Final Numbers of MSU's Fears' Historic Passing Season

Let's break down the final numbers of Fears' massive season at point guard.

Michigan State guard Jeremy Fears Jr. (1) signals teammates before a play against Louisville during the second half of NCAA Tournament Second Round at KeyBank Center in Buffalo on Saturday, March 21, 2026. | Junfu Han / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

It's not hyperbole to say that we just saw one of the best seasons ever for a Michigan State point guard.

There have been plenty of great point guards to represent the Spartans, and Jeremy Fears Jr. is now comfortably on the list. What's even better is that he has two more seasons of eligibility remaining.

Michigan State's Jeremy Fears Jr. hunches over during a game against Michigan at the Breslin Center on Friday, Jan. 30, 2026. | Starr Portice, Michigan State Spartans on SI

Fears is as elite a passer as anyone who has played college basketball in some time. The statistics that we'll explore in this article are extremely prolific. He has also gotten much better as a scorer, jumping from 7.2 points per game as a redshirt freshman to 15.2 points per game as a redshirt sophomore.

Still, Fears' skills as a distributor are what made him a second or third-team All-American. Here are some of the stats that best show how good a passer he has become:

328 Total Assists

Michigan State's Jeremy Fears Jr. drives to the basket against North Dakota State during the first round of the NCAA Tournament at the KeyBank Center on Thursday, March 19, 2026. | Starr Portice, Michigan State Spartans on SI

Nobody has had more assists in a season in Michigan State history than Fears. He somewhat comfortably shattered the previous single-season record set by Cassius Winston in 2018-19, when he had 291 assists that season. Fears officially passed Winston during the team's Big Ten Tournament loss to UCLA.

What contributed to the pace towards the record was Fears' consistency. He had 15 games of at least 10 assists this season, but what kept him up there was how high the floor was. Fears had at least five assists in every single game this season. Only 64 players in Division I basketball, including Fears, just averaged 5.0 assists per game.

9.4 Assists Per Game

Michigan State's Jeremy Fears Jr. jogs out to the court after being introduced as a starter against Northwestern at the Breslin Center on Thursday, Jan. 8, 2026. | Starr Portice, Michigan State Spartans on SI

That many assists divided by the 35 games the Spartans and Fears played comes out to 9.4 assists per game. No one in college basketball averages more. Only Braden Smith of Purdue dished out more total assists than Fears, netting 345, but the Boilermakers played four more games than Michigan State. That settled Smith shy of Fears on a per-game basis at 8.8.

This is also comfortably an MSU record, and it's not even close. The gap is by an entire assist per game, with Magic Johnson's national title-winning 1978-79 campaign being second at 8.4 assists per game.

53.1% Assist Rate

(L to R) Michigan State basketball player Jeremy Fears Jr. and teammate Carson Cooper laugh while talking about their head coach Tom Izzo during a press conference at Capital One Arena in Washington DC on Thursday, March 26, 2026. The Spartans play the University of Connecticut on Friday evening in the 2026 NCAA Men's Basketball East Regional. | Eric Seals / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

One last stat that shows just how important Fears was is his assist rate of 53.1%, according to KenPom. College Basketball Reference has it at 53.0%. That stat simply measures how many of your teammates' baskets come from your own assists while you're on the court.

Being above 50% in that stat is, simply, absurd. Since CBB Reference began tracking it in 2009-10, Fears this season had the highest assist rate out of anyone and was just the fourth player to have a season above 50%. KenPom has tracked it since 2003-04, with Fears this season ranking third among everybody, only behind Jose Juan Barea of Northeastern in '05-06 (54.2%) and Travis Diener of Marquette in '04-05 (53.3%).

Michigan State Spartans guard Jeremy Fears Jr. yells to the crowd during a game at the Breslin Center against the Iowa Hawkeyes on Tuesday, Dec. 2, 2025. | Starr Portice, Michigan State Spartans on SI