Winston finished with eight points and nine assists and Ward with 13 points and eight rebounds. Junior guard Lourawls "Tum Tum" Nairn Jr. was able to find the open man for seven assists with zero turnovers. 

On one of Winston's assists, he took a swing pass, looked onward to his right, but delivered a no-look strike to the opposite post for a layup by sophomore forward Kyle Ahrens. Small subtleties, such as looking off the defenders, found easy baskets for the Spartans.  

Izzo said a big surprise performance was redshirt-senior Matt Van Dyk. Van Dyk, averaging just one shot attempt in his last five games, didn't help with scoring but found ways to extend plays, leading to the team-high nine rebounds. While these numbers don't jump out as important, he was involved in key moments where he was able to accomplish the little details that swung the game open for the Spartans. 

"We put that kid in a tough situation, especially when Kenny (Goins) got in foul trouble and Kyle was struggling a little bit," Izzo said. "I can’t say it was not in my summer, ‘laying at the beach looking at my iPad’ thought process at all. But shazam, it happened."

On one occasion, Van Dyk was able to fight his way next to 7-foot-1 Youngstown State center Jorden Kaufman. Van Dyk found a finger tip able to reach high enough to tap the ball to fifth-year senior Eron Harris — knocking down the jumper. 

"That's not a small play, that's a huge play," Harris said. "Those are winning plays, so we need more of that type of stuff if we're going to win big games."

Van Dyk on a separate occurrence was able to save a defensive rebound from going out of bounds, leading to a break led by Winston and ending in a basket. Van Dyk, on the other hand, found himself falling into the pompons of the MSU Dance Team. 

"With MVD (Van Dyk), he's a guy that doesn't make a lot of mistakes, so when he comes into the game he knows the scouting report, he knows what to do, so that is going to be big time for us," Nairn said. 

However, the Spartans still have a lot of room to grow, Izzo said. Sophomore guard Matt McQuaid found himself wide open after a shot fake sent his defender right by him. Instead of pulling the three, McQuaid passed it over to Nairn for the late in the shot clock three, which he missed. He freed himself with the fake, electing to have Narin, a career 30 percent 3-point shooter, versus himself, a 38 percent 3-point shooter, and put the Spartans in an odd situation. 

Another poor performance by redshirt-sophomore Kenny Goins left him with two points before he fouled out. His final foul had him pulling on a trailing Youngstown State guard around his screen. 

While 8-25 from the 3-point line and 1-6 from the free throw both don't scream blowout, MSU was able to do enough of the little things that made the game look out of hand.