Beilein riding high into new school year

http://www.michigandaily.com/node/73409

By Neal Rothschild, Daily Sports Editor
Published September 4, 2013

The year 2013 has treated John Beilein well.

He’s working his dream job. He made the national championship last season. He has a Big Ten ring. He’s continuing to reel in the country’s premier recruits to support the two potential NBA first-round picks that elected to stay at Michigan. He spent part of his summer in Russia coaching the US University Games team. He went to New York to see his former star point guard become an NBA lottery pick. And to top it off, University alum Stephen M. Ross has just endowed the Athletic Department with $100 million.

And after all of that, the best part of his job?

“Favorite part of the job is going to the individual workouts early in the year and seeing the progress people have made,” Beilein said.

Sounds like an upset selection, but considering how much Beilein relishes the minutiae — the process involved in his job rather than the results — it makes some sense.

The least favorite part of his job?

“There’s very few things that I dislike about, you know, living your dream right now. How can you not just love every bit of this?”

Yeah, that sounds more like it.

Coming off the summer following the most successful season of his career, Beilein has much to be happy about. He strolled into the Crisler Center media room Wednesday afternoon, still seemingly in summer mode, with a pearly white polo, a heavy tan and an ear-to-ear grin.

And lucky for him, it just so happens to be the time of the year for his stated favorite part of his job. With the players coming back for the school year, he’s busy conducting individual workouts — with no more than four players allowed per session two hours a week — before official team practices start up Sept. 15.

The individual sessions, Beilein said, would be used to emphasize individual defense before team defense becomes the focus when full-team practices begin. Aside from that, the offseason has been about assessing the freshmen, developing the sophomores and fine-tuning the two other players on the roster — fifth-year senior Jordan Morgan and redshirt junior Jon Horford.

“It continues to amaze me. We have Jon and Jordan and then we have the sophomores,” Beilein said of the returning players. “I look at them and the one thing that differentiates these sophomores is they’re prep-school guys. Spike (Albrecht) has already turned 21 years old. He’s the only 21-year old alter boy still out there. Mitch McGary is 21 years old, so they’re a little bit older and I feel that from them, that they have maturity about them that we trust.”

As for when the new Wolverines’ place in the rotation might become more clear to Beilein, that might take a few weeks.

“We had that opportunity this summer to just look a little bit at (the freshmen). We call (those looks) the blinks, ‘what if’ this and that. But I think in time it will tell. But having those young men out there, I think we have some real versatility again. I think there’s some great possibilities out there given the makeup of this team in regards to how we play and who plays.”

There was some light shed on certain players’ development. McGary looks to be “in really good shape.” Indications are that freshman point guard Derrick Walton can pick concepts up quickly. Sophomore guards Nik Stauskas and Caris LeVert both look stronger, though LeVert had some minor injuries over the summer.

But there are no glaring causes for concern for Beilein at the moment. In fact, he’s doing pretty well for himself.

“Thirty-eighth year of doing what I have dreamed of doing my whole life — teach and coach. Thirty-eight straight. … I do love, love this environment that the Beilein family is in right now.”

Remember when the naysayers said Beilein's gimmick offense wouldn't work in the BT or that he couldn't recruit? Patience paid off

'shoes

A few things from the article that really caught my attention. In no particular order...

1. McGary looks to be “in really good shape.” - This should help him pick right back up at "Tournament level McGary"

2. The individual sessions, Beilein said, would be used to emphasize individual defense before team defense becomes the focus - I'm sure this is the norm for most coaches but IMO we're going to rely on our D a bit more this year with Trey being gone so this sounds great to me.

3. freshman point guard Derrick Walton can pick concepts up quickly - With Walton picking up the game and Irvin being a freak I'm really excited to see these freshman. As excited as I was to watch Mitch last year.


Is it bad that it's only the second week of the football season and I already can't wait for the BB season to start too? ha ha!

Nice article 2nd. Thanks for sharing.

sandyeggo_blue wrote:

Is it bad that it's only the second week of the football season and I already can't wait for the BB season to start too? ha ha!

Yes it is...

sandyeggo_blue wrote:

Nice article 2nd. Thanks for sharing.

Thanks but I must admit that I didn't even read it.  It just came in my email with the online version of The Daily and I saw it was related to basketball so I thought that I'd post it here.

The Walton comment is big- whether he is ready to be a BT caliber PG (to at least share with Spike), as a freshmen is vital to our success.

'shoes

I think Michigan is going to be much better defensively this year. Hardaway was a below average defender. The addition by subtraction, along with LeVert (our best defender) picking up some of those available minutes, should make the defense noticeably better than last year.

Good call on Caris' defense Hail.

'shoes

It's going to be very interesting to see how the basketball team responds this season.

I think the B1G is pretty wide open again. IU will not be the same team, despite what all my fellow alumni friends say. They're just blind.

I'm not sure what Ohio has coming back, but I expect the same 3-5 teams that were near the top last year to be there again...but, again, it will be much more wide open.

Unless Michigan's freshman are as freakishly good as hyped, and then they may run away with the conference.

Tier 1:
Michigan St.

Tier 2:
Michigan
Ohio St.

Tier 3:
Iowa
Indiana
Purdue

Tier 4:
Wisconsin
Minnesota

Tier 5:
Northwestern
Penn St.
Illinois

Tier 6:
Nebraska

hailtoyourvictor wrote:

Tier 1:
Michigan St.

Tier 2:
Michigan
Ohio St.

Tier 3:
Iowa
Indiana
Purdue

Tier 4:
Wisconsin
Minnesota

Tier 5:
Northwestern
Penn St.
Illinois

Tier 6:
Nebraska

This pretty much how I feel with the exception of Penn St. I really think they might be decent this year. If they get a couple of bounces to go their way they could be a tier 4 by the end of the year.

I also think that Iowa is gonna be a team to look at. They have all of the momentum coming in this year.

My hatred of sparty makes me say stupid things and keeps me feeling like M is better but we're going to have to play some nice D this year to beat Sparty for the B1G championship. One thing that is going to be an interesting story line is how well Harris heals from his ankle sprain. I think it was mentioned on here that most people are thinking it's a high ankle sprain. I haven't actually read what kind of sprain it is but if it is a high ankle then it could linger and nag him all year. Lock down Payne (easier said than done) and the playing field is easily leveled.

I had Penn St. as a .500 tam in the Big 10 before Jermaine Marshall transferred. A back court of Frazier, Newbill, and Marshall would have been the best in the conference.

Props to Coming for not saying anything mean about basketball!

dwoody wrote:

Props to Coming for not saying anything mean about basketball!

Be patient...