Michigan State Basketball: What you need to know for Iowa matchup

Michigan State basketball has Iowa coming into town as it looks to continuing growing its momentum into March. Here is what you need to know.

Michigan State is coming off of a momentum-building win on the road against Nebraska. They will need to clean up some things and have a more complete showing against the Iowa Hawkeyes on Tuesday.

In the game against Nebraska, a big question being asked was: who is going to step up to be that third scorer the Spartans can turn to? Gabe Brown, Aaron Henry and Kyle Ahrens all competed to take that position and all had a solid game. One of them will need to step up and continue playing the way they did against a bigger and tougher matchup against the Hawkeyes.

The team is looking to get back to what it means to be a Spartan, which would include a fast-paced, knock-em-out style play in which they’re tougher and stronger on the boards. If they can do this against Iowa, they’ll be hard to beat.

Cassius Winston and the other guards will have a difficult matchup when they have defend Joe Wieskamp who is averaging 14 points and six rebounds. He is a capable shooter who is struggling from deep in his last few games but it does not take much to find your rhythm and get comfortable to knock them down. The Spartan guards will have to be up on him tight so this does not happen.

Next, the big men for Michigan State will have their toughest matchup of the season. They will need to try to slow down the beast Iowa has in Luka Garza who is averaging nearly a double-double with 24 points and 9.6 rebounds. The Spartans will have their hands full with this one.

Using their center of gravity and getting their body into the midsection of Garza is what needs to happen early on in the game to let him know someone will always be there. Throwing a couple of double-teams on him to get him thrown off and out of rhythm would also help the Spartans early.

If the Spartans can limit one of these two players then their chances of winning increase immensely. If they cannot stop these two guys it will be a long day for the Spartans.

Next, the Spartans will look to continue that ball movement they had during the Nebraska game. They were moving the ball a lot and getting nice open looks for Brown to fire from deep. This will also need to happen for these Spartans to contend with Iowa.

Michigan State will also need to limit its turnovers. They are only averaging 12.9 turnovers which is slightly down from previous years. However, against Nebraska, the Spartans had 22. This simply cannot happen if they hope to pick up this signature win against the Iowa and keep rolling into March.