The latest edition of INSIDE THE FORT, including plenty of football, basketball and recruiting information. Be sure to catch our EJ Holland’s Monday ITF segment INTO THE BLUE, as well, also weekly on Michigan football recruiting.
We start this segment with Michigan football …
There have been rumors this week about both of Michigan’s backup quarterbacks, Dylan McCaffrey and Joe Milton. There’s been talk in some circles that McCaffrey was hurt worse than thought by a cheap shot at Wisconsin and might miss significant time.
We have not heard that. In fact, we specifically asked some close to it if they thought we’d see McCaffrey again this year.
“I believe we will,” she said … and that was the extent of it.
As for Milton, there were rumors on twitter he’d start this week. That’s not the case, but we do expect to see some of him this weekend at Illinois depending on how the game goes, and not just in “garbage time” if U-M is so lucky to put this one away early. We could see him the way we saw McCaffrey in the opener, for example. He has made strides in practices the last several weeks.
Other injuries … we don’t expect to see either junior linebacker Josh Ross or senior tight end Sean McKeon this week.
In Illinois, redshirt junior quarterback Brandon Peters has obviously been the main topic of discussion surrounding the Illini’s injury front this week, and Doug Bucshon of Orange & Blue News provided an update on not only Peters’ status, but also the team’s other injured players.
“[Illinois head coach] Lovie Smith doesn’t update the media on injuries, so we won’t know for sure until game time who is out,” Bucshon explained. “That said, Brandon Peters was injured last week, and is not expected to play on Saturday. Peters left the game against Minnesota with what appeared to be a head injury, and our guess is he is going through concussion protocol.
“Freshman quarterback Isaiah Williams, redshirt freshman running back Jakari Norwood, junior defensive end Isaiah Gay, and senior safety Stanley Green didn’t make the trip to Minnesota due to undisclosed injuries.”
Bucshon went into a bit more detail on Peters’ overall performance so far during his first season in Champaign, and whether or not he has met expectations through five games.
“No one expected Peters to be an all-world performer, but he hasn’t consistently made the throws that he was expected to make,” the insider noted. “He has shown flashes and made a few plays, but Peters is completing just 58.3 percent of his passes. Though he doesn’t throw the ball up for grabs much, his decision making when he feels the pass rush has been less than stellar.
“The offense has been frustrating for fans to watch. Offensive coordinator Rod Smith doesn’t appear to have confidence that the offensive line can protect Peters, so most of the throws have been of the dink and dunk variety. They aren’t taking any shots downfield, and Peters has completed just four passes of 30 or more yards.”
****
To basketball and recruiting now, starting with the latest on Juwan Howard and his team during practice …
There’s been a lot written about how Howard is going to divvy up responsibilities, with many believing assistant coach Phil Martelli is going to be the ‘X and O’ guy and running the show, making Howard a ‘figurehead’ of sorts. From what we’ve gathered, that absolutely isn’t the case.
We’ve spoken with a number of practice observers who said there’s no question — none — who is running the show, and it’s Howard. The kids have great respect for him and are picking up the new offense, one former Wolverine big man Tim McCormick told us long ago he expected would be more up tempo ... and he's seen some practices.
“The NBA is a faster league,” he said. "The kids will probably have a lot more freedom. For all things that we loved about John Beilein, it’s probably not easy to play for him from a turnover standpoint, freedom standpoint. I think players will have more ability to create, take more chances, be faster in transition compared to the last few years.”
One of our practice observers saw evidence of it. They’ve been careful about saying too much, not wanting people to know what they’re running, but recruits and their parents have been introduced to it … and they like it. One person with great basketball knowledge we trust a lot offered this:
“They are much more up tempo offensively,” he said. “They are running transition right into offense like the NBA, running some two-big stuff. It’s definitely NBA style and though not Beilein offense, plenty of elbow, hand off and ball screen concepts that are very similar.
“Howard Eisley and Juwan were running the offense segments. Juwan was definitely in charge. The least active of the three assistants during some sessions was Phil Martelli.
“Bottom line — Juwan did not look like a first time head coach running a practice.”
In other words, he looked very much like he knew what he was doing.
One who still needs to pick it up — Brandon Johns at the four. He’s still not aggressive enough offensively. One who has improved, in addition to junior shooting guard Eli Brooks — sophomore shooting guard David DeJulius.
“He looked more comfortable making plays off the bounce,” our source said. “It’s the first time I’ve seen some of the stuff he did in high school off the dribble translate.”
So that’s good news.
