The Final Four Is Not On The Schedule - A Podcast Discussing Michigan State Basketball.

December 5, 2022: Michigan State heads into Happy Valley to take on the Penn St. Nittany Lions in their second Big Ten matchup of the season. Penn State is 6-2 going into this Big ten opener for them despite being a team without a lot of size. The Nittany Lions have relied heavily on the 3 point shot with over half their field goal attempts coming from behind the arc.

The Spartans will again be without Malik Hall but fortunately, Jaden Akins seems to be ready to go. Can the Spartans match the fierce energy Penn State has been bringing this season and contain their outside shooting? MSU really struggled against Northwestern off ball screen and they will likely be tested again with this guard heavy team.

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December 4, 2022: Michigan State for the second straight year drops a game at home to the Northwestern Wildcats. This time it is the season opener and came at the hands of an inability to stop the 'Cats on defense. Northwestern shot 21-24 from the free throw line to hang on and defeat the Spartans.

One positive note was the return of Jaden Akins from injury who got to start the game but was clearly limited at times with his conditioning. AJ Hoggard came off the bench and played one of his better games but it wasn't enough as the Northwestern guards of Boo Bouie and Chase Audige proved too much for MSU's perimeter defense. Next up for Michigan State is a date on Wednesday at State College against Penn State.

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December 2, 2022: Michigan State prepares for its Big Ten opener against the Northwestern Wildcats at the Breslin Center Sunday night. After going 5-3 in the extremely difficult early non-conference stretch versus high level competition (and down two of their best players) MSU will attempt to begin its assault on another Big Ten title for Tom Izzo.

The Wildcats come in struggling on offense ranked #174 in KenPom but survive on the defensive side of the ball by mucking things up. They rank first in 2-point defense and #25 overall with a strategy of clearly keeping games low scoring. MSU will try to move the ball in transition and crash the offensive boards. This also might be one of the rare games where they have a turnover advantage over another team (when is the last season we said that?)

Expectations are that Jaden Akins will suit up and play some minutes while Malik Hall rests his foot for another week or two. Of some interest is the probable addition of Keon Coleman to the team once again and discussion that he might play a bigger role than we anticipated. This is somewhat helped by the injuries and the fact that he will have about an extra month with the team this season since the football team didn't make a bowl game.

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November 30, 2022: Perhaps it was inevitable that MSU would run into a team that got hot while their legs were out of juice. After playing 3 games in four days in Portland, OR the return late on Monday allowed for little rest before traveling to Notre Dame. The stretch of non-conference games that looked so daunting before the season began proved that way tonight especially as the Spartans were down two of their best players - Malik Hall and Jaden Akins.

Notre Dame began the game with a blistering shooting performance in the first half leading to a 24 point lead which MSU was only able to cut to 18 by half time. Although, AJ Hoggard tried to bring the Spartans back in the second half the team just didn't have enough in the tank to make it close and fell to Notre Dame 70-52. They will now head back to East Lansing to prepare for the start of the Big Ten season against Northwestern on Sunday.

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November 28, 2022: It was announced today (November 28) that ESPN is canceling the Big10/ACC Challenge going forward and this will be its last year. The conference challenge will be replaced by the SEC/ACC challenge next year and we suspect we will see some iteration of the Big10/Big12 challenge as its replacement. Anyway, Michigan State will head into South Bend to take on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish in an interesting matchup.

Notre Dame is 5-1 but has looked shaky and not very dominant despite playing lesser competition. They are led by 4 fifth year starters and an athletic heralded freshman in JJ Starling. Per usual, Notre Dame is a good offense ranking #28 in KenPom with decent shooting and turnover percentage. However, they are an unmitigated disaster on defense ranking #168 in overall defense where the only bright spot is good defensive rebounding.

It appears that the Spartans will be without Jaden Akins again as well as Malik Hall who still has a few weeks left to recover from the stress reaction in his foot. Expect to see MSU try to get out and run and build upon their shooting success against a poor defensive team. We wouldn't expect a lot of offensive rebounding against Notre Dame but perhaps they haven't yet been challenged by a team like MSU. Finally, if Michigan State gets a lead, will they be able to hold it without any late game heroics?

