Michigan notched its second win of the season on Friday, defeating TCU 76-64 to improve to 2-1. However, the game was a tale of two halves for the Wolverines, especially in managing turnovers — an area that has plagued them this young season.
Michigan committed a staggering 16 turnovers in the first half, accounting for 41% of their possessions. The Wolverines’ sloppy ball handling allowed TCU to stay within three points at the break despite Michigan holding the advantage in shooting efficiency and rebounding.
“I’ll take the blame for all of (the turnovers) early,” May added. “We’ll clean up some things with the game plan and have maybe a little more condensed offensive attack. But once again, until you’ve been in these situations where a guy’s playing you completely different than you’ve seen in the last 70 practices, there’s an adjustment period.”
May acknowledged that the team’s struggles with turnovers are part of the broader growth process, something the Wolverines have emphasized during its early-season practices. After the game, Michigan fell to 339th nationally in turnover rate at 24.5 percent which is worst in the Big Ten and almost 100 spots behind Washington at 19.6 percent.
Needless to say, the Wolverines have a lot of cleaning up to do.
“We were playing a little bit too fast,” Michigan coach Dusty May explained after the game. “… We’re a bigger, less play-making team off the bounce, and when you drive, (opponents) collapse. And so you have to have great off-ball movement. You have to have ball fakes. We just… were over-penetrating. … We probably told them what not to do too much this week instead of focusing on what we wanted to do to beat their defense.”