A rusty first half was salvaged by a high-energy second half with much more offensive efficiency for Michigan State basketball en route to an 80-69 win over Colgate.
The Raiders weren’t exactly pushovers like Tom Izzo sometimes opens the season against, making four out of the past five NCAA Tournaments, but they had a disappointing 2024-25 season, going just 14-19 and missing the Big Dance. They still gave Michigan State a heck of a fight on Monday night.
Michigan State played much better in the second half and closed out on a nice note, but it wasn’t before some sloppy defense and poor switching.
Here’s what I noticed about the Spartans on Monday night.
1. Free throws are an issue
Through two exhibition games, Michigan State struggled from the free throw line, and that continued on Monday night as the Spartans shot just 24-of-37 from the line
Against better teams, missing 13 free throws is going to be the difference between winning and losing. This must be addressed moving forward, and knowing Tom Izzo, the Spartans will probably be shooting free throws all week.
2. Jeremy Fears Jr. needs to play 30-plus minutes
When Jeremy Fears Jr. is on the floor, the offense moves smoothly and the defense is much more effective. When he’s not on the floor, the offense kind of falls apart and the defense isn’t quite as stingy. He’s the straw that stirs the team’s drink, and it’s clear that he needs to be on the court more often than not.
You never want to wear players down, but he likely needs to play 30-plus minutes per game.
3. The defense looked lost on switches
Switching is a normal part of defense, and Michigan State was doing a little too much of that and it ended up getting a lot of guys lost on switches. It was a lot of bigs switching onto guards and not switching back quickly enough, leading to open threes.
That led to a lot of open shots and it was the reason Michigan State was only up three points at halftime. The switching was a lot better in the second, but the defense was overall disappointing.
At least the rebounding was dominant.