Penn State + Michigan Preview.

After a big win on Saturday against Illinois, the Spartans will get right back into conference play with a game tomorrow, Wednesday night at Penn State. Coverage for this game will be on the Big Ten Network starting at 6. Penn State has struggled this season under new head coach Mike Rhoades. It can be very difficult to take over at a new school with how the transfer portal is with NIL now. Rhoades and Penn State sit at 12-12 while the team had just 1 returning player from last year which is still not bad for the circumstances. Although it has not been the season Penn State fans would have liked so far, they are 3-1 in their last 4 and playing their best ball of the season. The Nittany Lions are led by Point Guard Ace Baldwin. Baldwin transferred to Penn State this year to play with Mike Rhoades, his coach from VCU. Ace is an elite floor general and runs the Penn State offense with great control. Baldwin is 2nd on the Nittany Lions in points per game but his specialty is his passing as he is 2nd in the Big 10 in assists per game. The Nittany Lions leading scorer is Baldwin’s backcourt partner, Kanye Clary a great shooter. This is a game the Spartans can’t afford to play around in. This is a must win game and they’ve got to start fast. I believe MSU has an advantage at about every position in this game outside of the center position. This is a position MSU has not been able to get much production out of this year. The Spartans guards, Hoggard and Walker are much bigger than the starting backcourt for the Nittany Lions. I want to see AJ get aggressive like he was in the 2nd half vs Illinois on Saturday. Hoggard has 3 inches and 25 pounds on Ace Baldwin and I expect Izzo to emphasize that to him because sometimes Hoggard just needs a little extra coaching. This is also a homecoming game for Hoggard as he’s from Pennsylvania and will have lots of family there. I definitely expect this game to be much closer than the first matchup in East Lansing that the Spartans won by 31 points. The Spartans held Baldwin to 2 points on 0-7 shooting so I expect him to be aggressive in this one because he’s a very competitive player. Michigan State enters this game tomorrow as a 2.5 point favorite, so obviously Vegas is expecting a close game. I am not so sure I agree with Vegas so I am taking the Spartans by double digits as my prediction. I think we start to see why this team was ranked #4 in the preseason poll.

The Spartans will have another road game on Saturday night when they travel down the road to Ann Arbor to take on their rival, the Michigan Wolverines. The Wolverines are coached by former Wolverine player Juwan Howard. The expectations were not very high for Michigan going into the season yet they are still underperforming. I am going to assume that they are not going to come back down 20 to beat #14 Illinois on the road as I write this, so Michigan is 8-17 coming into this matchup Saturday. The wolverines lost All-American Center Hunter Dickinson in the transfer portal this offseason and the ripple affect has hurt them tremendously. Along with losing Dickinson, the Wolverine fanbase believed they had landed top transfer portal PG, Caleb Love from UNC. This was until he was denied by the schools admissions and he later on chose to go to The University of Arizona. Oh yeah and the Wolverines best player this year Dug McDaniel is only allowed to play in home games due to an academic issue. McDaniel was not present in the Spartans dominant victory over Michigan earlier in the season. Due to the disappoint season the Wolverines are having, I am expecting a large amount of Spartan fans to make the short 1 hour-ish drive to Ann Arbor. I am already see lots of talk on Twitter. Making it look like a home game at our rival would be something else! This game just like the game against Penn State tomorrow is a must win. If the Spartans drop games to the 2 worst teams in the conference then their work will be cut out for them the rest of the season. I say this because the only team left on the Spartans schedule that is higher in NET ranking than them is Purdue. And if you know about College Basketball, you know winning at Purdue is almost impossible right now. Michigan State needs to focus on themselves in this game and I think they’ll be just fine. In past years, the Spartans have struggled playing at Michigan due to the environment but that shouldn’t be a problem. The Wolverines take some of the worst shots I’ve ever seen and it starts with McDaniel. Although McDaniel is their leading scorer, he is what I would call a “shot chucker”. Spartans Senior Forward, Malik Hall will have his hands full guarding Oliver Nkamhoua who transferred from Tennessee and averages just under 15 points per game. The Spartans have been shooting the ball great recently, starting with Jaden Akins who is shooting .500 from 3 in his last 4 games. Maybe this is a game where Izzo can test some lineups and get Freshman 5 star Xavier Booker some more minutes like fans have been asking. I do actually think that this will be a somewhat close game. For some reason it seems like every time MSU plays at Michigan the Wolverines hit every shot. The line for the game is not out yet but I would guess the Spartans will be about a 5 point favorite. I will stick with my Penn State prediction and say Sparty by double digits. Coverage for the game is on FOX starting at 7:30 with their pregame show. GO GREEN!