The No. 11 MSU women's basketball team will head back on the road Sunday to take on the Indiana Hoosiers at 2 p.m. in Assembly Hall.
The Spartans (17-3 overall, 6-2 Big Ten) lost their last road game at Penn State on Sunday and will look to regain some confidence on the road against an Indiana (8-9, 1-6) team that is still looking for its second conference win.
"I have challenged this team all year long to get better and improve with each game," MSU head coach Joanne P. McCallie said. "I can't be satisfied with a performance ever because that is when the team loses focus. I will continue to challenge this team the rest of the year."
The Spartans have won their last four games against Indiana. The last meeting was the final regular season game for the Spartans last year, and they won it in overtime of 60-51.
The Hoosiers, led by guard Cyndi Valentin, who is averaging 16.1 points per game, and center Angela Hawkins, their leading rebounder, who is pulling down 7.3 per game.
This game marks the first of three games that the Spartans play against unranked teams before heading out to Minneapolis to face No. 10 Minnesota. The Spartans can use these next three games to try and work out the kinks that have slowed them in their previous big road games.
"Last Sunday's game against Penn State gave us a lot to look at and learn from," McCallie said. "There are a lot of great games left, and we don't view any game differently from the rest.
"We have to play tough regardless of who we are playing."
The Spartans are led on offense by junior guard Lindsay Bowen, who is averaging 15 points per game, and junior forward Liz Shimek, who is averaging 9.2 rebounds per game.
Shimek is coming off her seventh double-double of the year against Purdue, a team that the Spartans handled at home.
"We played a great all-around game (Wednesday night)," senior guard Kristin Haynie said after the Purdue game. "We didn't let up on defense, and our offense was shooting great all night."
Haynie scored her 1,000th point of her career against Purdue, making her the third Spartan to reach that feat this year. It does not seem that Haynie will be the last one to reach that mark this year, either; as Shimek closes in on the total, it looks more and more like she also will reach it later in the year.
MSU showed no ill effects from Sunday's loss at Penn State and are posed to use it as a learning experience.
"The loss to Penn State hit us hard last week," Haynie said. "It is the worst loss I have experienced in my career here, and it is something that none of us want to go through again. We know that we have to be well-prepared after practice and come out and play hard for 40 minutes, regardless of the opponent."
The Spartans are in fourth place in the Big Ten, at the midway point of the conference season, and need to continue winning if they hope to make a run at a conference championship.
"We will now head down and face a very tough, scrappy team in Indiana," McCallie said. "We don't look at any team differently, and Indiana is no exception."
