The Spartan defense was locked in early and a Jordan Scott blocked shot led to a runout and a Jeremy Fears to Carson Cooper alley-oop for the games first bucket on MSU’s 2nd possession. Fears would hit a triple on the next trip, and Cooper added a turnaround jumper over Aday Mara a short while later. The negative of the first four minutes were a foul each on Cooper, Jaxon Kohler, and Cam Ward. The early fouls even led to a Jesse McCulloch appearance. Spartans up 7-5 at the first break.
The home team
got the game knotted up at the FT line coming out of the break. After a Kohler missed 3, Cam Ward got whistled for another foul and had to head to the bench. Seconds later, Yaxel Lendeborg hit a 3 for um’s first lead. And then McCulloch picked up his first foul on a rebound opportunity. That’s 5 fouls on MSU in just over 5 minutes, and all by our bigs. Okay, Fears then kicked a wolverine below the belt after being fouled, so he got called for a technical, and um added two more points at the line. After giving up a bucket and falling down 7, MSU caught a break when Mara shoved Cooper to the ground to earn his own tech. Fears hit the 2 FTs, a Cooper putback got us back within 3. Denham Wojcik got in the game and got called for a foul trying to play defense. That was MSU’s 7th foul, putting um in the bonus. Spartans down 14-11 at the 2nd commercial.
Cooper came to play today as he picked up his 8th point on another dunk to get the next segment going. um scored in transition after a Fears turnover, but then were called for a delay of game technical. Fears converted the solo FT. After a couple empty possessions, um went on a quick 5-0 run to go up 9. Kohler got on the board with a putback, the first non-Fears/non-Cooper points for MSU. On the next possession, it was Kohler again for an and-1 to get MSU back to within 4. Spartans trailing 23-19 at the under-8.
After 2 more FTs for um, Teng hit a triple to split the deficit. Lendeborg and Kohler traded points in the lane. MSU got a stop and then Teng hit another one from deep to get us all notched up at 27. um answered with a 3 of their own to go back up. Finally, the foul calling begins to even out and three of um’s bigs have a couple fouls. Cooper split a pair at the line. Lendeborg knocked down another triple. Fears split a pair on his charity trip. The two teams exchanged transition points, MSU getting their second Alley-Coop. Still down 4, 35-31 at the last 1st half commercial.
The Spartans struck first out of the break as Coen Carr scored down low with some English. On the other end, Ward picked up foul #3, so Lendeborg got the two points back at the stripe. Fears answered with his second triple. The Spartan defense then forced a turnover, and then Kohler hit the baby hook to give MSU their first lead since 7-6. After another Scott rejection, Fears ran it up and left it for a trailing Kohler for a triple from the big guy. After a bit of a Spartan highlight reel, um’s best player, Lendeborg, gave Carr a flat tire as he took it to the hole for the finger roll. With a little over a minute until intermission, MSU called their obligatory timeout. Scott missed a three, Teng got the board, and then Fears missed a FG. um came down and hit a corner 3. MSU could not score in the final ten seconds, and we are down one point at halftime.
Three Spartans are already in double digits, with Kohler at a dozen, Cooper at 11, and Fears with 10. Our other starters, Scott and Carr, only have 2 points combined. And Teng has the only other MSU points thanks to his pair of triples. For um, only Lendeborg has double digits, leading everyone with 19. MSU has been disciplined with only 2 turnovers; um has 5. And after getting 5 fouls in the early going, MSU made it to the half with only 9 as a team. Three of those are Ward’s, but no one else has more than one. That should allow Izzo to really rely on his starters in the 2nd half. 7 offensive rebounds for MSU have the rebounding battle just barely in the Spartans’ favor, 19-18.
MSU’s strategy coming out of the 2nd half was to go inside at Mara and try to get him his 3rd foul. Early on, he was up to the task. um struck first and got their lead up to 6 before MSU got their defensive mojo back, including a steal by Scott from his knees. Down by four, Fears stole the ball from Mara and was immediately fouled by the Spaniard. That took us to the under-16 timeout, with the score 51-47.
During the timeout, the play was reviewed and predictably upgraded to a flagrant. Fears added two from the line and then Kohler tied the game with a turnaround. After giving up a basket, Fears drew a foul on Lendeborg driving to the lane, and tied the game up again from the line. Kohler blocked a shot on defense and then was rewarded with a trailing three for the MSU lead. Lendeborg and Carr then exchanged dunks, each posterizing the other. Another basket surrendered, another answer, this time an and-1 for Cooper from Fears in the lane. um responded again, and then Scott got caught with a heel on the line for a turnover. A failed alley-oop from Wojcik to Carr when the pass was just too high for Flight 55 brought the game to the under-12 timeout even at 61.
MSU went cold on offense and allowed um to get up by 7, a run including a triple and a pair of FTs from Trey McKenney. The Fears-to-Coop connection came through with an and-1 to end the drought. McKenney answered with another triple. Carr got us 2 back with a dunk, and then Fears was fouled on a defensive rebound as the game headed to the under-8. That foul put MSU in the bonus so they would be heading to the line after the commercial. Spartans down 71-66 with 6:59 on the clock.
Fears bricked on the front end of the 1-and-1. MSU got a stop, and Fears took it straight to the lane to earn another trip to the line, this time hitting both to draw his team to within 3. Still down by three, Kohler got caught collapsing on defense and left Lendeborg, the last person that should be left alone, wide open for a three. Down 6, Tom Izzo called a timeout with 3:27 remaining.
Fears got the isolation game going and hit a pullup jumper to make it a four-point game. On um’s possession, they could not finish at the rim but a scramble for the rebound went out of bounds and was called off of Jordan Scott. They would retain possession after the under-4 timeout, which came with 2:39 to go.
MSU gave up a quick bucket after the commercial. Cooper had a great look to answer but his shot rattled out, and um was able to throw the ball up on the rebound and drew a foul on Fears as he prevented a layup. Down 7 after an um FT, Carr then had a shot not stay down. Teng then had his chance to miss, this one from deep. With 1:12 to go, Cooper attempted to intentionally foul Mara, but the foul was ruled too intentional, which is apparently a flagrant. Mara made two at the line, and on the ensuing possession, MSU was forced to foul after giving up an offensive rebound. Two more made FTs made it an 11-point game with less than a minute, and the game was suddenly feeling out of reach after an incredibly competitive game. Cooper did get a quick dunk on the ensuing Spartan possession, but then MSU was relegated to more intentional fouls. It took four more trips to the line by um before Fears simply dribbled it out. Final score: 90-80.
After having one more rebound in the first half, MSU was outbattled on the boards 17-13 in the 2nd. We allowed um to shoot 10-22 from deep, 45%, with way too many of those coming on wide-open looks. Lendeborg finished with 27 and was clearly the best player on the floor; we simply had no answer for him. On offense, Kohler finished with 23, Fears had 22 and 9 assists, and Cooper had 19. Teng was next with 8, while Carr and Scott got 8 between them. Our starting wings let us down in this one, combining to shoot 4-15.
Michigan State finishes the regular season with a 25-6 record and a 15-5 mark in the conference. We are waiting for the Nebraska/Iowa game to go final to see our seeding in the BTT. That game is going to overtime now. I will update this article as soon as we have a winner in that game.
