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

January 2, 2025: Happy New Year to you and your families as we talk about MSU’s upcoming resumption of Big Ten play against the Ohio State Buckeyes. We are probably 4-5 weeks away from having a real good feel for the quality of any of the Big Ten teams. Ohio State is a good example of that. The Buckeyes opened the season with a big win over Texas but then dropped a game to Texas A&M. They seemed t...

December 30, 2024: Michigan State welcomed back former assistant coach Dwayne Stephens with his Western Michigan Bronco team and handed them an 80-62 loss. Despite the 18 point deficit, it was a game in which Western Michigan kept within 5-10 points for the majority of the game. However, it was some late opportune shooting and defense which pushed out the lead at the end of the game for the Sparta...

December 30, 2024: New MSU commit, Cam Ward is a 6’7” 210# forward from Upper Marlboro, MD. He will join the Spartans next year and comes with a diverse game scoring, shooting, rebounding, and defending. Ward won the Gatorade POY for Maryland last year and is looking to defend his high school’s state title as well. All of this he does under the coaching from his father whom he says has been a good...

December 27, 2024: The Spartans will welcome back former long time assistant coach Dwayne Stephens and his Western Michigan Broncos on Monday at the Breslin Center. It’s been tough sledding for Stephens at Western as he has had trouble assembling a competitive team even in the diminished mid-american conference. This year’s team isn’t off to a great start at just 3-8 with only two of those wins ov...

December 21, 2024: Michigan State returned back to the Breslin Center for a home game against the Florida Atlantic Owls and cruised to an 86-69 victory. It was a close game throughout the first 13-14 minutes of the game until MSU started to tighten the screws on defense and finished with a 42-29 lead at half time. The Spartans continued to do just enough to extend the lead slightly and cruise in w...

December 19, 2024: Michigan State returns back to the Breslin Center for a home game against former Final Four team - the Florida Atlantic Owls. The Owls are under a new coach this year as Dusty May moved on to Ann Arbor. But the Owls seem to be a pretty good team with an 8-5 record and a lot of size. FAU is a top 100 team on Ken Pom with a rating of #46 on offense but #179 on defense. Teams are r...

December 17, 2024: Michigan State was challenged by Oakland once again struggling to manage a 32-31 lead at half time at Little Caesar’s Arena in Detroit. But the second half was a different animal as the Spartans blasted the Golden Grizzlies by 18 to win comfortably 77-58. It was a game where both teams coming in were struggling from 3 but each shot 35%. The difference in the game was MSU dominat...

December 15, 2024: Michigan State heads back to the hard court after ten days off since their two Big Ten matchups. The Spartans continue their long annual series with the Oakland Golden Grizzlies for its 23rd year. So far, MSU is 22-0 in the series but Oakland usually poses some interesting challenges for the Green and White. Oakland is coming off its most important win in their history last year...

December 7, 2024: Michigan State came out on Saturday and destroyed the Nebraska Cornhuskers 89-52 to open the Spartans’ home Big Ten play. The 37 point margin was tied for the second biggest Big Ten winning margin for MSU in their history. The game looked exactly as you would expect for a blowout win at home against a very good Big Ten opponent. Nebraska was ranked 41st on KenPom coming into the...

December 5, 2024: On Saturday, Michigan State will welcome in Fred Hoiberg and his Nebraska Cornhuskers as the Spartans’ Big Ten home opener. It will be Nebraska’s first Big Ten game and one in which they carry a 6-1 non conference record highlighted with an 11 point win on the road at Creighton. The ‘Huskers play fast, defend well, and shoot pretty well which should give MSU a challenge at home b...

December 4, 2024: Michigan State’s conference season opener was a good one on the road as they come away from Williams Arena in Minneapolis with a 90-72 victory over the Golden Gophers of Minnesota. It was a win in which MSU did just about everything we suspected they would need to do to get a win. Run, rebound, and shoot well. It was the first game this year where the Spartans shot well from behi...

December 2, 2024: Michigan State hits the road for the first time this year as they take on Minnesota in Minneapolis to tip off conference play. Minnesota has taken a huge step back this season after being decimated by the portal and one of their best players leaving for the NBA. So MSU will take on the Gophers in a game against a team that struggles to shoot the 3, 2, and one point shot (free thr...