Freshman Franz Wagner continues to impress, as well, and the offense — while looking a bit clunky last week — has continued to make strides. The defense, meanwhile, has been really good with seniors Zavier Simpson and Jon Teske leading the way there. As Simpson noted, Wagner is much better than expected there (“he actually plays defense,” he said when asked to compare Franz to his brother, former U-M big man Moe Wagner), and junior Isaiah Livers has been much quicker and better on the perimeter after dropping some weight.
Just because Martelli wasn’t active one day, however, doesn’t mean he won’t play a big part in everything that goes on. They call him the “godfather’ for a reason.
“I did three St. Joe’s games last year [as an analyst],” McCormick said. “I have done 10 or 15 over the last 15 years. Going through my notes, I found it interesting some of the terms I used: position-less basketball. Emphasis on low turnovers. Real structured motion game ... rely on threes. All things very similar to Beilein. I think Martelli coaches maybe as close to Beilein style as anyone.
“I don’t expect Juwan to adapt his system to be like Beilein’s, but Phil can ease that transition, because Michigan’s players have been taught a certain way. Phil Martelli understands a lot of concepts and can help the transition a great deal. He’s also a really good guy, really authentic, honest, very much in love with the game of basketball.”
McCormick spent time at one of the basketball tailgates before a football game and loved the way Howard and Martelli interacted.
“They have great chemistry. They like each other, and they also felt like a unique match,” he said. “Phil also was looking for that right opportunity, and it came at just the right time. His understanding of the college game, scheduling, practices and academics — he’s a great fit.”
****
On the recruiting trail, we obviously have to start with five-star Isaiah Todd of Raleigh (N.C.) Word of God Christian Academy. Futurecasts have been rolling in for Todd to Michigan, and those close to Kansas have essentially conceded he won’t be going there.
“Michigan or overseas,” one close to the Jayhawks program told us today.
Todd’s recruitment has been interesting. As has been reported, schools like North Carolina and N.C. State stopped recruiting him because they were too close to a situation involving one of his handlers who got in some trouble. To be clear, though, North Carolina coaches really like the kid, per one of our national sources.
“He’s up there quite a bit hanging with the North Carolina kids, and they love having him around,” he said. “He’s a really good kid and doing his best to ensure people know that’s who he is.”
Others backed off due to some influences around him, and rumblings are that Kentucky coach John Calipari stopped recruiting him believing he’d be playing overseas next year (likely Australia). Our source has watched the kid grow, and he said he’s one of his favorites from the 2020 class.
“He’s grown up,” he said. “He went from a first day cut at USA Basketball one year to earning a leadership award.”
But will he ever play college ball?
We still don’t think so. We said we’d learn more when there were boots on the ground in Colorado Springs this weekend for USA Basketball, and we have. We asked our guys close to it whether he was hearing the same things we were from the Kansas guys about Michigan overseas.
“It’s likely going to be both,” he said.
In other words, a pledge to U-M and then likely play in Australia next year rather than at Michigan.
Several fans have taken the “what can it hurt?” approach on this one, noting it could help with other five-star recruits. After all, Howard himself said at Big Ten Media day in Chicago that it would take one to fall for other dominoes to follow, noting he was that guy back in the Fab Five days and helped recruit guys like Chris Webber, Jimmy King and Jalen Rose to follow him.
But that can work both ways, too. One of our national sources said there’s buzz in Colorado Springs that four-star Hunter Dickinson of Hyattsville (Md.) De Matha is watching the Todd recruitment closely.
“The word is they could lose him because of it,” he said, which obviously wouldn’t be ideal if Todd did pledge to U-M and then head overseas.
Publicly, Dickinson has reacted positively to Todd’s Michigan tweets on twitter, Instagram, etc., but it’s up to the Michigan coaches to gauge this one. There’s a reason they get paid the big bucks.
Dickinson is visiting Notre Dame this weekend even though most don’t believe he’s a great fit for the Irish with what they like to run and the way they use their bigs. His coach played for Irish coach Mike Brey back in the day. Florida State and U-M are better fits for him, and it could come down to those two if big man Mark Williams, a four-star out of Bradenton (Fla.) IMG Academy commits to Duke Nov. 1, as expected.
Williams had a great U-M visit but his sister played for the Blue Devils, and most believe he’s a lock.
As for a few others — Montverde Academy four-star Moses Moody, teammate of four-star guard pledge Zeb Jackson, is still really feeling U-M, though Oregon and Virginia are moving up, and hometown Arkansas is very much in play. We still believe five-star shooting guard NImari Burnett is leaning toward Alabama (as do several others), where he believes he will be a point guard with the offense running through him.
