EAST LANSING — The grind before the real grind is almost over for Michigan State basketball.
And Tom Izzo’s team, off to its best start in eight years, is eager for a break. Even if he knows the hard work they put in during their holiday break will pay off with long-term gifts come March.
After 11 games in 44 days to open the season, winning all but one, the ninth-ranked Spartans will play two opponents in the next 16 days before returning to Big Ten action. The first comes Saturday, Dec. 20, when MSU faces Oakland in Detroit at Little Caesars Arena (noon, Big Ten Network).
The Spartans (10-1) then will disperse for Christmas before returning to host Cornell on Dec. 29 (7 p.m., FS1) in their final nonconference game.
When 2026 arrives, MSU hits the road again for surging Nebraska on Jan. 2 to resume Big Ten play the rest of the way.
“We’re prepping for games beyond this. … Big games ahead of us, conference play,” senior Jaxon Kohler said after Tuesday’s 92-69 win over Toledo. “Those are the games that we’re preparing for, and we have to use these games to kind of prep and work on the stuff we’re not as good at.”
The Spartans raced out to a 30-point lead by the break against the Rockets before turnovers and mistakes began to multiply after halftime. Izzo told his players after the game they hadn’t learned from a similar second-half swoon Nov. 13 vs. San Jose State, even though they earned high-level victories over Kentucky and North Carolina, and got a pair of wins to begin Big Ten play.
It is MSU’s best start since opening 15-1 during the 2017-18 campaign. This year’s team, however, struggled in its first true road game Saturday at Penn State, a 76-72 escape. That was followed by the quick turnaround to Tuesday’s slight slide in the second half.
Kohler said the onus is on himself and the other three captains to ensure the Spartans don’t have those late lapses moving forward.
Junior Coen Carr, one of those co-captains, said it was clear MSU did not have “the same pop we had in the first half” against Toledo and “can’t have these second-half dropoffs, especially coming into Big Ten play later.” Yet Carr felt the Spartans’ season thus far has been one in which they’ve shown both resiliency and ability to play through their problems.
“There was a couple games we could’ve laid down in the second half and lost those games, but we fought back,” he said. “Especially Penn State, it was rough, it was tough. I feel like that wasn’t one of our best games at all, top to bottom, and we just found a way to win.
“Just having that ability to find a way to win is something that’s gonna be very important for us going down to the late part of the season.”
Izzo won’t buy into any excuses that his players are fatigued mentally or physically. He expected to have his players put in multiple workouts a day before Saturday’s game against Oakland, which MSU is 23-0 against all-time, and to continue improving their deficiencies, before the 18 remaining Big Ten games start in January.
“This is the time of year where you normally get a lot better,” Izzo said. “But the problem is, as we all know, you don’t have as much time as you used to because we’ve got a game in a couple days and then we’re off for a week. Then you come back, and then once the Big Ten starts now, it’s just constant.
“If they’re tired, you know what? Maybe I’ll give them Christmas off.”
Contact Chris Solari: csolari@freepress.com. Follow him @chrissolari.
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This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: MSU off to best start in 8 years: ‘Maybe I’ll give them Christmas off’
Reporting by Chris Solari, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