November 28, 2024: Michigan State played North Carolina down to the wire in the third place game at the Maui Invitational and managed to down the Tar Heels in overtime, 94-91. It was a game that MSU led with a fairly comfortable margin throughout the latter parts of the first half just about to the end of the game when they had a bit of a meltdown and allowed North Carolina to tie the game and sen...

November 26, 2024: Michigan State played Memphis in the second round of the Maui Invitational after a relatively easy win in the first round against Colorado. Today despite hitting finally their threes, MSU were worse offensively with 2pt FGs and FT leading to an 8 point loss 71-63. Michigan State will now move onto the consolation game against the loser of the Auburn/North Carolina game late on W...

November 25, 2024: Michigan State played in the first round of the Maui Invitational tonight and cruised past Colorado despite only shooting 9.5% from behind the arc. Deep shooting is clearly a huge concern for this team but they are doing everything else so well that it is covering for the shooting to this point. The most remarkable aspect of the game for the Spartans was their defense and reboun...

November 22, 2024: Michigan State is heading to beautiful Maui for Feast Week this year and a loaded Maui Invitational. The tournament features Auburn, Iowa State, North Carolina, Memphis, Dayton, UConn, Colorado, and Michigan State. Lots of potential final four teams in the field. The Spartans will open up against the weakest (on paper anyway) team in the field with Colorado. The teams don't have...

November 19, 2024: Samford visited the Breslin Center bringing their frenetic full court press and 3 point attack challenging the Spartans in new ways this season. Fortunately for the Green and White, they held off the pesky Bulldogs, 83-75. Once again, Jaden Akins had a fantastic game outside of his foolish technical foul. Finally a few 3s started to fall for him and we can only hope it becomes c...

November 18, 2024: Michigan State welcomes Samford to the Breslin on Tuesday night for their last warmup before the Maui Invitational next week. The Bulldogs represent a real challenge as they are again expected to win the Southland Conference and nearly beat Kansas in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament earlier this year.  Samford will provide a real test as they are the second fastest team...

November 16, 2024: Bowling Green top assistant coach and former MSU point guard, Tum Tum Nairn almost spoiled his homecoming to East Lansing with an upset by the Falcons. Michigan State needed a 10-0 run to end the first half to tie the game at half time and then an 18-0 run to finish the game to secure a 14 point win, 86-72. Despite the double digit loss, the Falcons controlled the majority of th...

November 14, 2024: The Spartans welcome back a familiar face to the Breslin on Saturday night as Tum Tum Nairn makes his assistant coaching debut with the Bowling Green Falcons. It comes after Michigan State fell to top ranked Kansas at the Champions Classic where they shot 3-24 from 3 point range. Michigan State will look to correct those shooting woes. Other than the poor long range shooting, th...

November 12, 2024: Michigan State falls to Kansas 77-69 in the Champions Classic in Atlanta tonight. Although there were some very encouraging signs to the offense tonight, for the second straight year they are struggling to hit beyond the arc early again the season. The Spartans went 3-24 from behind the line despite many of them being wide open. On the bright side of things, they were much impro...

November 10, 2024: Michigan State will take on Kansas in what might be the rubber match for their meetings in the Champions Classic. The teams currently have a 2-2 record against each other in the early season premiere showdown and this is very likely one of the last years of the Classic. Conference realignments and TV deals are rapidly changing the face of the non-conference schedules meaning the...

November 8, 2024: Michigan State played their second game of the year where Niagara falls to MSU 96-60 behind the outstanding play of Jaxon Kohler. Kohler finished the game with 20 points, 13 rebounds (6 offensive), and 2 steals in just 17 minutes on the floor. This was the first time that he finished the way we’ve been waiting for. The Spartans were also helped with great play again from their gu...

November 6, 2024: Michigan State will take on Kansas in the Champions Classic next week but first, they host Niagara on Thursday at the Breslin Center. This expects to be the easiest competition of the season for the Spartans. So in this game we look to see if some early signs continue for the Green & White. Namely, will they continue to hit the offensive glass hard and will we see the same Jaden...

November 4, 2024: Unlike last year, Michigan State opened up the season with a win over Monmouth, 81-57. The Spartans looked different in this game in that they had their fast break humming and were dominant on the boards racking up almost 50% offensive rebounding rate. The one similarity to last season’s opener against James Madison was the dreadful 3 point shooting (3-18). Despite the shooting,...