The Spartan Nation Basketball Weekly

  Poise Will Triumph Over Panic To borrow an idea from Mark Dantonio, the Spartans are a 19-6 basketball team, not a 6-19 basketball team. They stand

 

 

Poise Will Triumph Over Panic

To borrow an idea from Mark Dantonio, the Spartans are a 19-6 basketball team, not a 6-19 basketball team. They stand tied for a share of first place in the Big Ten at 9-3, with all their major goals still out there to play for. Yet, after three straight Conference defeats, they have let the Big Ten back into a race that only a ten days ago looked like it might soon be put to bed.

The concern around Spartan Nation today isn’t MSU’s position in the standings, it’s how they’re playing and what they must do to be at their best during the stretch run. Spartan Nation caught up with Tom Izzo earlier this week, before the belly flop against Purdue, to find out where the Spartans need to go from here. 

“We’ve been inconsistent with our lineup, as everybody knows,” Izzo began. “We’ve gotta get Kalin back, that’s the obvious one.” But what’s not so obvious is how much Lucas has an impact on the Spartans back end play. “Everybody looks at his Offense, looks at his penetration, and his speed on the break, but believe it or not, it’s his Defense (the Spartans have really missed).” 

Aside from the obvious of getting the returning Big Ten Player of the Year back and healthy, Izzo wants to get a rotation ironed out on the Spartans front line. “We need to get some consistency with our bigs…we’ve been moving people around quite a bit,” Izzo admitted. And as evidenced again Tuesday night, So. Delvon Roe must adjust to play with enough control to avoid early foul trouble. “As I told my staff (Sunday), we’re game planning for (our) bigs, and yet we’re not playing them as many minutes,” Izzo concluded. “So we’ve got to start game planning for who’s going to be in there the most, and that seems to be a smaller lineup more often than not.”

Aside from getting the line up straight, the Spartans must get their mental game back on track. As battle tested as this bunch is, they’re still a College Basketball team of young men. Fortunately for the Spartan Nation, they have been tripped up in recent years, knocked down, and nearly knocked out (think UNC). But each time, they’ve rebounded to come back even stronger. There’s currently no apparent reason to think they can’t do it again down the stretch in 2010. They’ve just gotta be Michigan St., and do what Michigan St. Basketball does from late February through the end of March: focus, play together, and believe.

Are Too Many 3s Being Jacked, and not Enough Balls Being Jumped?

The Men’s game took a positive step a couple years ago by bumping the 3-point line back a smidge, but it’s not enough. Besides looking ridiculous on the court (because it’s so close to the old/women’s line), the new 3-point distance hasn’t done enough to separate the true “shooters” of the game from the Beileinesque 3-jackers across the country who are not intimidated by the 3-point distance to consider developing more of a balanced offensive game. This week, Spartan Nation asked the Dean of Big Ten Coaches, and his number one nemesis Bo Ryan, what they thought of the current position of the 3-point arc.  

“Having coached internationally, and dealing with the International line, it doesn’t make that big a difference with shooters,” Ryan contends. “Shooters can shoot with the line at either place, so I think that the line is fine where it is right now.” Apparently Ryan believes the game is stocked with great shooters. Tom Izzo did not completely agree. 

“I think it’s not good when coaches are talking about shooting 34% or 30% from the “3” is equivalent to 50% from the “2,” Izzo told Spartan Nation. “It gives you more reason to take them.” Izzo would prefer the line be moved back, possibly to the International distance, to decrease the again growing tendency to rely on the 3-point shot. 

The increasing 3-point emphasis might someday take more away from College Basketball than it adds. But Ryan says fans should rest assured the issue will be monitored. “What they’ll do is, after a few years of playing with the line where it is, they’ll start looking at numbers, and then maybe they’ll talk about doing some things.” 

