Michigan State basketball<\/a> had their second of two exhibition games Sunday afternoon, a thriller that saw MSU battle some common mistakes, eventually leading to a loss. <\/span><\/p>\nThe No. 4-ranked Spartans came out extremely flat, allowing the No. 9 Volunteers to open a 17-1 lead on Sunday afternoon. After clawing its way back, Michigan State would find itself tied 88-88 with 3.9 seconds left. A bad foul gave Tennessee a free throw opportunity with 1.9 seconds remaining, allowing Tennessee to secure the one-point victory. <\/span><\/p>\nEven though it was just an exhibition game, one in which all proceeds went to supporting the Maui Wildfire Fund, this game had the feel of an important one. From the electricity in the air from the fans, to the comeback effort on the court, this was a mid-season dogfight. <\/span><\/p>\nSo, let\u2019s go over the good, great, bad, and ugly from the one point loss in East Lansing.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\nGood: Coen Carr<\/b><\/h3>\n
The secret is out about Coen Carr. The entire nation should be on alert. If given the chance, Coen Carr will try and end your career by putting you on a poster. Opposing defenders should heed the warning and make a business decision when Carr is coming through the lane. In both games this season thus far, Carr has electrified the crowd with elite athletic plays, either blocks or dunks. He is confident in his drives, unlike most other freshmen. <\/span><\/p>\nBut what\u2019s even more promising is Coen led the Spartans with a plus-minus of +22, meaning when Carr was on the court, the Spartans outscored Tennessee by 22 points. To have a freshman make that sort of impact, while also engaging the fans is an incredible weapon. Carr would finish the afternoon with nine points, four rebounds, one block, and one steal. He is quickly becoming the biggest X-factor of the three freshmen.<\/span><\/p>\nGreat: Full-court pressure<\/b><\/h3>\n
Michigan State finished the day with 17 turnovers, 11 of which coming in the first half. The only saving grace was that, partly because of the effective full-court press, Tennessee also coughed the ball up at an alarming rate. The Volunteers would finish with 20 turnovers when it was all said and done. <\/span><\/p>\nTennessee had an advantage with size at the guard position, so Michigan State countered by applying pressure from full court, and it worked right out of the gate. Tennessee surrendered seven turnovers within the first nine minutes. By not allowing Tennessee to walk into the half-court, Michigan State forced them to make shots outside of their set plays. <\/span><\/p>\nUnfortunately for MSU, Tennessee did just that, and could not miss to start the game. But, the success and effectiveness of the full court press was a great sign to see nonetheless.<\/span><\/p>\nBad: Free throws (again)<\/b><\/h3>\n
It’s concerning that for the first two games, free throw shooting has made an appearance in the b<\/em><\/span>ad <\/span><\/em>category. Last week, it was AJ Hoggard and Carson Cooper who struggled from the line, and, while this week wasn\u2019t so much an individual or two, the team as a whole still struggled. Michigan State shot an embarrassing 62 percent from the free throw line in the first half. That absolutely cannot happen, especially when you are struggling with your half-court offense, as they were to start the game. When your sets aren\u2019t working and your shots aren\u2019t falling, free throws keep you in the game and can ignite a comeback. This was not the case for MSU in the first half. <\/span><\/p>\nMichigan State basketball would eventually start to hit their free throws in the second half, shooting 80 percent (16-for-20), but the damage from missed opportunities in the first half was already done. In a game where you lose by one, leaving 10 points out there (26-for-36) becomes even worse. <\/span><\/p>\nUgly: Slow, sluggish start<\/b><\/h3>\n
Stop me if you’ve heard this before, Michigan State basketball got off to an extremely slow start on Sunday. As noted already, MSU did a great job applying pressure from the jump against Tennessee. This forced them to hit their shots from outside. And Tennessee did just that. Even though just two Volunteers essentially carried them, Dalton Knecht had 28 and Jordan Gainey had 20, the pair could not miss. Add this to the Spartan’s lackluster, careless offense to start the game, and Michigan State found themselves down incredibly bad just five minutes into the exhibition. <\/span><\/p>\nTurnovers, ineffectual offensive sets, and missed shots spelled a terrible, slow, sluggish start for MSU. <\/span><\/p>\nEven though they showed incredible poise to fight their way back, they made it extremely difficult on themselves. Their start forced an 18-point comeback midway through the first. Slow starts have plagued MSU for years now, and it was a trend I was hoping would not carry over into this new, promising season. <\/span><\/p>\nIt\u2019s just one game so we will give the Spartans a break. But, starting as they did Sunday afternoon will not get MSU to where they want to be this year.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"What did the Spartans do well?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":8310,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[187],"tags":[291,59,190,189,504],"class_list":["post-8294","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","tag-coen-carr","tag-featured","tag-michigan-state-basketball","tag-michigan-state-spartans","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8294","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8294"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8294\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8310"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8294"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8294"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spartanshadows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8294"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}