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Blue lacks 3 D's in weekend loss

COLUMBUS -- Watching the Michigan women's basketball team lose to Ohio State yesterday was like watching a bad 3-D movie.

That's because the Wolverines didn't have a single one of the three D's.

They played no defense. They showed no discipline. Worst of all, the team didn't seem to have any direction. The result, predictably, was an 83-75 shelling by the Buckeyes.

Don't be fooled by the final score. This game was over by halftime. At one point, Ohio State led by 17 points.

The most obvious problems arose from the lack of defense. Michigan started out in a zone, practically daring the Buckeyes to shoot from outside.

All Ohio State did was go 7-12 from three-point range in the first half, including three consecutive treys during a 90-second span that led to a 20-9 Buckeye run.

The hapless zone was equally ineffective in the paint, as seven first half offensive rebounds and countless lay ups by Ohio State turned the game into a rout.

Once it became painfully obvious that the zone wasn't doing the job, the Wolverines switched to a man-to-man defense at the start of the second half. The extra pressure didn't do much good, though, as Buckeye All-American Katie Smith riddled the Michigan defense for 20 of her 31 points in the last 20 minutes.

As the Wolverines' defense disappeared, so did their chances of a win.

The defensive collapse forced Michigan into a frenzied offense, and the squad showed about as much discipline as a 4- year-old with a piece of candy.

Even if the Wolverines hadn't coughed the ball up four times as much as they took it away --16 turnovers to four steals --they still would have done themselves in with poor shot selection and senseless fouls.

Of the starters, only Pollyanna Johns ended the game with less than four fouls; she had three. More importantly, Ohio State went to the free throw line 32 times, while Michigan made just 18 trips.

The Buckeyes capitalized on the discrepancy by making more free throws (23) than the Wolverines attempted (18). Smith was the main beneficiary, chalking up 11 points from the stripe.

The sloppy play was due mostly to a lack of direction, which translates to a lack of leadership, on the floor. The Michigan players were scrambling to stop Ohio State's high-powered offense, but when they did come up with a stop, which happened occasionally, there was no continuity on offense. The team didn't seem to know what to do.

The Buckeyes effectively kept the ball out of Johns's hands for much of the game, but instead of moving the ball around the perimeter in search of an easy shot, the Wolverines were repeatedly baited into turning the ball over or forcing dumb shots.

Of course, Michigan could have discussed these types of things early in the first half -- when the contest still looked like a decent basketball game -- by simply calling a timeout and going over the game plan.

Instead, all five of the Wolverines' first-half timeouts went unused, even though their only substitution came with just two minutes left in the half.

Were it not for some impressive outside shooting by Molly Murray and Jennifer Kiefer (five 3-pointers combined), this game would have been even uglier than it was.

Michigan didn't lose this game because of talent, nor did it lose it because the other team had an All-American.

This game was lost because no matter how cliche it sounds, Michigan forgot about the three D's.

I don't care what kind of glasses you were wearing -- this was one bad 3-D movie.