It’s been more than two weeks since MSU’s last game, and head coach Suzy Merchant said her team is excited to get back on the floor and face live competition.

“I (feel) like we have a good pep in our step, and we’re waiting for our opportunity,” she said. “That’s what you play so hard for, to have an opportunity in March.”

The opportunity comes against a relatively unfamiliar opponent in Louisville, whose head coach Jeff Walz was an assistant coach at Ball State when Merchant was also in the Mid-American Conference as the head coach of Eastern Michigan.

Both Walz and Merchant took over their current positions five years ago and have experienced substantial success in the NCAA Tournament, with Louisville reaching the program’s first Final Four in 2009.

Guard Becky Burke is the lone Cardinal left from the historic team and said she has told her teammates to respect MSU, with the Spartans as one of just 10 teams to win at least one game in each of the past three NCAA Tournaments.

“I think we have to take (MSU) very seriously and put together a great game plan because they’re obviously a very good team to be in the NCAA Tournament in the first place,” she said in an interview with CardsTV. “I feel very confident in our staff, that they’re going to have us ready to play.”

MSU and Louisville have nearly identical team statistics in a number of categories, but the Spartans are the hotter team of late, winning eight of the last 10 games, compared to Louisville’s 5-5 record during that span.

The Spartans usually have a standard group of male students they practice against, but since they were away on spring break, MSU had to scrimmage against itself.

Senior guard Taylor Alton said it’s helped her team make big strides defensively.

“It’s been a steady increase of competitiveness,” she said. “We’re going at it battling, fighting constantly, and it’s kind of fun to see people not take it anymore and push back.”

Merchant said the Big Ten Tournament allowed her team the opportunity to get more players in her rotation minutes and give the team critical experience in a pressurized, must-win environment.

“Everybody found out what it was like to win but have the pressure of survive and advance,” she said. “To feel the disappointment of not playing well, and a few players in particular not playing well in that Purdue game, and that it cost us. That feeling of your gut hurts. You’ve got tears in your eyes, and … if you don’t want that to happen in this next round, what are you willing to do?”