Unlikely Michigan State basketball player gave inspiring halftime speech vs. Michigan

An unlikely Michigan State basketball player gave an inspiring halftime speech to lead the Spartans past Michigan.

A lot went wrong for Michigan State basketball in the first half of its 81-62 win over Michigan on Tuesday. Sure, the Spartans only trailed by two at the break, but it felt much worse than that. Michigan was lights-out shooting the ball and MSU left a lot to be desired.

Something needed to change fast during halftime if the Spartans wanted to win this game. However, it was a very unlikely Spartan that stepped up giving an inspiring speech to this team before coming out for the second half.

Davis Smith inspires team during halftime

Of all the people who could’ve stepped up in the halftime locker room to motivate the team, it was senior Davis Smith who did so. Smith is not a regular player for MSU, typically only playing in the last few minutes of blowout games. However, it was him who spoke up and got his team riled up heading into the second half.

AJ Hoggard and Malik Hall spoke about this moment after the game, saying “I don’t think I’ve ever seen Davis like that…He came in, spoke, stepped up to the plate and told us what we needed to do.”

What does this tell us about MSU’s culture?

Davis has only appeared in eight games this season, only scoring in three of them. He also hasn’t played more than five minutes in a game this year, showing he isn’t a regular contributor on the court for this team. But he undoubtedly is a major contributor off the court.

How often do you hear practice players being the guy to step up vocally during a big game like this? I honestly can’t say I ever have. This tells me that the culture and respect in East Lansing is something that not many other programs have. For Davis to feel confident enough to speak up in the heat of the moment is very telling. But for the stars of this team to respect him enough to listen and give him credit publicly is even more telling.

The culture at Michigan State is special under Tom Izzo, we all know this. This is just another example proving that even further. Davis has made a lifelong fan out of me now and I know I’ll be cheering extra hard for him to score next time he gets in the game.