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

February 16, 2025: Michigan State just beat the Illini in Champaign and now they return home with a challenging game against fellow Big Ten leader, Purdue. The Boilers are tied in the standings with the Spartans one game back from UM. This will be the only meeting between the two. After looking awful against the Hoosiers, the Spartans pulled a 180 and looked as good as they did bad against Illinoi...

February 15, 2025: Michigan State pulled off an improbable road win over Illinois where they started down 16 and won by 14. Perhaps more strangely, they closed the game on a 15-negative 2 run (a goal tending call got reversed). The win came in large part behind Illinois choosing to spend too much time behind the 3 point line where they shot only 21%. For the Spartans, Jaxon Kohler had a double dou...

February 13, 2025: Michigan State heads back on the road for a rematch against Illinois. The matchup earlier at the Breslin turned out well for the green and white as they got star player, Kasparas Jakucionas, in foul trouble and squeaked out a 2 point victory. Champaign has not been a kind road environment for the Spartans in the recent past and a win there will be a tall order. The big question...

February 12, 2025: Michigan State lost a very disappointing game late on Tuesday night to Indiana and its sloppy zone 71-67. Despite a great start to the game with MSU up 20-8, the Hoosiers switched to a lazy 2-3 zone and gummed up the Spartans’ offense the remainder of the game. By playing slow they took MSU completely out of its game and played ahead midway through the first half to the final ho...

February 9, 2025: Michigan State took care of business against Oregon with a second half performance for the ages. We’re sure Tom Izzo hopes his team won’t need any heroics to knock off the Hoosiers in East Lansing to record his 354th Big Ten win. The Hoosiers are a team in disarray as head coach Mike Woodson announced last week that he would be retiring at the end of the year which saves an embar...

February 8, 2025: Michigan State returned home to East Lansing and played two strange halves of basketball. In the first half, Oregon torched the Spartans for 50 points and led by 14 at the half. But roles reversed in the second where MSU scored 50 and held the Ducks to 24 allowing for a 12 point win, 84-72. On offense, the Spartans were led by Freshman Jase Richardson who scored a career high 29...

February 5, 2025: Michigan State returns from Los Angeles with a two game losing streak after having won 13 straight. So MSU will look to right the ship with another former Pac-12 team, the Oregon Ducks. Oregon has had a strange year in that they started 11-0 with a lot of Quad 1 wins but have only gone 5-7 since beginning Big Ten play with 3 of those losses at home. They are riding a four game lo...

February 4, 2025: Michigan State took on UCLA to finish their first Big Ten west coast trip. Unlike the game at USC, the Spartans came out of the gate with their hair on fire and competed hard charging to an early lead. Unfortunately, MSU started turning it over and UCLA built a 7 point lead at halftime, 35-28. Despite the Spartans trying to fight back in the second half they were largely unable t...

February 2, 2025: MSU heads to the storied Pauley Pavilion on Tuesday night to take on the red hot UCLA Bruins. The Bruins have won 5 straight after losing 4 in a row in the Big Ten. One thing to note about the current win streak for the Bruins is that it has all occurred in the pacific West. It should be a good challenge for the Spartans as they try to bounce back from their first Big Ten loss. C...

February 1, 2025: Well, it was bound to happen even though we never like to see it, MSU falls to USC 70-64 on the road for their first loss in the Big Ten season. It was a game that USC led wire to wire by capitalizing on early Michigan State miscues and getting some timely offensive rebounds to drive the lead up to 15 early. Star Desmond Claude led the way for the Trojans and got a lot of his wor...

January 30, 2025: Head West young man. Michigan State is leaving the Midwest for the not-so-friendly confines of Los Angeles for their doubleheader with USC and UCLA. Three time zones and over 2000 miles away they will find themselves first at the Galen Center taking on first year coach Eric Musselman and his entirely new roster of transfers. USC showcases Desmond Claude who is a downhill driving...

January 28, 2025: The Spartan train just keeps on rolling as MSU blasts the Gophers 73-51 to sweep the season series between the teams and move to 18-2 overall and 9-0 in the Big Ten. This game MSU did it largely on the boards crushing Minnesota 40-22 and finishing with a 42% offensive rebounding rate and only giving up 16% to the Gophers. Offensively, there weren’t any real standouts for the Spar...

