Michigan State Basketball: Joey Hauser a game-changing transfer for Spartans

Michigan State basketball landed a game-changing transfer on Tuesday afternoon in Joey Hauser, a former top-60 target in his recruiting days.

The wait is finally over. After weeks of speculation and package deals and potential splits, the Hauser brothers have announced their transfer destinations.

Early on, the talk was Wisconsin for both, but after all the visits took place, it looked more likely that a split would actually happen, meaning Joey Hauser would be headed to Michigan State while older brother Sam was Virginia-bound.

https://twitter.com/jjhouz24/status/1133463644258357249

This isn’t just a big move for the Spartans in the short-term (he should be eligible in 2020), it’s huge for 2-3 years down the line when guys like Xavier Tillman and Cassius Winston are gone.

Hauser could become a leader on the team and not only help shape the younger guys when he’s finally eligible, but before that when he’s on scout team. Instead of teaming up with his brother yet again, he looked out for his best interests and chose Michigan State.

Tom Izzo has to be ecstatic, too. He recruited Joey, a top-60 recruit in the 2017 class, hard out of high school before he picked Marquette and he got a second chance to land him and didn’t miss. This is one of the biggest transfer gets for Izzo in recent memory, rivaling that of Bryn Forbes — Eron Harris and Brandon Wood were big, too.

Following his redshirt freshman season, Hauser was named to the Big East All-Freshman Team, averaging nearly 10 points and five rebounds per game. He can shoot it from anywhere on the floor and that ability to stretch the defense will provide another scoring threat in 2020-21.

Michigan State struck gold here by landing Hauser and protecting the scholarship limit. The Spartans didn’t have to push someone out by landing both and got the best-case scenario which will allow them to recruit top targets in the 2020 class still. Izzo is hungry for that second title.