Strong Second Half Start Leads MSU to Senior Night Win vs. Rutgers
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EAST LANSING, Mich. --- Michigan State's seniors were able to complete their time at the Breslin Center on a high note.
A strong start to the second half propelled the eighth-ranked Spartans to a 91-87 victory over Rutgers on Senior Night on Thursday, with MSU surviving a frantic push by RU at the very end. Regardless, it's Michigan State's fifth consecutive victory, bringing the team to 25-5 overall and 15-4 during Big Ten play. It is also the program's 14th straight win on Senior Night.
It ended up being a junior leading the way for Michigan State. Coen Carr had a team-high 21 points to go with six rebounds, including a stretch where he dunked on three straight possessions that really brought the home crowd to its feet. Jeremy Fears Jr. also had 21 points with eight assists.
The win also seals up a top-4 seed within the conference and a triple-bye in the Big Ten Tournament nThe regular season finale is set to be a doozy. MSU is traveling down to Ann Arbor next to face No. 3 Michigan on Sunday (4:30 p.m. ET, CBS).
Game Recap
First Half
The first 20 minutes of basketball was the type of hoops that might cause Tom Izzo a couple missed hours of sleep. MSU seemingly turned the ball over again and again, often quite preventably. Izzo's team ended up giving it away 10 times during the first half after only turning it over nine times at Indiana and six times at Purdue.
Rutgers ended up holding the lead for more than 13 minutes in the first half, though the Scarlet Knights' lead never got above four, including at 28-24 with less than 2:30 to go in the first half. Michigan State was able to finish the first half strong, though, going on a 7-2 run to complete the half to still enter the break with a 31-30 lead.
RU didn't take many threes in that first half, but its shooting was a reason it was able to hang around and have some leads. Four of its seven attempts at the break had gone down, with two makes coming from Tariq Francis. He led all scorers with 10 points at the break.
Both teams generally had balanced scoring attacks during that first half, though. Five different players scored for the Spartans, while seven Rutgers players got onto the scoring column through 20 minutes.
Second Half
Michigan State looked much sharper coming out of the locker room, to say the least. The Spartans quickly went on a 7-0 run to start the second half, forcing Rutgers head coach Steve Pikiell to burn a timeout just 1:40 in. That put the home squad up eight and gave some of the fans, who were a tiny bit restless in the first half, some room to breathe.
Not long after, a dunk contest broke out for a bit. Coen Carr had three dunks in three possessions, bringing the Breslin crowd into an uproar. MSU got a stop after that third dunk, and Rutgers seemed so focused on keeping Carr away from the rim that Jordan Scott ended up driving the baseline for a fourth dunk in four possessions. That put Michigan State up 11 less than five minutes into the half, forcing RU to burn its second-to-last timeout as well.
MSU kept taking it to Rutgers as the half continued, ballooning the lead up to 15 by the under-12 timeout, where it had outscored the Scarlet Knights 27-13 to that point since the break. Shots were falling for the Spartans and every rebound seemed to go their way. It looked much more like the Michigan State team that had just gone out and won back-to-back road games at Purdue and IU.
There was an "uh oh" moment, though. Fears got called for his third foul with 10:56 to go after bumping a Rutgers player driving to the basket. He certainly disagreed with it, but ended up picking up a technical foul by pointing at the replay on the jumbotron, which suddenly put him with four fouls for the game. He had to sub out, but Denham Wojcik gave some positive couple of minutes to keep the Spartans' lead in the double digits by keeping the MSU offense humming.
When Rutgers couldn't make any progress with Fears off and Wojcik on, it felt like cruise control from that point onward (that ended up being too much so). Michigan State's lead continued to hover in the high teens, but then RU went on a 6-0 run to cut the lead to 12 with 3:37 left. That caused Izzo to call a timeout, perhaps because he wanted to be up by enough to get all the seniors into the ballgame.
MSU was able to settle things down, but Rutgers didn't go away quietly and let the Spartans get to their tradition of letting the seniors kiss the logo that easily. Izzo put out his senior-laden lineup to prepare for that, but RU hit three three-pointers in a row to draw within seven with 42.8 seconds left. Izzo then put the starting lineup back in to finish the job, but they then allowed it to become a four-point game with 20.8 seconds remaining. Then it was a two-point game with 2.9 seconds left. Fears made two free throws, finally exhausting Rutgers' hopes.
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A 2025 graduate from Michigan State University, Cotsonika brings a wealth of experience covering the Spartans from Rivals and On3 to his role as Michigan State Spartans Beat Writer on SI. At Michigan State, he was also a member of the world-renowned Spartan marching band for two seasons.
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