@ Mich

[gotime909]

Monster road win!! Short handed and still went in there and controlled most of the game! Not sure how we?re winning these games with this squad, but I?ll take it! Excellent job by Izzo this year so far!

 

[johnny2x2x]

Hell yes!!! Izzo and Cassius got it done. Wow, team played so hard.

 

[MSUMatt28]

I don't know how this season is going to end when it's all said and done. But this group has been special in a lot of ways. Izzo is getting everything he can out of them.

 

[SpartyNash]

About damn time. Was sick of getting embarrassed by them. This season may be among Izzos best coaching jobs in recent memory, which is refreshing since I ripped him all spring and summer after the Syracuse debacle.

 

[Spartan23MSU]

The best d ive seen in over a year. Unexpected to say the least.

 

[Spartanmack]

according to the uofm board from earlier this season, we just beat the most perfect team in college basketball in their own gym. not too shabby.

 

[johnny2x2x]

according to the uofm board from earlier this season, we just beat the most perfect team in college basketball in their own gym. not too shabby.

They remind of MSU last season in some ways. They came out of the gate playing really well, beat a couple good teams by a lot early in the season (NC and Nova we beat ND and NC early last season). Looked like they were maybe the best team in the country after 15 or so games. And then struggled to win some games they should win by blowout, lose a couple on the road, and then just not really improve.

Sometimes when you beat name teams early in the season it doesn't mean as much as you think it does. Nova was terrible at the start of the season and lose at home to Furman. NC struggled early and is now a top 5 team. UM doesn't have any depth, I think that they will struggle when teams speed them up, specifically Teske and Iggy, they can't keep up.

It was 1 game, great win. Glad we have 5 days off now, I think we can win out and at least get a share.

 

[Spartanmack]

Sometimes when you beat name teams early in the season it doesn't mean as much as you think it does. Nova was terrible at the start of the season and lose at home to Furman. NC struggled early and is now a top 5 team. UM doesn't have any depth, I think that they will struggle when teams speed them up, specifically Teske and Iggy, they can't keep up.

It was 1 game, great win. Glad we have 5 days off now, I think we can win out and at least get a share.

agreed on this part but i dont see any real similarities b/w them and the '17/'18 Spartan team.

I'm not reading anything into it or taking anything away from it other than it was a really solid win against a really solid team in their gym. I'm just taking the piss out of some of their more annoying posters. That one was either a post or a thread title and in that same thread there was a lot of chest thumping and shitting on Izzo. One idiot said something like Beilein had beaten Izzo enough in the last 5 years to erase all that shit about Izzo, whatever that means. Of course he didn't realize they were .500 heads up for the last 5 years when he wrote the post.

 

[MSUMatt28]

I'm not sure I would draw too many similarities between UM this year and MSU last year, other than the fact that both made an early splash with big wins over UNC. UM is a good team that has some offensive limitations, but also have some games where the offense flows and when it does they're pretty hard to beat. In that regard they aren't a ton different than last year's UM team (maybe slightly stronger defensively, slightly weaker offensively). Last year's UM team with MAAR and Wagner could take people off the dribble better. I do agree that sometimes early season wins are given too much weight. You win by 20 like UM did vs UNC and it gets a lot of attention. Same sort of result in conference and people chalk it up to life in conference play.

As for MSU. Again this team has been greater than the sum of it's parts all year, especially since Langford went down. You don't get the feeling that the team is dominating but then you look at the scoreboard. It does so many of the little things well and doesn't get rattled in hostile environments (other than maybe the Purdue game). And their defense has been somewhat overlooked all year while teams like UM and Virginia have gotten more of the attention, but it's been consistently stifling.

 

[Sbee]

Very well coached game for MSU, we went under the screens and took away the drive, made them shoot from the outside. UM made some bad decisions, especially Poole, jacking up NBA 3's after a switch when Teske was being guarded by Winston.

I was really shocked to read that was our worst defensive performance of the year in terms of points per possession, but it was. Good call by Izzo by not pushing the break too much, I love to run but when you're down 2 starters and essentially don't have a backup PG, you have to conserve fuel. It also led to us only having 6 turnovers.

Hell of a win, hopefully we can finish the sweep in EL. We might have Ward back for that one so they would see a different MSU team

 

[johnny2x2x]

Very well coached game for MSU, we went under the screens and took away the drive, made them shoot from the outside. UM made some bad decisions, especially Poole, jacking up NBA 3's after a switch when Teske was being guarded by Winston.

I was really shocked to read that was our worst defensive performance of the year in terms of points per possession, but it was. Good call by Izzo by not pushing the break too much, I love to run but when you're down 2 starters and essentially don't have a backup PG, you have to conserve fuel. It also led to us only having 6 turnovers.

