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Michigan State Basketball: Final report card for 2019 Maui Invitational

By Connor Muldowney

LAHAINA, HI - NOVEMBER 26: Aaron Henry #11 of the Michigan State Spartans shoots over Anthony Edwards #5 of the Georgia Bulldogs during the first half at the Lahaina Civic Center on November 26, 2019 in Lahaina, Hawaii. (Photo by Darryl Oumi/Getty Images)
LAHAINA, HI - NOVEMBER 26: Aaron Henry #11 of the Michigan State Spartans shoots over Anthony Edwards #5 of the Georgia Bulldogs during the first half at the Lahaina Civic Center on November 26, 2019 in Lahaina, Hawaii. (Photo by Darryl Oumi/Getty Images) /
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Although Michigan State basketball didn’t win the Maui Invitational title, the Spartans still finished strong. Who earned the highest grade this week?

It wasn’t the outcome Michigan State was expecting, especially with no matchup with Kansas in the championship game, but the Spartans still left Maui with a winning record and victories over Georgia (Anthony Edwards) and UCLA.

Fifth place sounds bad because, well, it was far short of expectations after an opening round loss to Virginia Tech. The Hokies were hitting 3-pointer after 3-pointer and that downed the Spartans who just couldn’t pull off the comeback late in the second half. If this team is going to make a deep run in March, it needs to be more consistent on both ends.

We saw more consistency in the first half against Georgia and second half of the UCLA game. If only we could have combined those two games into one — Michigan State would have won a game by about 40 in that case. Georgia’s Anthony Edwards went off in the second half against MSU with 33 points and the Spartans started slow against UCLA but got hot late.

Overall, Maui wasn’t exactly a success, but it was just good enough to leave a decent taste in fans’ mouths.

Cassius Winston had a great tournament, as did Aaron Henry, but a guy like Xavier Tillman struggled mightily and may just need to get back home to figure things out.

Which Spartans received the highest grades this week?

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