Let’s just get our “other than Rashan Gary,” out of the way. [JD Scott]
THIS ARTICLE HAS A SPONSOR: It’s Nick Hopwood, our MGoFinancial Planner from Peak Wealth Management. Nick spent last week in Florida with his in-laws because he’s smart with money and stuff. And he spent the whole week texting me he wishes he was in San Antonio or LA because he’s as much of a fan as you are. You should talk to him about your finances so that it’s only your in-laws in the way of going next time.
Legal disclosure in tiny font: Calling Nick our official financial planner is not intended as financial advice; Nick is an advertiser who financially supports MGoBlog. MGoBlog is not responsible for any advice or other communication provided to an investor by any financial advisor, and makes no representations or warranties as to the suitability of any particular financial advisor and/or investment for a specific investor.
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The Question:
Other than THAT MOMENT what was your favorite moment of the 2017-18 basketball season?
Also the sponsor is answering the question.
Nick Hopwood: Wagner behind the back, down the lane ANKLE BREAKER!
Alex: Yes. I was in attendance for the home win over OSU, in MSG for MSU and Purdue, and in San Antonio for the Loyola game. Those were each really special: the excessive booing of Andrew Dakich on Senior Day, authoritatively proving that this Michigan team was better than State, having Jon Teske spark a blowout over an eventual two-seed for a banner, and coming back against Cinderella in the Final 4 to knock them out.
But nothing will stand the test of time better than Moe Wagner absolutely embarrassing Nick Ward with the behind-the-back dribble.
slackbot: 
Ace: Let’s take a moment to watch:
Yup, that holds up.
Seth: The gfycat label for that is LateGorgeousIberianlynx FYI, in case anyone else has need to memorize that.
[After THE JUMP: We come up with several more descriptions of that event before moving on to the others.]
Brian: Unfortunately the video for "Timber" is not so on the nose as to have Pitbull riding a newly felled tree to the ground like it's the bomb in Dr. Strangelove, but here's this.
Seth: Brian, your description in the column was one of my favorite ever:
Moe Wagner induced the most beautiful and futile Michigan State floor-slap of all time from Nick Ward's face.
Alex: I'm old enough to remember when people thought that was a budding rivalry between Wagner and Ward.
Ace: I love how quickly it all goes wrong. One moment Ward is in front of Moe, the next his legs have completely abandoned him.
Alex: In two games, Moe had 42 points (and two wins). Ward had ten points in 24 minutes.
 |
| Self-weird guy’ing. [Campredon] |
Ace: But how many did Ben Carter score?
Alex: More like Cen Barter.
Ace: Also: the Ben Carter Game is my favorite non-Michigan moment of the year, obviously.
Brian: I'm going to rep a loss here: the absurd 92-88 Purdue game, particularly the first ten minutes of the second half when the teams combined for four empty trips. There is something terrific about basketball games where every trip down feels like a haymaker.
Ace: You know the A&M game was like that except only on one side and I found that quite fun too.
Alex: You'd probably love Houston vs Golden State then @Brian.
Ace: Only if Reggie Miller is calling it.
Brian: And at the time Purdue felt like the best team in the country so the game had a ton riding on it and MAAR was obliterating all comers and Carsen Edwards was responding. I wasn't even that mad we lost.
slackbot: Eat MAARby's
Alex: The first ten minutes of the UNC game were similar. And then: doom.
Brian: The rest not so much.
Seth: This isn't my final answer but the first Purdue game, in Crisler, was personally an amazing live experience until Super Bowl and his chums dirked the ending. I lucked into two seats within conversational earshot of Mark Schlissel and was on my feet and yelling virtually the entire game. Never did talk to Schlissel, but Steratore knows his nickname now.
Ace: I’m going in a similar direction as Alex. I’ll admit I had some trepidation before the second matchup with MSU; I’d rather liked the idea of a one-game season sweep at Breslin and the Big Ten Tournament put that at risk. State did their Spartan Dawgs thing, sitting quite close to Michigan’s bench for a portion of the quarterfinal game and openly relishing their opportunity for revenge.
Then Michigan leaped out to a 13-4 lead and Nick Ward—yeah, him again—drove to the basket, took a hard foul from Jon Teske, and pulled Teske on top of him as both tumbled to the ground. Ward pops up looking for action and is met by Charles Matthews, whose full name would be Mild-Mannered Charles Matthews if it weren’t already Kentucky Transfer Charles Matthews.
Matthews does not respect Nick Ward. Not at this moment, at least. He certainly doesn’t respect the cheap attempt to spark some life into MSU. So he laughs directly in Ward’s face, and keeps laughing as Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman escorts him away from a potential technical foul. It’s a perfect moment that led to a perfect photo.
oh we’ll get this photo in a few more times this week i promise. [Campredon]
Even though State tightened that game up before Michigan pulled away, that was the moment this team showed its full form: a defense-first, trash-talking bunch of bulldogs that knew, without a shred of a doubt, that they were one of the best teams in the country, and certainly the best in the Big Ten. Real tough laughs in the face of fake tough.
