Nebrasketball: More of the Same in Loss to Michigan

Coming into Thursday evening’s game at the Michigan Wolverines, Nebraska needed to find some wins for any hopes at a postseason berth of any kind. That would be a tall task going against the number-nine ranked team in the country.

Well, when the game starts with a ten to two run for the Wolverines, with five coming from Jon Teske, you get exactly what kind of game this was going to be. Tanner Borchardt had Nebraska’s lone point throughout those first four minutes of game time.

The Huskers were able to keep pace a little bit, with both teams scoring five points in the next two and a half minutes, with Borchardt again carrying the scoring burden, with three points.

Then, it was off to the races with the Wolverines. A 14-4 run would get Michigan out to a 31-11 lead with only six and a half minutes left to go. At one point during this run, Nebraska dribbled around until the shot clock was nearly out and chucked up a shot. Analyst Dan Dakich noted, “it’s like they don’t even know what the shot clock is, and it’s been like that all year.” If that doesn’t sum up the season, I don’t know what does. More from Dakich later.

The Huskers got a kick in the butt (kind of) and managed to keep with the Wolverines (somewhat) for the remainder of the half, with the score at break being 43-21. Amir Harris and Glynn Watson Jr. had the final ten points for Nebraska. Scoreless at halftime? James Palmer Jr.

If you must need a highlight for Nebraska, look to Nana Akenten. He had four points going into half including this dunk.

Akenten would then open the second half with his own personal seven to two run to cut the lead to a mere eighteen points. And with Borchardt’s next layup after a Wolverine free throw, Nebraska was only down 47-30.

Three and a half minutes later? Huskers scored six points. Michigan scored fifteen, who are now up 26 points, 62-36.

Dan Dakich on the mic would bring up an intriguing quote: “There is enough talent on this basketball team. Enough good coaching in this basketball program to win more than they have. This is not a coaching problem, this is a player situation.”

What you think of that or take from that what you will, but it was at this point, finally, where Palmer scored his first points on a three-pointer with nine minutes to go.

Throughout this game, the announcers rarely talked about the game, purely based on how abysmal the performance from Nebraska was. There was talk of John Harbaugh, a lot of “don’t at me” and even some highlights of the Wofford Terriers.

The lead increased all the way up to 31 points with a minute and a half to go. What happened in the eight minutes I glossed over? James Palmer got some courtesy points to help his average (not enough to dethrone Nana as the team leading scorer with 11), Roby showed some flashes of why everyone thinks he has the skill to dominate, but too little too late. Lastly, from Dakich, we heard the plea from the analyst, “this game just needs to end.”

And 90 seconds later it did. And we all thanked God and Tim Miles packed another pair of socks from his drawer.

Final: Huskers 53, Michigan 82