MSU Escapes Penn State, 76-72

Well, that one did not go quite the way I had expected it to. The big story before the game started was that Divine Ugochukwu would be starting at the shooting guard position. I ran the survey this past week of who would get the nod there, and I made the mistake of leaving Ugo out of it. Maybe Ugo reads TOC and had a chip on his shoulder today, because the big story during the game was his play. The sophomore transfer had a career-high 21 points. He shot 8-10 on his FGs including a perfect 5-5 from 3, and he also helped out with a rebound, an assist, and three steals. Prior to today, he had one game with 16 (East Carolina down in Ft. Myers) but had not scored more than 6 in any other game.

Let’s take it a step further and say that without Ugo’s career day, MSU very well may have lost today’s game. The Spartans started both halves strongly, taking a 17-8 lead in the first half and then getting a 15-2 run to open the second half and erase a three-point halftime deficit. But in both halves, Michigan State then gave up big runs to Penn State to fall behind. In the 2nd, after jumping out to a 51-41 lead, Penn State scored the next 11 points (in less than 2 minutes) to take the lead back with 12 and a half to play.

From that point on, it was a lot of trading punches as the lead went back and forth. The margin never went above 4 points either way. With 3:27 remaining and MSU down a point, Divine hit the fourth of his triples on the day to put MSU up 69-67, a lead they would finally hold on to. A lot of that had to do with the Nittany Lions missing their shots, however, as they had three separate chances to regain the lead. Down the stretch, Ugo added his fifth and final three-pointer, while he and Fears hit some FTs to get MSU to the finish line. The final score of 76-72 is worrying. It is the first time MSU gave up 70 points this season (the TV broadcast let us know they were one of two teams in the nation to not do that yet this year – now Marist is the only one left), and this was far from the best offensive team we have gone up against.

Beyond the defensive performance that probably has the team catching an earful from Coach Izzo as I type this, the offense (aside from Ugochukwu) also left a ton of points on the board. Here is the missed layup count from this game: Coen Carr – 1; Jaxon Kohler – 1; Divine Ugochukwu – 1; Cam Ward – 1; Jesse McCulloch – 1; Jeremy Fears – 2; Carson Cooper – 5. A dozen missed layups. And this was not Duke forcing us into contested shots late in the clock. Many of these, especially Cooper’s, were either going up to strong or not strong enough. Not a lot of touch from our bigs today. Absolutely needs to be cleaned up. This team should not expect 20-point performances from Ugo every game. Sometimes we need to win on the inside.

Speaking of the inside, PSU won that matchup today. The final box score has PSU winning points in the paint 34-24. They also won fast break points 12-4. MSU did edge them in offensive rebounds 11-9 to get more 2nd chance points, but just a narrow 13-10 advantage there. Based on everything I have seen from MSU this year, I was expecting us to dominate these categories today.

Going back to the conversation about the lineup, though it did surprise me that Ugo was put into the starting lineup, I obviously cannot be mad at it based on how it went today. The one negative it did have, which Izzo will have to fix, is the PG rotation. In both halves, we saw both Fears and Ugo get subbed out together and Denham Wojcik inserted with either Kur Teng or Jordan Scott. While I have had my moments of admiration for Denham’s game – he is very calm with the ball in his hands and even has some handles getting past defenders – I don’t think he should be the backup PG. Fears’ and Ugo’s breaks need to get staggered if they are going to start together so at least one of them is on the court at all times. Not like there is a shortage of guys that can play on the wing.

While MSU got the win, I am not providing my usual “3 Likes” in this article. I have too much to discuss on the negative side. Another area that is becoming a growing concern for me is Jeremy Fears’ shooting. He went 2-5 today, which isn’t awful, but it did feature 2 more missed bunnies. Fortunately, he did make two from down low today to end his missed FG streak that went back to the Iowa game. His 9 assists is great, but he needs to be able to finish his own shots more regularly to keep defenses honest. And last thing, Coen Carr can’t be held to 3 points on 4 FG attempts. He is the guy on this team that can mentally deflate the opponents more than anyone else. We need to be using that weapon more frequently.

That’s all I have to say. The database that SB Nation uses had not uploaded pictures from this game yet so that is why the cover picture is an old one. What were your thoughts on the game?