To see this from a John Beilein team gave me more joy than I can possibly describe.
Brian: Thanks to the Journey and lip reading we now know that all it took to set Ward off was one "GET UP, BITCH" after a hard foul. They shook.
Ace: I’ve watched that segment more times than I care to admit. But seriously, given the schedule this year, MSU should be required to put Matthews’ troll-face on their regular season title banner. Raise that to the rafters, bitch.
(Apologies, MSU brings out the Jesse Pinkman in me.)
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Seth: Alright so my final answer: It’s six days after that Purdue home game and 51 hours after Breslin, at the end of the first Maryland game. The team was dog tired from the compressed schedule and playing like it. Free throws and Charles Matthews had both reached their nadir. Michigan barely scraped 20 points in the first half, erased a 10-point deficit, built a 10-point lead, lost the 10-point lead, and watched helplessly as Kevin Huerter, on his first open look all night, put us down by 1 with a few seconds to play. Livers throws a better inbound pass than any Michigan quarterback this year, and MAAR trips over two guys, and like three total electrons held all the emotions in the world together as he goes to shoot a one-and-one.
I'm watching this on my computer from home because I'm doing the gamer, and then I see Muhammad-Ali's face.
slackbot: Eat MAARby's
Ace: I’m working on my Rahk retrospective piece and it’s incredible how photogenic he is despite never changing facial expression unless he’s literally just won a banner.
He’s constantly stone-faced while his body is contorting into the most bizarre angles. Or, in this case, about to sink two ice-cold free throws.
Seth: Heart and soul of this team. Your rival has all the lottery picks and you play them once, on the road.
Seth: Sorry, Nebraska has the tiebreaker so it's four games in four nights or GTFO.
Seth: Two points down and three seconds from death in the Round of 32 and the inbound is coming to you on a comeback.
Seth: It's not at all a coincidence that Villanova's season-clinching run began when MAAR picked up his second foul.
slackbot: Eat MAARby's
Brian: We should probably mention a 19-6 run to close out a Final Four game.
Ace: Moe’s performance in general was one for the ages.
Brian: He was so sweaty.
And two Duncan Robinson moments stand out. One: Blocking the soul out of Penn State.
Two: capping the BTT game against MSU with an and-one and hammering his chest with Wagner, causing various MSU fan head explosions.
[Campredon]
Ace: The first one occurred in a game with another of my favorite moments: Jordan Poole’s ferocious poster dunk and camera staredown.
The second led to one of my favorite quotes of the year:
“I’m having a blast, honestly, at MSG, at that point in the game I don’t want to say we had it in hand, but we developed a little bit of a lead and it was late. But yeah that was a cool moment. I screamed so loud celebrating it, by the time I got to the line I was a little light headed from it all. I missed the free throw, I’m not saying that’s why, maybe part of it. But just a cool moment, one I’ll never forget,” he said.
slackbot: Hey Brian, don't forget to title a post "HEY! YOU GOTTA STOP FEEDING BELVEDERE" at some point.
Ace: Dude yelled so hard he missed a shot he makes in his sleep.
Ace: Also, shoutout to Zavier Simpson’s biggest mood after Teske dunked on Isaac Haas.
Brian: YES
Ace:
Seth: This is overlapping now with next week's TWO: favorite gifs of the season.
Brian: Let us not forget the MAAR Accessories Game.
[Paul Sherman]
slackbot: Eat MAARby's
Ace: I’m not saying a lack of goggles cost him in the tournament but I’m also not saying it didn’t. Did Rahk cement himself as the coolest Michigan player in recent memory?
Brian: The least fun fun thing was being up a zilly at the Trohl Center and just waiting for it to fall apart. Which it only sort of did, so there's that.
Ace: Eh, they sucked, I wasn’t really worried in that one.
Brian: This was in no way a rational thought.
Ace: But Rahk: the pink shoes, the ice cold expression, the way his layups looked… dude is smooth.
prepping a rahktrospective (sorry) and, man, I'm not sure Michigan has had a more photogenic player. (pics: @FullOfTwitt, @BlueBarronPhoto, @MGoFrenchy) pic.twitter.com/prcjeSFpJe
— Ace Anbender (@AceAnbender) April 4, 2018
Brian: Hell, his name.
Ace: And the several legitimately cool nicknames that came with it. Thank you to the Journey, again, for making me aware that the team calls him “Haam.”
Seth: I want to honorable mention a couple of moments from LA. One is when FSU watched Duncan Robinson collect the final rebound and immediately gave up all thoughts of fouling. The other is
C.J. Baird Gets His Life Avatar
Ace: THA GAWD
Brian: I have the worst honorable mention.
Ace: Dangit Brian.
Brian: It was sort of fun watching Rutgers try to offense.
slackbot: I think you mean Rutger
Brian: It was, at the very least, extremely memorable.
Ace: Brian.
Brian: I'm a rubbernecker, I admit it. I read replies on ratio'd tweets.
Seth: I wouldn’t classify this as a car wreck. More like deviant street performance art:
Ace: I have the best honorable mention.