Hell of a win, hopefully we can finish the sweep in EL. We might have Ward back for that one so they would see a different MSU team

It was a great win, we started out shooting well from 3, but then cooled off big time. We started 4 for 5 from 3 and then made 1-15 the rest of the way, and all but a couple were really good looks. I think that happens in such an intense and physically draining game.

Both teams stunk it up from 3, but I feel like most of UM's 3s were challenged and even some were really bad shots. the first half was actually a pretty smooth and well played half, I felt we could have been up more than 2 at halftime. The 2nd half became a battle of wills, you could see how tired both teams were.

 

[MSUMatt28]

It was a great win, we started out shooting well from 3, but then cooled off big time. We started 4 for 5 from 3 and then made 1-15 the rest of the way, and all but a couple were really good looks. I think that happens in such an intense and physically draining game.

Both teams stunk it up from 3, but I feel like most of UM's 3s were challenged and even some were really bad shots. the first half was actually a pretty smooth and well played half, I felt we could have been up more than 2 at halftime. The 2nd half became a battle of wills, you could see how tired both teams were.

I'm not sure how many of our 3's were good looks in the second half. Cassius did not have much room to get any off (and credit to him for not forcing them). Goins had some decent looks but he came back down to earth after a hot first half.

The thing now is satisfying as that win was, exorcising a few demons in the process, the team has to avoid a letdown now. They celebrated afterwards like they had won the championship, and they may have to play UM 2 more times (hopefully in the finals and not the semi's, but I have a feeling Purdue may steal the title with their easy schedule even though they're an inferior team to UM and MSU).

 

[SpartyNash]

Very well coached game for MSU, we went under the screens and took away the drive, made them shoot from the outside. UM made some bad decisions, especially Poole, jacking up NBA 3's after a switch when Teske was being guarded by Winston.

I was really shocked to read that was our worst defensive performance of the year in terms of points per possession, but it was. Good call by Izzo by not pushing the break too much, I love to run but when you're down 2 starters and essentially don't have a backup PG, you have to conserve fuel. It also led to us only having 6 turnovers.

Hell of a win, hopefully we can finish the sweep in EL. We might have Ward back for that one so they would see a different MSU team

I could not agree more on the first paragraph. That play in particular sticks out in my mind, I figured ?oh shit, easy 2 for Teske hopefully no foul? yet Poole jacks up a contested 3 with about 20 seconds on the shot clock.

 

[Sbee]

I'm not sure how many of our 3's were good looks in the second half. Cassius did not have much room to get any off (and credit to him for not forcing them). Goins had some decent looks but he came back down to earth after a hot first half.

The thing now is satisfying as that win was, exorcising a few demons in the process, the team has to avoid a letdown now. They celebrated afterwards like they had won the championship, and they may have to play UM 2 more times (hopefully in the finals and not the semi's, but I have a feeling Purdue may steal the title with their easy schedule even though they're an inferior team to UM and MSU).

MSU now has a 78% chance to at least share the title, with Purdue's odds also strong at 58%. Meanwhile, the poor Wolverines are now under 10%. Actually, there are very much in danger of falling below Wisconsin and Maryland in the standings and needing to play on Thursday of the Big Ten tournament.

As for the other odds:

MSU solo title: 40%
MSU/Purdue tie: 37%
Purdue solo: 19%
MSU/UofM tie: 6%
UofM solo: <1%
Odds that UofM finishes ahead of MSU: 3.2%

 

[MSUMatt28]

MSU now has a 78% chance to at least share the title, with Purdue's odds also strong at 58%. Meanwhile, the poor Wolverines are now under 10%. Actually, there are very much in danger of falling below Wisconsin and Maryland in the standings and needing to play on Thursday of the Big Ten tournament.

As for the other odds:

MSU solo title: 40%
MSU/Purdue tie: 37%
Purdue solo: 19%
MSU/UofM tie: 6%
UofM solo: <1%
Odds that UofM finishes ahead of MSU: 3.2%

I am not sure Purdue is losing again unless it's at Minnesota. Minnesota is not very reliable as a spoiler but might be playing for their NCAA lives.

I also can't rule out us tripping up at IU without Ward and/or UM flipping the script back in EL, though hopefully not.

 

[MSUMatt28]

I will add too that I am not a fan of the 20 game conference schedule now that everyone is almost through it. Yes it makes the schedules potentially less unbalanced (but only slightly), but it's too many conference games. 18 is the right number. I would not be surprised to see some Big Ten teams flame out early in the NCAAs due tothem being out of gas because of this grind of a schedule.