Spartans Take The Bark Out of the Bulldogs with 70-63 NCAA Win!

Spartans Take The Bark Out of the Bulldogs with 70-63 NCAA Win! Time Life Warner Arena Charlotte, NC Michigan State has not made winning easy this year, but

Spartans Take The Bark Out of the Bulldogs with 70-63 NCAA Win!

Time Life Warner Arena

Charlotte, NC

Michigan State has not made winning easy this year, but they keep on doing it. Today they added a 70-63 victory over Georgia from the SEC to improve their season record to 24-11. Denzel Valentine led the way with 16 points while Travis Trice added 15 and Branden Dawson dropped 14.

Spartan head coach Tom Izzo used his usual U.P. charm to sum the win up, “My father told me nothing would be easy, and we kind of live on that, to be honest with you. I thought we played about three, four different games today. I thought Georgia came out and really played well early and did everything they do. What they do, we swear we weren't going to let them get to the line 25 times and we didn't, they got there 26. We've been a team that has been assists, we had 18. We did some of the things we do, they did some of the things they do. Very good rebounding team, I loved the way they rebounded and I thought they never quit. We made a couple of mistakes again, but for the most part if you added up the minutes we played well, there would be a lot of them. As they say, it's win and advance, that's what we're going to do and move forward.”

The Spartans again had the free throw line become their Achilles heel. They shot a lowly 57% from the charity stripe going 11-19. Valentine was a perfect 6-6, but the rest of the team faltered. The Spartans had a very low nine turnovers and that was their saving grace. MSU had 22 points off the bench.

Valentine said of his perfect performance from the line, “I just knew that I didn't play my best second half so I didn't want to let the team down. If we had a loss or something like that, I didn't want to say it's because of me. So I just went to the line like I'm going to make up for it and I just knocked them down.”

Branden Dawson got into foul trouble early, sitting for 14 of the 20 minutes in the first half. If you are a person who likes to look for silver linings on a bad day here it is. Earlier this season this team would have imploded. Not now. They have grown up and when Dawson went to the bench the Spartans coming off of it performed admirably.

Valentine said of that improvement on this squad, “We're going to give credit to Marvin and Colby, they played big minutes for us, they came in and were ready to play early in the season. We wouldn't know what we would get but those guys have stepped up big time, not just this game but in the Big Ten tournament and a couple games late in the season, they stepped up their play, so those guys came in and played good.”

Trice added about his team maturity when a star struggles that, “I honestly feel more confident now with our guys coming off the bench and some of our other guys, just the way they're playing right now, the energy and the focus they're doing has been great for us.”

Even Izzo couldn’t help, but praise his team growing up and not letting one player having an off night doom them. “It was phenomenal. We just had no choice. Colby is a doctor, he's in medical school so smart as they come and you really could -- he really understands things. And Marv is a guy that I think has grown as much as anybody. He was a kid that didn't play until he got to high school so he's behind in some ways. He's improving, he's listening. His roommate is Tum Tum and Javon. It might not sound like it, but I'm so excited that we're moving on because not only do you worry about the first game more than any game, but the first game against what I knew was a solid team -- I would rather play a team that's got crazy athletes and not as solid than I would that's kind of like us, that's solid, they can grind it, they can run a little bit, and I will say that a healthy Gaines I think might have made that game a little different, too. But we've had some injuries all year, we'll take it. I'm excited where we're going and looking forward to the challenge ahead of us on whichever team wins.”

Perhaps the biggest head scratcher was Matt Costello. He played a man’s game on defense and setting picks and working the boards. Although what he did well made a major impact, on the scoring stat line you see one of eight shooting with two points, but you do see seven boards.

When asked to explain how Costello can play so well, but struggle in scoring even Izzo admitted to being perplexed. Why is that coach? “This is where you wish you were a politician, don't you, so you could be politically correct? Hell, no, I can't figure it out myself. I think he's having trouble figuring it out, too. He did some good things, he guarded pretty well, he blocked some shots. He got six, seven rebounds, but I don't know, I don't know. You know, I think I'll blame it on one of my assistants, that's what we do at this level. Blame it on somebody, sure as hell isn't going to be the head coach and you can't blame a player so one of my assistants is in big trouble when we get back.”

So for now the Spartans move on to face Virginia on Sunday who beat Belmont here tonight 79-67. That time is not set as of the publishing of this article. They played last year in the Sweet Sixteen at Madison Square Garden where the Spartan won 61-59.