We start this segment with Michigan football …
There have been rumors this week about both of Michigan’s backup quarterbacks, Dylan McCaffrey and Joe Milton. There’s been talk in some circles that McCaffrey was hurt worse than thought by a cheap shot at Wisconsin and might miss significant time.
We have not heard that. In fact, we specifically asked some close to it if they thought we’d see McCaffrey again this year.
“I believe we will,” she said … and that was the extent of it.
As for Milton, there were rumors on twitter he’d start this week. That’s not the case, but we do expect to see some of him this weekend at Illinois depending on how the game goes, and not just in “garbage time” if U-M is so lucky to put this one away early. We could see him the way we saw McCaffrey in the opener, for example. He has made strides in practices the last several weeks.
Other injuries … we don’t expect to see either junior linebacker Josh Ross or senior tight end Sean McKeon this week.
In Illinois, redshirt junior quarterback Brandon Peters has obviously been the main topic of discussion surrounding the Illini’s injury front this week, and Doug Bucshon of Orange & Blue News provided an update on not only Peters’ status, but also the team’s other injured players.
“[Illinois head coach] Lovie Smith doesn’t update the media on injuries, so we won’t know for sure until game time who is out,” Bucshon explained. “That said, Brandon Peters was injured last week, and is not expected to play on Saturday. Peters left the game against Minnesota with what appeared to be a head injury, and our guess is he is going through concussion protocol.
“Freshman quarterback Isaiah Williams, redshirt freshman running back Jakari Norwood, junior defensive end Isaiah Gay, and senior safety Stanley Green didn’t make the trip to Minnesota due to undisclosed injuries.”
Bucshon went into a bit more detail on Peters’ overall performance so far during his first season in Champaign, and whether or not he has met expectations through five games.
“No one expected Peters to be an all-world performer, but he hasn’t consistently made the throws that he was expected to make,” the insider noted. “He has shown flashes and made a few plays, but Peters is completing just 58.3 percent of his passes. Though he doesn’t throw the ball up for grabs much, his decision making when he feels the pass rush has been less than stellar.
“The offense has been frustrating for fans to watch. Offensive coordinator Rod Smith doesn’t appear to have confidence that the offensive line can protect Peters, so most of the throws have been of the dink and dunk variety. They aren’t taking any shots downfield, and Peters has completed just four passes of 30 or more yards.”
****
To basketball and recruiting now, starting with the latest on Juwan Howard and his team during practice …
There’s been a lot written about how Howard is going to divvy up responsibilities, with many believing assistant coach Phil Martelli is going to be the ‘X and O’ guy and running the show, making Howard a ‘figurehead’ of sorts. From what we’ve gathered, that absolutely isn’t the case.
We’ve spoken with a number of practice observers who said there’s no question — none — who is running the show, and it’s Howard. The kids have great respect for him and are picking up the new offense, one former Wolverine big man Tim McCormick told us long ago he expected would be more up tempo ... and he's seen some practices.
“The NBA is a faster league,” he said. "The kids will probably have a lot more freedom. For all things that we loved about John Beilein, it’s probably not easy to play for him from a turnover standpoint, freedom standpoint. I think players will have more ability to create, take more chances, be faster in transition compared to the last few years.”
One of our practice observers saw evidence of it. They’ve been careful about saying too much, not wanting people to know what they’re running, but recruits and their parents have been introduced to it … and they like it. One person with great basketball knowledge we trust a lot offered this:
“They are much more up tempo offensively,” he said. “They are running transition right into offense like the NBA, running some two-big stuff. It’s definitely NBA style and though not Beilein offense, plenty of elbow, hand off and ball screen concepts that are very similar.
“Howard Eisley and Juwan were running the offense segments. Juwan was definitely in charge. The least active of the three assistants during some sessions was Phil Martelli.
“Bottom line — Juwan did not look like a first time head coach running a practice.”
In other words, he looked very much like he knew what he was doing.
One who still needs to pick it up — Brandon Johns at the four. He’s still not aggressive enough offensively. One who has improved, in addition to junior shooting guard Eli Brooks — sophomore shooting guard David DeJulius.
“He looked more comfortable making plays off the bounce,” our source said. “It’s the first time I’ve seen some of the stuff he did in high school off the dribble translate.”
So that’s good news.
