we just thought this guy knows what it takes to win. He had some big, big time matchups, and he really took on the challenge, but if he said he was an elite high school defender, I need to go back and see some of that tape.

We have a limited amount of evaluations, and they must not have been on the same nights. LJ’s capable of impacting the game on both ends. I thought in the first half, he gave us a real jolt. He changed the game with his energy and his passion. I don’t think he played nearly as well in the second half for whatever reason, and we’ll look at the film and try to figure it out, but we need him to be an impactful player for us if we’re going to max out as a group, because he’s what we need as well. He’s a playmaker. He’s a pesky defender. He’s strong. He’s tough, so he brings a lot of the things to the table that this team needs.

On whether he’d like Lendeborg to be aggressive early or go at his own pace

I don’t want guys overthinking it. I want them to take what the game presents. If he’s got an advantage to his right hand going downhill, I want him to take what the game presents. Ideally, that’s a rim finish, but tonight he got to the rim and they came over late for a verticality, and he skipped it to the three. We kicked it back to Elliott. Those possessions, even when they don’t go in, I feel like we’re going to rebound 50 plus percent of those, because the defense is broken down.

We’re in rhythm. We’re cutting. We’re moving. Everything is positive. I don’t want these guys going into each possession saying, I need to do this. I want them to read their man. I want them to read the ball and their teammates and take whatever the game gives them.

On what he saw from the defensive effort

I love what we can become defensively. The assistant coaches were stressing that before the game of giving these guys a tangible number of deflections. We don’t give a lot of tangible numbers. It’s more of percentage of rebounds and percentage of this, because we want to play with 90 possessions. If a team makes this play in the 60s and 70s, the numbers are skewed. We didn’t offensive rebound enough.

We were more active today. I thought our intensity was better. We just let teams move the ball and be too comfortable against us. I think we’ve got to do a better job going forward of when the offensive player catches the ball, his momentum is going away from the basket, so we’re not on our heels as much. Defensively, we’ve got a very, very high ceiling. We could end up being one of the top teams in the country if we continue to get better, to learn the nuances of our defense, and then stay committed to it.

On what being more aggressive means to him

It did, and obviously, when the ball’s going in, it’s energizing. In the first half, I thought we generated A-plus looks that didn’t go in, and it impacted our in-between game, our transition, our conversion, and it impacted our defense a little bit as well. That’s why I was so happy with the SEGA team, because they came in and gave us that defensive jolt without scoreing baskets.

Anyone who’s ever played the game of basketball, when you have an energizing play, you’re going to defend with more energy. You may not defend smarter or whatever the case, but I think simply by us getting off to a good start and not being consumed with is the ball going in or is it not, and then when it started dropping in, we just found a little bit more rhythm. Defensively, we’re huge, we’re athletic, we’re disruptive, and so when we rebound the ball and finish possessions, it seemed like they got us several threes out of their ten.

They averaged 13 a game. Out of their ten threes, I feel like three or four or five of them were on second or third shots, and once again, our first shot defense has been really, really good this year. We’ve just given up too many second chance efforts, and a lot of it’s been we’re not pursuing the ball well enough from the perimeter. We’re not jumping, we’re not going after it like we need to, and so like I said, we have a lot of room for improvement, but our guys have been committed to working and going in the right direction.

On what he’s seen that makes him believe he can pick up quality wins in Las Vegas

Nothing gives me confidence that we’re going to pick up a few quality wins other than just we have a really good team, we’re capable of playing really good basketball, but I haven’t watched San Diego State. I’ve watched Auburn, obviously. We’re very familiar with them. They sent us home last year, but they’re talented. I know their personnel. I know most of their players.

I don’t know them all together well. The confidence that I have to go get a couple wins is simply because we have a really, really good staff and really, really good players. That’s it right now. Now it’s time to turn the page and start studying for what we need to do.

On Morez Johnson setting the tone defensively

He’s the guy on a team that always gets to the ball. You see his verticalities, how many shots he changes, and those have a residual effect, in my opinion, on the other team. When you get to the rim and a dive blocks your first two, or Morez goes vertical and blocks your shot, the next time you’re a little bit less aggressive, more tentative going to the rim.

There’s never been a film session where Morez hasn’t been the quickest guy to the ball on our team. I think a big part of it, obviously, he’s very gifted with his size and athleticism, but his focus and determination and the ability to concentrate every rep is, I think, his separator. He’s going to continue to improve as we get him more involved offensively, but he brings a lot of winning qualities to our team. He’s extremely important.

On what he hopes to get out of the tournament in Las Vegas

I hope for some vitamin D. I hope we stay healthy, and I hope these three games in three days show us what we need to do, continue to do, or do better to win the Big Ten tournament. I know some coaches and programs don’t value as much a 18-team tournament, this year 18, last year 14, against 18 really good teams winning three games in three days a lot of times against sweet 16, three straight sweet 16 wins or whatever the case.

We want to win the Big Ten tournament again. We want to be in position to compete for it, so three games in three days gives us an opportunity to prepare like that, to take care of our bodies and prioritize the next game immediately when the buzzer sounds after game one and game two. Then we’ve got to be able to learn on the fly where we don’t have time to practice in between.

We go straight from a game, film session, walk through and be able to apply things. That’s the secret sauce of an elite team. Hopefully, we’ll see us doing that on the fly.

Nonetheless, we are 100% a growth mindset program. We need to be better next week than we are today. We need to continue to learn more about our team, and whether we win or whether we lose, we’re not going to be too high or too low because our season is long and we have a high, high ceiling.