When the men's basketball team faces Michigan State University tonight in the 2K Sports Classic benefiting Coaches vs. Cancer Classic at 7 p.m. in East Lansing, Mich., what looks like a rather large mismatch on paper might very well turn out to be one. Head Coach Craig Robinson, however, said he is hoping he might emerge from his head coaching debut with his first victory.
The Michigan State men's basketball team is just two years removed from a trip to the Final Four of the NCAA tournament. Last season the Spartans won 22 games and were bounced from the Big Dance by eventual Final Four participant George Mason University.
The Bears last participated in the NCAA tournament 20 years ago, when the team made its first and only appearance. Last year the team finished with the fifth-best record in the Ivy League at 6-8 and was 10-17 overall.
"I feel like if we can just not get killed on the boards and not turn the ball over, then we have a chance," Robinson said. "I like what I'm seeing in practice so far. You have to remember that putting in a new offense is like having 13 freshmen. ... All you can ask is for them to play hard and tough and we'll see what happens."
Playing with some emotion should not be much of a problem for the Bears. Two members of the team, forward Scott Friske '09 and guard Damon Huffman '08, are returning to their home state to play a collegiate game for the first time.
Friske was an All-State selection at Charlevoix High School and is the fifth-leading scorer in the history of Michigan high school basketball. Huffman is so revered in his hometown of Petoskey, on the northern tip of the state, that he is listed among the famous people born there.
"It's going to be a nice trip for those guys," Robinson said. "I just hope that they are not overwhelmed by the magnitude of this game and that they do what they are capable of doing, because for us to win, both of them have to play well."
Since the school year started, the Bears have been working overtime in order to prepare for this season. Robinson was hired in late June and, due to NCAA regulations, did not have an opportunity to thoroughly work out his new team until September.
With almost the entire squad back from a team that went 4-3 down the stretch in the Ancient Eight last spring, Robinson does have some talent in place to work with. Second team All-Ivy performer Keenan Jeppesen '08 is back and should be the go-to scorer that the Bears lacked in the first half of last season. Jeppesen, a 6-foot 7-inch swingman, averaged 16.1 points per game in Ivy play last year, the second-highest average in the league.
Down low, Friske will team with 6-foot 9-inch forward Mark MacDonald '08 to give the Bears a presence on the glass. Those two were second and third - behind Jeppesen - in rebounding on the team last year.
Huffman was the Bears' second leading scorer in 2005-06, but he must improve on last season's 29.3 shooting percentage from behind the arc. Point guard and co-captain Marcus Becker '07 will team with Huffman in the backcourt.
Experience is the one category in which Brown might hold an edge over Michigan State tonight. The Bears have nine players on the roster who have seen significant playing time at the collegiate level. The Spartans had three players selected in June's NBA draft and return just 22.4 percent of their scoring from last season.
One thing the Spartans do return, however, is a strong backcourt. Sophomore Travis Walton and junior Drew Neitzel were voted co-captains by their teammates and will have to carry much of the load in the early portion of the season. Walton led the Big Ten Conference in assists in league play and is the first sophomore captain since Mateen Cleaves in 1997-98. Neitzel is the team's highest returning scorer.
"Drew Neitzel ran the offense there last season and I'm sure he's going to be a focal point this season," Robinson said. "I know they have a couple of recruits who should be able to step right in too."
Even without players like Maurice Ager and Shannon Brown, Michigan State is still one of the top teams in the country in terms of talent. Any team coached by Tom Izzo, an Associated Press Coach of the Year award winner who has taken the Spartans to four Final Fours, is going to be chock full of talent, whether it be upperclassmen or underclassmen.
Robinson spent the past six seasons observing Izzo's ability to recruit firsthand as an assistant at Big Ten rival Northwestern University. Michigan State has beaten the Wildcats seven straight times dating back to 2002, but Northwestern was almost always playing a Spartan squad that had more than half a season's worth of games under its belt. Robinson is hoping that catching MSU in the opener might be the key to pulling off the upset.
"Its more so the timing than the personnel because you know that even though they graduated some players, Coach Izzo is going to restock the cupboard," he said. "To play them early in the season is obviously better then getting them later in the year. But even if they had to reload the whole team they would still be head and shoulders over us in terms of talent."
Whatever the outcome, Robinson is simply happy to have his first campaign underway.
"We are very excited and it's going to be a fun game on a lot of levels," he said.
