Following its own advice - defense wins championships - MSU blanketed Iowa defensively en route to a 94-70 victory.
MSU head coach Tom Izzo has criticized the No. 5 Spartans’ defense of late, but said the team made significant improvement against the No. 25 Hawkeyes (17-8 overall, 6-6 Big Ten) on Sunday.
“When it comes down to making a run in the tournament you’ve got to be able to defend and rebound,” he said. “I didn’t think we rebounded quite as good but we did get better defensively. We’re making some steps defensively.”
The Spartans (20-3, 9-3) held Iowa to 33 percent shooting while forcing 19 turnovers.
MSU was out-rebounded 40-36, which marked the first time since March 25, 2000 against Iowa State that MSU was out-rebounded.
Senior forward Andre Hutson said the Hawkeyes are a great rebounding team and they deserve a lot of credit.
“They were the better team tonight at that,” he said. “It’s kind of hard to swallow.”
Boasting the nation’s leading rebounder in forward Reggie Evans, the battle of the glass was stressed by both teams. However, the Spartans’ defense made Evans, who averages 15.5 points and 12 rebounds per game, a non-factor.
“We watched a lot of film and a lot of his points were right under the basket or in the lane,” Hutson said. “Tonight the defense just did a good job keeping him out of the lane.”
Evans finished the game with two points, nine rebounds and eight turnovers in 22 minutes of play. He was obviously frustrated at not being able to post up low, air-balling a short jumper from the baseline early.
Evans was limited to just 10 minutes in the first half as he picked up three offensive fouls against the swarming MSU defense.
“That’s the benefit of watching a lot of film,” Hutson said. “You get to learn a player’s tendencies. We saw that he was a very aggressive player and he likes to bully his way through players to get to the basket.”
Hutson finished the game with 17 points and six rebounds.
The Spartans’ defense also recorded a season-high 13 steals.
Sophomore guard Jason Richardson lead the team with a career-high seven steals. He finished with a game-high 21 points.
“The coaches wanted me to go in there and dig in the post,” he said. “Every time I turned around it just seemed like the ball was right there in front of my face.”
MSU scored 24 points off Iowa turnovers, many of which resulted in fast break opportunities. On the flip side, Iowa’s fast break was nonexistent.
“I thought we did a very good job stopping the break and stopping (guard Dean) Oliver,” Izzo said. “I think (guard) Charlie (Bell) deserves a ton of credit, so does (guard) Marcus (Taylor) on their job on Oliver.”
Oliver finished the game as Iowa’s leading scorer with 14 points, but made only three of 14 shots away from the foul line.
Richardson said the sign hanging in MSU’s locker room reading “Championships are one decision away - Sacrifice” says it best.
“It means a lot to us,” he said. “We’ve got to sacrifice things to win championships. We’ve got to put everything on hold besides basketball.”