Freshman Franz Wagner continues to impress, as well, and the offense — while looking a bit clunky last week — has continued to make strides. The defense, meanwhile, has been really good with seniors Zavier Simpson and Jon Teske leading the way there. As Simpson noted, Wagner is much better than expected there (“he actually plays defense,” he said when asked to compare Franz to his brother, former U-M big man Moe Wagner), and junior Isaiah Livers has been much quicker and better on the perimeter after dropping some weight.
Just because Martelli wasn’t active one day, however, doesn’t mean he won’t play a big part in everything that goes on. They call him the “godfather’ for a reason.
“I did three St. Joe’s games last year [as an analyst],” McCormick said. “I have done 10 or 15 over the last 15 years. Going through my notes, I found it interesting some of the terms I used: position-less basketball. Emphasis on low turnovers. Real structured motion game ... rely on threes. All things very similar to Beilein. I think Martelli coaches maybe as close to Beilein style as anyone.
“I don’t expect Juwan to adapt his system to be like Beilein’s, but Phil can ease that transition, because Michigan’s players have been taught a certain way. Phil Martelli understands a lot of concepts and can help the transition a great deal. He’s also a really good guy, really authentic, honest, very much in love with the game of basketball.”
McCormick spent time at one of the basketball tailgates before a football game and loved the way Howard and Martelli interacted.
“They have great chemistry. They like each other, and they also felt like a unique match,” he said. “Phil also was looking for that right opportunity, and it came at just the right time. His understanding of the college game, scheduling, practices and academics — he’s a great fit.”
****
On the recruiting trail, we obviously have to start with five-star Isaiah Todd of Raleigh (N.C.) Word of God Christian Academy. Futurecasts have been rolling in for Todd to Michigan, and those close to Kansas have essentially conceded he won’t be going there.
“Michigan or overseas,” one close to the Jayhawks program told us today.
Todd’s recruitment has been interesting. As has been reported, schools like North Carolina and N.C. State stopped recruiting him because they were too close to a situation involving one of his handlers who got in some trouble. To be clear, though, North Carolina coaches really like the kid, per one of our national sources.
“He’s up there quite a bit hanging with the North Carolina kids, and they love having him around,” he said. “He’s a really good kid and doing his best to ensure people know that’s who he is.”
Others backed off due to some influences around him, and rumblings are that Kentucky coach John Calipari stopped recruiting him believing he’d be playing overseas next year (likely Australia). Our source has watched the kid grow, and he said he’s one of his favorites from the 2020 class.
“He’s grown up,” he said. “He went from a first day cut at USA Basketball one year to earning a leadership award.”
But will he ever play college ball?
We still don’t think so. We said we’d learn more when there were boots on the ground in Colorado Springs this weekend for USA Basketball, and we have. We asked our guys close to it whether he was hearing the same things we were from the Kansas guys about Michigan overseas.
“It’s likely going to be both,” he said.
In other words, a pledge to U-M and then likely play in Australia next year rather than at Michigan.
Several fans have taken the “what can it hurt?” approach on this one, noting it could help with other five-star recruits. After all, Howard himself said at Big Ten Media day in Chicago that it would take one to fall for other dominoes to follow, noting he was that guy back in the Fab Five days and helped recruit guys like Chris Webber, Jimmy King and Jalen Rose to follow him.
But that can work both ways, too. One of our national sources said there’s buzz in Colorado Springs that four-star Hunter Dickinson of Hyattsville (Md.) De Matha is watching the Todd recruitment closely.
“The word is they could lose him because of it,” he said, which obviously wouldn’t be ideal if Todd did pledge to U-M and then head overseas.
Publicly, Dickinson has reacted positively to Todd’s Michigan tweets on twitter, Instagram, etc., but it’s up to the Michigan coaches to gauge this one. There’s a reason they get paid the big bucks.
Dickinson is visiting Notre Dame this weekend even though most don’t believe he’s a great fit for the Irish with what they like to run and the way they use their bigs. His coach played for Irish coach Mike Brey back in the day. Florida State and U-M are better fits for him, and it could come down to those two if big man Mark Williams, a four-star out of Bradenton (Fla.) IMG Academy commits to Duke Nov. 1, as expected.
Williams had a great U-M visit but his sister played for the Blue Devils, and most believe he’s a lock.
As for a few others — Montverde Academy four-star Moses Moody, teammate of four-star guard pledge Zeb Jackson, is still really feeling U-M, though Oregon and Virginia are moving up, and hometown Arkansas is very much in play. We still believe five-star shooting guard NImari Burnett is leaning toward Alabama (as do several others), where he believes he will be a point guard with the offense running through him.