Another “rules” issue in the College game today is the possession arrow. Led by Dick Vitale, some have championed an effort to bring back the Jump Ball, which was once considered a basic fundamental of the game. Yet again, Izzo and Ryan sit on opposite sides of the fence.

“I would love to see it come back…why shouldn’t an Official be able to throw the ball up,” Izzo said. “It comes down to, are we getting the proper tosses.” Izzo believes the Possession Arrow is now affecting strategy, and possibly even the competitive integrity of the game. “The tactic can be to get trapped in the corner and hold on to it because a Jump Ball is going to be your possession anyway.” 

When asked if the Jump Ball should be brought back, Ran quickly responded, “absolutely not.” “I lived through the era as a Player, and as a Coach,” Ryan explained. “That’s a tough thing to do (toss a Jump Ball) with the size of the bodies, no matter who’s in the jump…it can be very unequal on the toss, so I think that the possession arrow is a good thing.”

The College game would be better off, but perhaps not quite as competitive if the 3-point line were moved back to the International distance, and if the Jump Ball were reinstated into the game. More importantly though, the College game would be better.

The "Play in" Solution to Tournament Expansion

A lot of talk has surfaced in recent weeks about expanding the NCAA tournament. Of course, this talk coincides with what is likely the inevitable shift of the NCAA Basketball broadcasting rights to the Four Letter Empire that is ESPN. The NCAA can opt out of its broadcasting contract with CBS after the 2010 tournament, and it’s going to be extremely difficult for CBS or any other traditional “free” network to compete with the $ubscription fee $upported ESPN.

I think the answer to tournament expansion is already a part of today’s tournament: the play in game. Currently, there’s only one play in game (64 vs. 65) that takes place early in the first week of the dance. Why not first expand the field by 7, for a total of 72, and have as many as two “play in” games per region. A total of 8 “play ins” could be accommodated by the vast resources and channels (ESPNU, ESPN, ESPN2, etc.) of the ESPN brand. Two play in games could be played over the course of two days, in the primetime viewing hours, and essentially start the madness a few days earlier. 

The idea of Tournament expansion isn’t horrible, but the idea of adding another calendar week to the Big Dance probably is. Realistically, the NCAA will probably chase the largest dollar amount available. But perhaps the best solution to the problem of “bubble teams” and “automatic bids” lies in the expansion of the “play in game.” Time will tell if that’s too obvious a solution for the genius leadership of the NCAA to see.

Enough Already…We Are the Spartans, Sparty is a Mascot

Is anyone else completely sick of so called sports journalists and broadcasters referring to MSU teams as “Sparty?” I know Sparty is one of the most recognizable and popular mascots in the nation (especially with young kids), but do they know the athletic teams at MSU carry the nickname of “Spartans”?

The Four Letter Network (ESPN) clearly deserves the most blame for this disturbing trend. The Four Letter essentially sets the media dialogue of the sports world, which can be really good or really bad. It’s really good if you’re the NBA, and benefit from a disproportionate amount of hype for its league relative to the actual fan interest. It’s really bad if you’re MSU and you consistently have ESPN’s top people, including some like Rece Davis who worked in Michigan and covered MSU, referring to the Spartans almost exclusively as Sparty. Does anyone go around calling the Buckeyes “Brutus,” or the Gophers “Goldy”?

I love Sparty. It’s probably the best mascot in the Big Ten, and one of the top dozen in the nation. But it is not the Michigan St. Sparty, or Spartys, it’s the Michigan St. Spartans. Hopefully someone in the Athletic Department will lob a call to the lazy monopolizers in Bristol (ESPN HQ) to request their announcers’ stop hacking away with poor journalism and lazy coverage. Any other media outlet that either can’t tell the difference between a mascot and a nickname, or simply won’t extend MSU that level or respect, deserves the same kind of correction.

Jon Schopp is a senior columnist for Spartan Nation and you can read his columns every Thursday. In his "Spare" time he also is a well respected attorney. He also likes puppies, clowns and fish sticks