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November 27, 2022: Michigan State faced the University of Portland on their home court in the fifth place game of the PK 85 tournament. It was a tale of three games as Portland dominated the first half with a barrage of 3 pointers (9-19) to take an 8 point lead into halftime (42-34).

But the Spartans came back and on the backs of great shooting, solid defense, and tough rebounding took a commanding 12 point lead with a few minutes to go. But that's where this game unfortunately got very interesting as the 12 point lead was cut to one with 40 seconds left to play. The lead implosion happened on the back of 3 turnovers and multiple 3 pointers from the Pilots in front of their own fans.

Thanks to some great defense by MSU on the last possession they survived the Portland, OR trip down two men with a 2-1 record as they prepare for the ACC/Big10 Challenge in South Bend against Notre Dame.

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November 26, 2022: A depleted Michigan State team beat an even more depleted Oregon team 74-70 to qualify for the fifth place game against a surging WCC Portland team. MSU played a more complete game against the Ducks and looked connected offensively for the first time after losing both Malik Hall and Jaden Akins to injury.

Michigan State played better and looks to continue their semi-surprising run in the non-conference in the PK 85 and then a visit to South Bend in the ACC/Big10 Challenge.

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November 25, 2022: Prior to leaving for Portland, OR for the tipoff of the PK85 against Alabama, Michigan State suffered two huge losses to injuries - Malik Hall, and Jaden Akins. Akins was sidelined after the Villanova game where he sustained a new injury to his previously injured foot that is not deemed serious but will be rested for a few games. Unfortunately, Malik Hall had a non-operative stress reaction injury to his foot in practice on Monday which will keep him out of action for about 3 weeks.

Despite those key losses in personnel, the Spartans battled hard and managed to compete with Alabama in the first half mostly due to the scoring from Tyson Walker. However, the second half saw a few more shots miss for MSU and Alabama got a little hot from 3 allowing them to pull away. Freshman Brandon Miller led the way for the Crimson Tide with 24 points and 9 rebounds.

Bright spots to the game included the extended minutes to freshmen Jaxon Kohler, Tre Hollomam, and Carson Cooper who all showed signs of progression from the start of the season. Pierre Brooks played 33 minutes and showed some signs of great play logging 9 rebounds with 4 offensive but also looked lost on defensive assignments against a team that was prepared to punish defensive lapses.

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November 21, 2022: Michigan State opens up the PK85 holiday tournament in Portland, Oregon on Thanksgiving against the Alabama Crimson Tide. Coached by Nate Oats, Alabama plays a unique type of basketball emphasizing the 3 point shot and layups and dunks. It is predicated on analytics that show it best to shoot 3s and take only high percentage two point shots to maximize your scoring on offense.

Alabama comes in 4-0 but not pushed by any teams yet this year with their only close contest a ten point win over South Alabama. Can MSU contain Alabama's shot outside the arc? Can they slow down the number one team in the country in offensive rebounding? Also, will 'Bama's horrendous ball security (#316 in turnover %) be their undoing?

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November 19, 2022: The Spartans held on to defeat the Villanova Wildcats 73-71 at the Breslin on a snowy night in East Lansing. After being up 16 with less than 8 minutes to play, Villanova almost came all the way back using key turnovers and opportunistic 3s and free throws to catch up and beat MSU.

Fortunately, Tyson Walker was there in the clutch to prevent Michigan State from losing this game as he hit big shot after big shot to keep just enough separation for the win. Mady Sissoko came back down to earth as he was challenged by Villanova's center, Eric Dixon, who scored 24 points playing differently from the previous two matchups that Mady had earlier.

Overall, a good quality win for State as they prepare to head out west to the PK85 tournament where they will open up against Alabama. We close the show with a brief discussion about the Big Ten and its non-conference performance which might suggest the league is a little better than anyone thought.

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