January 26, 2025: Michigan State will look to continue its winning streak as it hosts Minnesota on Tuesday night. MSU took care of business in Minneapolis in December but this the Gophers are on a bit of a hot streak. They’ve won 3 straight including home wins over UM and Oregon and a road win in Iowa City. Minnesota’s success is primarily due to their all everything player - Dawson Garcia. Garcia...

January 25, 2025: Michigan State came into Madison Square Garden which has been something of a house of horror for the Spartans - and defeated the Rutgers Scarlet Knights 81-74. The win keeps MSU alone atop the Big Ten at 8-0 and extends their winning streak to 12 games. It also makes the 37th straight year with a winning season - longest in the Big Ten. The Spartans managed to contain Rutgers’ tw...

January 24, 2025: For now, there are only 2 new players scheduled to join the green and white next year, Cam Ward and Jordan Scott. Like Ward, Scott is also from the DMV - not typical recruiting territory for Tom Izzo and the two will be the first Spartans to hail from there since Carlton Valentine in the 80s. Scott brings a diverse game where he plays 1-5 in high school. With MSU it is expected t...

January 22, 2025: MSU now holds onto first place all by themselves at 7-0 after their exciting win over Illinois. They head to Madison Square Gardens for a semi-away game against Rutgers. MSG has not been kind to the Spartans in the past as they are 0-4 in Champions Classic games and lost two years ago to Rutgers in a similar matchup. The Green & White are hoping to avoid the MSG curse but will ha...

January 19, 2025: Michigan State hosted Illinois in their first real matchup of conference heavyweights and managed to hang on for an 80-78 win. As Rod predicted in the pregame, it came down to a one possession game with two teams taking away the others’ strengths. The teams were even on the boards, transition points, FG%, turnovers, free throw attempts, and field goal attempts. The difference cam...

January 17, 2025: In what is probably the most anticipated matchups of the year to date, Michigan State will host Illinois on Sunday afternoon. The game pits two of the top 15 teams in the country and maybe the top in the Big Ten. To date, MSU is riding a 10 game winning streak and is 6-0 in the league but has yet to play any team with a winning record. The Spartans have been promising and shown s...

January 15, 2025: Well, MSU returned home from Evanston and had only a few days to prep for a pesky Penn State team and was pushed but ultimately won 90-85. It was a less than stellar defensive performance from the Spartans as they largely had no answer for the Nittany Lions’ ball screens. Fortunately, the Spartans were good on the offensive boards and in protecting the ball leading to an advantag...

January 13, 2025: Michigan State returns home for a matchup against reeling Penn State on Wednesday evening. The Spartans are riding a nine game win streak and are unbeaten in league play at 5-0. One challenge for the green and white is that they have to maintain their focus in what could be a trap game with Illinois coming to town on Sunday. Penn State might be without their all everything point...

January 12, 2025: Michigan State took care of business in Evanston on Sunday afternoon with a relatively stress free 78-68 win over a tricky Northwestern team. MSU led by as much as 23 in the first half and took a 19 point lead into halftime. They built the lead largely on the backs of turning over the Wildcats and forcing bad shots on defense in conjunction with a great pace on offense. Jeremy Fe...

January 11, 2025: Michigan State is looking to continue its winning ways as it heads back onto the road to Evanston with a matchup against the Northwestern Wildcats. Of late, the ‘Cats have sort of had the Spartans’ number winning two of the last three at home and generally giving MSU fits every time they play. But this year’s Spartans feel different and Chris Collins has a much different team wit...

January 9, 2025: Michigan State returned home to the Breslin along with the Izzone Alumni to put on a show obliterating the Washington Huskies 88-54. The Spartans only allowed the Huskies 13 points in the first half and dominated Washington in just about every aspect of the game. MSU held Washington’s best player, Great Osobor, to just 6 points on 0-8 shooting en route to one of their best defensi...

January 6, 2025: Michigan State returns to the Breslin Center after a victory in Columbus and a 3-0 league record. They welcome in the Washington Huskies formerly of the Pac-12 for their first visit to East Lansing. This is certainly a game that MSU is projected to win but Washington will present some interesting challenges. Most notably is Great Osobor who is a transfer from Utah State who came w...

January 3, 2025: Michigan State resumed Big Ten play on the road against Ohio State in much the same way they ended play in early December - with a win. This time they won 69-62 in a hard fought game against a good opponent. It was a game in which MSU led most of the game outside of a brief moment in the second half after a huge Buckeye run that cut the Spartans’ lead from double digits. Ultimatel...