Michigan State Basketball: Report card for comfortable win over Maryland

Michigan State basketball picked up another quality win but who received the highest grade in our report card? Maryland didn’t stand a chance.

Defense has been the name of the game over the past couple of weeks for Michigan State and that remained true on Monday night against No. 13 Maryland.

From start to finish, Michigan State dominated on that end of the floor, making life difficult on the Terrapins on a night when the offense wasn’t playing its best. It stepped up to block nine shots and steal nine passes, forcing 12 Maryland turnovers en route to a 69-55 win.

You could only assume defense earned the highest grade from Monday’s win, right?

Let’s take a look at the grades from Michigan State’s big win.

Rebounding: B

This was an area of the Spartans’ game that looked like it could use some improvement on Monday night. The Spartans were surrendering far too many offensive rebounds and that seems like a theme over the past couple of weeks.

Maryland finished with 14 offensive rebounds to the Spartans’ 13 and nearly matched Michigan State on the glass with 38 boards to 40. The Spartans usually have much more comfortable margins in terms of rebounding, but the Terps were aggressive all game long, thanks to Bruno Fernando which put pressure on the typical run-and-gun team.

Michigan State still found a way to have an effect in the fast-break, but it wasn’t quite up to par with how well its been all season.

Improve on the glass, keep the opponent off the offensive boards and the rest will take care of itself.

Kenny Goins led the way with 12 rebounds while Aaron Henry had six and Nick Ward finished with just five. Not the best game for everyone on the boards.