By Paul M. Banks
So #25 Northwestern has their first ranking in 41 years, and loses to Illinois in overtime, but this is a chance for a statement game here. A win over #11 MSU and the Wildcats would likely keep their ranking.
This is a game of magnitude, why isn’t Erin Andrews here?
What can I say EA is lucious like Korie….I mean luscious…but like Korie Lucious. I don’t swing that way. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
MSU 16, NU 14 10:37 in half
battle of contrasting styles here so far, we’ll see who establishes dominance in tempo. It’s great to have Welsh-Ryan buzzing and full. I love conf games because then everyone shows up and today it’s packed. Granted 50-60% of the fans are for the other team, but still it’s get loud for both sides when something good happens.
Northwestern 19, Michigan St 16 9:45 left
John Shurna hits a 3…then gets another basket in transition.
Trading 3s back and forth here.
Chris Allen ties it with a 3 of his own
The back door cuts and lay-ups of the Princeton offense are working here. State just got back-doored like Jennifer Lopez.
Spartans’ Draymond Green answers on the other end. If I ever have a kid, I’m going to name him Draymond
NU up 30-29 with 4 min to go in half.
Kyle Rowley has 2 fouls in not a lot of minutes of playing time.
41-33 State is up at halftime
Izzo must have said something right at that last timeout before the half because the Spartans really turned it on after the break and before the half.
49-41 State, 16:12 left
It appears Kalin has taken well to his “benching” at practice this week. He’s running the floor like a general. And Durrell Summers is leading the team in scoring, which means I have to do the obligatory pun on his name. With 14 pts in the first half, it’s been “Summer, summer, summer time…summertime, time to sit back and unwind, time to sit back and unwind” Enjoy this music video while it’s literally 6 degrees outside
61-43 State now
This one’s getting brutal. Did you hear that? it’s the sound of NU’s dropping out of the rankings. Their conference schedule is brutally front-loaded too. So if they’re going to make the tourney this year, they’ll have to rebound quickly from this difficult beatdown. They look worse now that during the Butler game.
68-52, 8 min to go
Kalin with a nice duck and under, pretty reverse lay-in. Juice Thompson answers with a 3.
76-57, 6 min left
Kalin, Raymar and Durrell all have 17 pts, leading the Spartans. Putting a bow on this one. I’ll be back with postgame presser remarks, observations, quips and like Jerry Springer, my final thoughts.
Back at the Big Ten Media Day, one of the biggest topics discussed was Northwestern finally making the tournament for the first time in program history. Tom Izzo predicted they would. In postgame, he did say that the Cats are a still a good team and that very few teams are going to beat them by 21, the way his Spartans just did.
He also responded to questions about Kalin Lucas being thrown out of practice, and told the Chicago media what he told his local media. That there’s been a lot of attention surrounding his program this week, and that the incident wasn’t really that big a deal. A lot of great players get thrown out of practice at some point in their career, all the legends of MSU lore have at one time or another “So Kalin’s in good company there” Izzo said.
Obviously, Lucas has shown he got the message with his play. Leading all scorers with 21 points tonight. on 8-12 shooting. However, he did have 6 TOs vs just 4 assists.
I asked Izzo about the development of Durrell Summers, and H to the Izzo responded by saying Summers has grown more in the last 2-3 weeks than during his first couple years combined. He said that Summers has been in the gym nonstop these past couple weeks, and compared him to Morris Peterson, in both the good and bad ways.
Stay tuned to The Sports Bank, I’ll be back with exclusives from Durrell Summers, Kalin Lucas, Delvon Roe, and Raymar Morgan. I’ll also have a Tom Izzo Flipshare vid up soon. And by the way did I mention it’s freaking cold out…it’s freaking freezing, even inside.
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