Without a doubt, Michigan played further from its offensive identity than it has all season. That's a testament to UConn's defense.
The Wolverines posted their lowest effective field goal percentage, 3-point percentage, and assist percentage, while also posting its second-worst 2-point percentage. To top it all off, it was Michigan's fourth-slowest game of the year.
Michigan is in the top 35 in every single one of those stats on the year, struggled mightily in all of them, and it didn't matter. The Wolverines are national champions.
If anything, the game playing out how it did for the offense only gave further proof to Michigan being worthy title-holders as college basketball's best team. Winning ugly with defense two days after blowing the breaks off Arizona showed that it didn't matter what opponents did to try and stop the Wolverines, it wasn't enough.
"All year we've been just finding ways to win. We made two threes the whole game," said Most Outstanding Player Elliot Cadeau, "We wasn't making shots. We weren't. We had a couple assists, not as many as we usually do, but we constantly just been finding ways to win all year, no matter how everybody is playing."
Instead of dominating with its efficient shooting and impeccable ball movement as per usual, Michigan instead found solace at the free throw line, going a sparkling 25-of-28 from the charity stripe on one of its highest rates of the year.
UConn's defense loves to overextend up top and doesn't send tons of help, funneling ball handlers into the rim with a defender on their hip and shot blocker ready to swat any attempt. Because of that scheme, UConn is just 308th in defensive free throw rate. Michigan didn't have a great night finishing at the rim, but used its superior size to draw contact when it got downhill.
"Early in games we can tell how the game is being played, so then we talk about how we have to adjust and we have to figure out solutions based on how they're guarding us," said head coach Dusty May.
And of course, there's the defense, which was brilliant as always. The No. 1 defensive unit in KenPom this season allowed under one point per possession for the 19th-time this season.
UConn stood no chance at the rim. Tarris Reed had least-efficient NCAA Tournament game in the post. The Huskies hit threes early, but once that well dried up, there were seemingly zero avenues for offense. Michigan's size and length on the interior, led by Aday Mara, was the most dominant group between both squads' offenses and defenses.
"They're just so hard to score against at the rim. I could talk about the threes that we missed, and I thought we had a lot of good threes that we missed. But they just made it so tough on us around the rim," said UConn head coach Dan Hurley.
If there was one area Michigan's defense struggled with, it was the glass, with UConn's 44.9% offensive rebounding rate being the highest the team allowed all year by far. Michigan let UConn's guards sneak past them for second chance looks a handful of times in the game, but the Huskies could only muster up 19 second chance points on 22 offensive rebounds.
When we look back at this Michigan team, we'll remember the elite defense, Yaxel Lendeborg as a true superstar, Aday Mara's freakish gifts at 7-foot-3. The dominant run early in the year at Player's Era, and late in the year at the NCAA Tournament.
But if there's one thing that Michigan showed on Monday night that should cement its legacy as perhaps the best men's college basketball team of the 21st Century (KenPom adjusted net rating would suggest this), it's that the Wolverines were as malleable as they are dominant.
Dan Hurley and Co. put up a valiant effort and threw Michigan off balance, but it punched back and never was truly threatened in the game. The Wolverines sorted through their countless ways to beat an opponent, picked the right match, and handled business.
And just as notably, Michigan is slated to bring back five of its top eight players. We may be having this exact same conversation 365 days from today.
