Bloomington, Ind. - Old demons continue to haunt MSU.
Nearly everything went wrong as the No. 10 Spartans missed an uncanny amount of free throws, lost a six-point lead in the final three minutes of regulation and fell to Indiana in overtime, 78-74, at Assembly Hall.
"The interesting thing about this team, for the most part, is that we've won as a team," MSU head coach Tom Izzo said. "(Sunday) we really, truly lost as a team."
Izzo was quick to dismiss the notion, however, that another tough loss will hurt his team.
"We just made some mistakes," Izzo said. "I'm not worried about that. I'm not worried about this team. We lost a game. It does happen."
Indiana guard Bracey Wright was on fire from the get go, scoring 17 of the Hooisers' first 23 points, including three 3-point field goals to put Indiana (14-11 overall, 9-5 Big Ten) out in front, 23-15, within the first 10 minutes of the game.
"We got off to a great, great, great start: our best of the year," Indiana head coach Mike Davis said.
MSU (20-5, 11-3) was able to go on an 11-0 run to tie the game at 28, but a 3-pointer by Indiana guard Marshall Strickland gave the Hoosiers a 31-28 lead at the half.
The second half was back and forth, with Indiana opening its lead. But MSU was able to battle back seven minutes into the half when senior guard Kelvin Torbert dove for a loose ball at half court and found senior swingman Alan Anderson for a breakaway slam that gave MSU a 41-40 lead and forced Indiana's Davis to call a timeout.
With no timeouts remaining, the Spartans later extended their lead to six points, 64-58, on junior guard Maurice Ager's 3-pointer with 2:43 to play. From there, MSU's lead slowly went away.
A bucket by Strickland and two free throws from Wright cut MSU's lead to two with 1:30 to play, which led to possibly the most critical play of the game.
With the ball and less than a minute to play, MSU was attempting to run out the clock, but senior guard Chris Hill ran into Indiana forward Pat Ewing Jr. and lost the ball out of bounds, leaving Indiana with a chance to tie the game.
Davis called it a "big-time defensive play."
Hill, on the other hand, didn't see much defense in it at all.
"I was trying to draw a foul coming off, and I kind of got knocked off balance and it hit my foot and went out of bounds," Hill said.
MSU had 18 turnovers in the game.
Indiana took full advantage of the gift when forward D.J. White hit a fadeaway basket to tie the game at 64 with 17 seconds to play.
MSU called a timeout to diagram a play, but it did not work as planned when Torbert missed a jumper from the corner as time expired, sending the game into overtime.
Both MSU junior center Paul Davis and White entered the extra session with four fouls, but it was only Davis who picked up his fifth off the ball with 3:24 left. He finished with 12 points. This forced Izzo to go to a small lineup that featured the 6-foot-6 Anderson as the biggest player on the court for the Spartans.
MSU remained within three until Wright struck again, banking in a long three with 42 seconds to play that put the nail in the Spartans coffin.
"We called that bank shot," Davis said with a smile.
Unlike the first half, when the Hooisers struggled from the charity stripe, Indiana was able to hit all of its free throws to seal the deal as the fans rushed the floor after the game.
"We just didn't match their intensity," Anderson said. "I have no reason why we didn't."
MSU now looks to face Northwestern at 8 p.m. Wednesday at Welsh-Ryan Arena in Evanston, Ill.
