Beilein: Too many high school players lack toughness
Ann Arbor — Toughness can be described in a multitude of ways, and many coaches say it is impossible to teach because it is innate to each athlete.
Michigan basketball coach John Beilein disagrees and mentioned some former Wolverines who left tougher than they were when they arrived.
Finding defensive and scoring consistency is a must for all teams, but developing toughness helps teams in crunch time. Look no further than last Wednesday night when Michigan, trailing by 14 points in the second half to Penn State, found what Beilein described as an “edge,” and fought back for the victory.
Michigan (11-4, 1-1 Big Ten) will face Maryland (13-2, 1-1) on Saturday afternoon at the Crisler Center.
He hinted that today’s basketball recruit can lack toughness because of excessive AAU schedules most play, and said the all-around tough player went away when they stopped working exclusively with their high school coaches. Beilein said Friday that it’s a give and take in recruiting these days. Do you sacrifice strong shooting because you want someone who will selflessly defend and play a physical style every game?
But his point, perhaps contradicting what many others might think, is he can teach toughness and will polish the shooting.
“You just don't see it that much and you don't know what's being demanded of them,” Beilein said, referring to a general lack of toughness. “If you do see it, you like it. But you don't always get to see it, they’re playing so many games. For me, I don’t see it as much. We think we can teach some of that. We don't think we can teach some of the skill level and the shooting that we get. It’s a trade-off sometimes.”
He referenced former Wolverines Nik Stauskas and Tim Hardaway as players who developed that toughness.
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“They probably didn't walk in here with that edge,” Beilein said. “But it was created over time by them and by the environment we put them in."
But like anything of this nature, it takes time to develop. Because he has evidence like Stauskas and Hardaway, he will also take pure basketball talent first and teach the rest later.
“There are guys who have never dove on a loose ball in their entire life,” he said. “I'm not going to give a scholarship to a guy because he dove on a loose ball, when he can't shoot or he can't pass. You’d like everything. But to get a guy in high school that dives on a loose ball, stand in and take a charge, will sit down and check and guard his man at crunch time, there’s a lot of really good players who come into college and are successful that that was not what they’ve ever done.
“They can get better at it. They’re not going to turn into Attila the Hun over a couple years here, but they are going to get better in many respects.”
By no means, Beilein said, is his current team beyond the ability to improve in the toughness aspect. The players know it, too.
“As a team, we know we need to grow at (this),” Duncan Robinson said Friday. “The little stuff like taking a charge or diving on the ball, that’s not a skill but more of an effort area.”
Beilein is encouraged because his players are willing to learn.
"The good news is, these are a bunch of good kids, and the bad news is, the edge that a lot of great teams have has been lacking in some games.
"There's no way we can win without that edge. There's just no way. We just have to have this mindset, this tough mindset about us that we can get through things. We haven't proved that we're a tough team. We have proved we can be tough at times. You have got be tough in every single game all the way through."
He pointed to last Sunday’s Big Ten opener at Iowa, a double-overtime loss, as a perfect example of the Wolverines not playing with a high-toughness level throughout.
"You almost have to rely on their intelligence and sometimes they have to get stung by some of this,” Beilein said. “We looked back at (the Iowa game) and there were seven or eight plays where there wasn't an edge mentally or the focus was there or there wasn’t an edge physically. And there's the game. You're 2-0 (with a win in the Big Ten), and you've got one more win and you’ve got a good road victory.
"You hope they're smart enough to get that. But getting a guy to have a guy drive right into his chest and take it without backing off is (tough. Well, are you going to practice that all day long and get guys injured falling down? It'd be like Jim (Harbaugh) doing all these tackling drills all day long and now they learn how to tackle but everybody’s hurt. That's the funny thing with this particular team. It doesn't come as natural to them. We're trying to educate them and find different ways. There’s these little moments that we’ve had in the last week (feels like) we’re almost there.”
achengelis@detroitnews.com
Twitter: @chengelis