“They took away the three and we couldn’t get into any sets. Tom Izzo and the job he does with the program is great. That’s probably the toughest defensive team I’ve played against in my career.”

Morgan said he and his teammates used a “six eyes” defensive style, which MSU coach Tom Izzo said he stole from the Detroit Pistons when they played Michael Jordan.

It features one defender on the player, with two others eyeing him from other parts of the floor.

“It’s a little bit of a take off the old Jordan rules,” Izzo said.

“He gets the ball and the Pistons did such a good job of putting a guy on him. It was just another thing we stole from somebody. We have used it for 3 to 4 years on good scorers who are also prolific penetrators.”

The Spartans also held Temple to 38 percent shooting from the field and 26 percent from beyond the 3-point arc.

Wounded Spartan

Junior forward Marquise Gray, one of the Spartans’ keys if he plays well, was in the game for only one minute and tallied one rebound and a personal foul.

After the game, Izzo said Gray has been battling a toe injury for the last three days that hampered him from playing 100 percent.

“We didn’t even know if Marquise could go today,” Izzo said. “He has a bad sprained toe and didn’t practice (Wednesday).”

Izzo said they were going to see if Gray could be helpful on the offensive glass and when they saw he was hurting, they kept him off the floor.

“I don’t think it’s broken,” Izzo said, “but it’s badly sprained. Hopefully we can get him some rest and get him back.”

Elevating their game

Both the MSU and Temple players agreed the elevation in Denver and the early tipoff took some getting used to, but didn’t affect the final outcome.

“We practiced early yesterday and I think the altitude affected us more than the time,” senior center Drew Naymick said.

“I was pretty tired the first four or five minutes, and we had a long stretch without a dead ball. But once I got my second wind, I felt great.”