The Spartans and Fighting Illini had a war that included everything except swords and shining armor Sunday afternoon.
And after losing the first-half battle and trailing 40-34, the MSU men's basketball team used a late surge and a controversial shot by sophomore forward Alan Anderson as a spark plug for the second half.
The result: a heart-pounding and exhilarating 68-65 Spartan win in front of a packed Breslin Center. It was MSU's first win of the season when trailing at halftime.
"The start was incredible - very good on their part and very poor on our part," MSU head coach Tom Izzo said. "But I think the crowd really yielded us this win. I think it was a case of two evenly-matched teams fighting it out and the home team winning."
Freshman center Paul Davis had arguably his best game as a Spartan, scoring 15 points and picking up eight rebounds. With senior forwards Aloysius Anagonye and Adam Ballinger in foul trouble down the stretch, Davis found himself guarding Illinois forward Brian Cook, a player Izzo calls the Big Ten's best.
But Davis didn't melt under the pressure, he reveled in it. Cook, who leads the Big Ten with 21.1 points per game, scored nine points in the first half, however foul trouble forced him to spend extra minutes on the bench. He only scored four second-half points.
But it wasn't the second half that put the Spartans (12-8 overall, 4-4 Big Ten) in comeback mode. It was the first half, where the Spartans dug themselves a trench against No. 13 Illinois (15-4, 5-3) soon after tipoff.
Izzo saw a red flag and called a timeout just 4:50 into the game. His team had already committed five turnovers and found themselves trailing 15-2.
Slowly, the Spartans relaxed, brought the lead to single digits and kept the see-saw battle in single digits. MSU trailed by as many as 14 in the first half.
With MSU trailing 40-31 and three seconds showing on the clock, Anderson drove up the floor trying to drain a last second prayer. He succeeded but not without controversy.
His shot, which seemed to go off after the buzzer sounded, swung the momentum. And after the game's final whistle, it proved to be the difference.
"He said it was so close," Illinois head coach Bill Self said of Big Ten official Tim Higgins. "But he called it good."
The momentum's carry-over wasn't evident in the opening minutes of the second half as neither team recorded a bucket over the first three and a half minutes. But after an Anderson jumper, a three-point play by sophomore forward Kelvin Torbert and a triple from the top of the key by Ballinger, the score was knotted at 42.
Ballinger's triple capped an 18-4 Spartan run and had the crowd smelling comeback.
"We caught some breaks and the crowd got really loud after that," Ballinger said. "Once KT got the and-one, we could feel it."
MSU took its first lead at 45-44 with 14:28 left in the game, but sloppy play similar to that of the first half kept the game close until the final buzzer.
Trailing 62-61, Ballinger upfaked from the top of the key and drove to the hole. He sunk a layup, but one official overturned the call, turning a possible three-point play into an offensive foul - Ballinger's fifth.
The Spartans defense turned up the volume, holding the Illini without a basket for more than three minutes, while scoring four points.
MSU would never relinquish the lead and despite a last-second triple try, Torbert celebrated the win by heaving the ball into the Breslin rafters as the buzzer sounded.
"It was a great game to make a statement in," Davis said. "To beat two top-20 teams in one week is great.
"To come back from that sloppy first half and the way we played much better in the second half says a lot about this team."
