The MSU women’s basketball team’s goal is still to play in the NCAA Tournament.
But another Big Ten loss would secure a losing conference record, therefore the Spartans (15-9 overall, 5-8 Big Ten) must run the table to keep realistic postseason hopes alive. Three conference games remain.
The first is Big Ten powerhouse Penn State (16-9, 8-4), who the Spartans face at 7 p.m. today in State College, Pa.
The Lady Lions are led by guard Kelly Mazzante, the nation’s top scorer with 25.3 points per game.
The 6-foot sophomore was selected Preseason Big Ten Player of the Year by the Big Ten coaches and media.
“We just need to guard her tight,” freshman guard Kristin Haynie said. “Once she gives up the ball, try not to let her get it back.”
Junior guard Vnemina Reese said even though Mazzante scores more than one-third of the team’s points, MSU can’t forget about the other players on the floor.
“We can’t just focus on Kelly,” Reese said. “She is a big factor on the team and she does win games for them, but she does have to have contributing factors to win those games.
“They do have four other players that do easily put points on the board.”
Mazzante is among 20 finalists for the Naismith College Basketball Player of the Year Award.
The Spartans defeated the Lady Lions 66-62 on Jan. 20. In doing so, MSU held the star guard to 3-of-13 shooting from the field and nine points in 37 minutes, her second lowest output of the season.
MSU is coming off a 62-57 defeat of Illinois on Saturday, where it used a 13-0 run late in the second half to pick up the victory and stop a two game skid. Julie Pagel notched a career-high with 25 points, playing most of the game with lower back pains.
On the other hand, Penn State is coming off a 96-81 loss to Iowa on Sunday. The loss snapped the Lady Lions’ five-game winning streak.
MSU head coach Joanne P. McCallie said the key to winning is controlling the pace of the game and time of possession.
“They like to gun the tempo, so we need to work on possession,” McCallie said. “We want to push the tempo too, but that doesn’t mean we want to shoot it.
“We are stressing to our team - possession. That is why we won the Illinois game. We had possession a lot.”
McCallie said this time around, it could come down to which team wants to win more.
“They are a scrappy team, we’re a scrappy team,” she said. “We’ll just have to fight hard and see what happens.”
Reese said the team doesn’t fear Penn State and has no doubt it can upset the Lady Lions again.
“We see that we are the underdog and they have more to lose than us,” Reese said. “And that works to our advantage.”
