Michigan's Stu Douglass vexed by shooting slump for basketball team

Posted: Dec 8, 2009 at 9:21 PM [Dec 8, 2009]

SALT LAKE CITY - Stu Douglass is at a loss. He’s been through slumps and struggled with his shot before. But this prolonged funk that he can't snap out of is something new.

Three-point shooting woes have been an epidemic around Michigan basketball throughout the first quarter of the season, and that has hurt no one more than the sophomore guard from Carmel, Ind., the guy many considered to be the Wolverines’ best shooter before the season.

“I never really experienced something like this before so it’s a little new,” Douglass said. “But getting shots up (Monday) morning definitely helped. If anything, just my confidence with my mechanics, but we’ll see, I guess we’ll see on Wednesday.”

Heading into Wednesday night's game at Utah (9 p.m., EST, CBS-TV), Michigan coach John Beilein said he doesn’t see anything wrong with Douglass’ shot.

Douglass’ personal basketball mentor, Mark Baker, taught the 6-foot-3 guard his shooting stroke when he was a seventh grader. Since then, Baker has been a constant guide for Douglass.

And when he watches Douglass’ games on television from his Indianapolis home, he said he doesn’t see anything glaring. But there are small things.

“There’s been times where I’m watching Stu,” Baker said. “And he’s holding it a tick too long on his shot. And that’s confidence.”

During games, Douglass said he doesn’t feel like anything is wrong with his mechanics. But after games, he wonders why he’s made only 7 of 31 three-pointers this year (22.6 percent) and what he can do to fix it. 

Michigan has not been much better, shooting 29 percent from three as a team.

Both on the court and off, though, Douglass has second-guessed himself, a sure sign his confidence is off.

“A little bit of both,” Douglass said. “More reflecting on the game, have the open shot and besides a few instances here or there I don’t second-guess. I’m usually going to shoot it. But after the game thinking why.

“Sometimes I think too much about it and I’ve got to stop myself.”

In the past, Douglass would seek out Baker. They’d spend a couple of hours together breaking down the mechanics of his shot or working on boosting confidence. He’d start making three-pointers again.

Then Douglass would leave the gym and all would be right.

“It’s a little bit more difficult because he’s in Ann Arbor and I’m in Indianapolis and I’m trying to figure it out from watching it on TV and I don’t get all the games on TV,” Baker said. “But I can tell you if I was in the gym with him, I’d spend 15 minutes saying ‘Here, this is what you’re doing’ and then we’d start working on it and then he’d get back to the repetition that it is supposed to be and he’d be fine.”

Without his lifelong coach, Douglass is still searching. He’s worked with Beilein, who has stressed that while Douglass’ shot has struggled, he’s emerged as one of Michigan’s better defenders.

“We haven’t discovered anything at all but we’ll continue to work on him,” Beilein said. “…We just keep working at it. Tell him what he can do and what he’s not doing.”

When it comes to shooting, he’s been a little shy to take the three-pointer, one of the skills that made Beilein so attracted to him and landed him in Ann Arbor.

And even when he tries not to think about it, he ends up wondering about why his shot isn’t working.

“It’s a whole big cycle,” Douglass said. “So it’s definitely part of it. I have to get back to the basics, really, and remember why I play this game and not stress out so much about it.

“It’s kind of been stressful, more than any other season I’ve kind of experienced.”

Michael Rothstein covers University of Michigan basketball for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at (734) 623-2558, by e-mail at michaelrothstein@annarbor.com or follow along on Twitter @mikerothstein.