For the second time in Big Ten play at home, Michigan State basketball trounced a team by 30-plus points.
Back in December, Michigan State beat a really solid Nebraska team by 37 and on Thursday night for the Izzone Alumni game, the Spartans dominated a 10-5 Washington team by 34. So through the first four Big Ten games of the season, Michigan State's average win margin is 24 points. That's actually unheard of when you talk about conference play.
The Spartans will now go on the road to face a pesky Northwestern team that never seems to roll over for Michigan State on Sunday afternoon.
Before we dive into that, let's talk takeaways from Thursday's beatdown.
1. Three-point shooting is still shaky, at best
I'm going to kick these takeaways off with the only negative thing I had to say about Thursday night's win and it was about the 3-point shooting.
The Spartans were 7-for-21 from deep against Washington and while both Jaden Akins and Tre Holloman hit a couple of threes, the rest of the team struggled. Those two combined to shoot 4-for-9 from deep while the rest of the team was 3-for-12. Not great.
And when you consider just how many open threes were missed, it becomes infuriating. The Spartans won by 34 so it ultimately doesn't matter, but this could've very easily been a 40-plus point win if this team hit its open threes. That won't matter in these blowouts, but against teams like Michigan and Illinois, it will absolutely matter.