Michigan Basketball: 3 keys for the Wolverines against North Carolina
By Adam Childs
Livers and Poole need to step up
Charles Matthews and Ignas Brazdeikis have been solid all year averaging 15.7 and 14.5 ppg respectively. They are the ones that drive Michigan’s offense but they need help. Especially in this game against the Tar Heels.
That is where Isaiah Livers and Jordan Poole come into play. They have both shown the ability to score a bunch of points, but they have been pretty inconsistent this year. Poole has scored 22 points against George Washington and 14 against Chattanooga but has scored 17 total points in the other four games. When his three-pointers are falling he gets going, but when he struggles his whole game struggles. The Wolverines have to get some scoring from him if they expect to win against North Carolina.
Livers is the first guy off the bench for Michigan and has done a nice job providing some scoring punch. They do not need him to be a 15 point per game guy, but if he can get hot it just adds another layer to the Wolverines offense. When Livers is hitting his shots you can just see how his energy rubs off on the rest of the team. The same with Poole.
These two can be electric for Michigan and if they can get both of them going at the same time the Michigan offense can put up a lot of points. Add that with their defense and they can become a very dangerous team.
Before the season started this looked like North Carolina would be the clear favorite in this game and ESPN still gives them a 56.1% chance of winning the game. But with the way the Wolverines have played so far this year and how tough their defense has been, Michigan has to be considered a possible favorite. Michigan is looking to cement itself as a true national contender this year, while the Tar Heels are looking to get back on track after a loss to Texas last week.
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If Michigan can slow the pace they can lock down the Tar Heels. If this game was in Chapel Hill I would give the edge to the Tar Heels, but the Crisler Center is going to be rocking for the Wolverines and they will feed off of that. Michigan continues to look dominant on defense and pulls off the “upset”.