Do Not Hit 'Panic' Just Yet on Michigan State Basketball
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Michigan State is in a rut right now — no other way to put it.
The Spartans — still 19-4 overall and 9-3 Big Ten play, by the way — have lost back-to-back games. Frankly, they’re extremely lucky the streak is not three, given how they played at Rutgers. Tenth-ranked MSU was the lesser team on the court last Friday against now-No. 2 Michigan, and it was the lesser team on Wednesday against unranked Minnesota.
There is not much time for Michigan State to turn it around. MSU’s path only gets harder from here. It’s got No. 5 Illinois on Saturday (8 p.m. ET, FOX), with the Fighting Illini entering on a 12-game win streak and first in the Big Ten. The Spartans’ remaining Big Ten hopes rest on this game.
Yes, things seem bleak. No one is sitting around and pretending the team’s play has been satisfactory over the last week and a half. But Michigan State has been in positions like this before.
The February Lull
For some reason, the first week of February continues to just give Tom Izzo and his team nothing but trouble. Maybe it’s Izzo’s Jan. 30 birthday. Either way, MSU has now taken at least one loss between Feb. 1-7 in eight consecutive seasons. Across this specific stretch, the Spartans are 4-11.
Last year’s team went 0-2 during the first seven days of February. Michigan State entered February 2025 at 18-2 overall and a perfect 9-0 during Big Ten play. It then proceeded to lose to both USC (Feb. 1) and UCLA (Feb. 4), both unranked teams, on the road to open the month.
Obviously, that team ended up doing just fine. It even struggled during the second week of February, needing a big comeback against Oregon and then losing to unranked Indiana at home. MSU ended the regular season with seven straight wins, all in Quad 1 games, to take a Big Ten title.
No, this is not the same team. Winning seven straight Q1 contests is, well, extremely difficult and not very replicable. The top tier of the Big Ten seems to be better than last year, too. Regardless, that experience is still something the Spartans can draw upon.
“We had a few more guards that did things [last season], but we did have a similar kind of bump,” Izzo said after the Minnesota loss. “Could have lost four in a row, really, because we could’ve lost to Oregon. I think Illinois — some people think it’s the best team in the league. I mean, Michigan and Illinois are definitely the two best right now. But some people right now think Illinois is the best team in the league.
“So, the road’s not going to get any easier. But, I don’t know. There’s got to be a gut check with a couple guys. They’ve got to play harder. They’ve got to play better.”
The (Potential) Rebound
Some of Izzo’s better teams in recent memory have bounced back from these types of stretches. The 2019-20 team, led by Cassius Winston, lost three of four to open February, but then won five straight to share a conference title.
Just a year before that, MSU lost three straight in late January and early February. That team won 14 of its next 15 games to share a B1G title again and also reach the Final Four.
Back in 2009-10, Michigan State lost three straight to open February. MSU still won a share of the Big Ten crown that year and reached the Final Four. Yes, these stretches stink to experience for fans, but the Spartans of the past have proven that they are anything but the end of the team’s evolution or the team’s season.
It’s also true, though, that the past only gets one so far. Circumstances are always a little different, and the injury to Divine Ugochukwu that Izzo says “doesn’t look good” doesn’t help. A big reason MSU rose last season was the unleashing of Jase Richardson. There’s simply not a Jase Richardson on this year’s roster.
Responsibility here has to fall to Michigan State’s “Core Four” of Jeremy Fears Jr., Coen Carr, Jaxon Kohler, and Carson Cooper. All of them saw what went down last year, after all. Players like Kur Teng and Jesse McCulloch, who were also on the team, also need to have a role here.
Really, though, the bulk of the responsibility has to fall on Fears. The drama around his play lately certainly hasn’t helped, but Fears is still the heart of this team. MSU will go as far as Fears takes it, just as was the case with Winston and many of the point guards of the past.
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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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