The Sweet 16 is upon us and in less than 48 hours, we'll all be planted in front of our TVs for about five straight hours, consuming all the basketball we can, and that includes Michigan State vs UConn on Friday.
The Spartans are the 3-seed in one of the toughest regions that I can remember that featured Duke, UConn, Kansas, St. John's, UCLA, and Louisville, but Michigan State is one of the four teams left.
Michigan State has also been playing pretty well so far, winning its first game by 25 points and then controlling the entire 40-minute battle with Louisville. Neither end result was really ever in doubt. Other teams like Duke, St. John's, UConn, Iowa, Nebraska, Texas, and Arkansas can't say they've had a stress-free run to the Sweet 16. They've all had their scares, but they're still in the field, some more shockingly than others.
Michigan State has been one of the better performers of the Sweet 16 teams, but one former college basketball coach disagrees. Actually, he apprently thinks the Spartans have no momentum.
Avery Johnson shared a re-ranking of the Sweet 16 on CBS Sports and the team that he believes is the worst in the field is coached by a Hall of Famer and beat teams like Arkansas, Kentucky, North Carolina, Illinois, and Purdue this season while going back-and-forth with Michigan and Duke.
The former Alabama head coach before Nate Oats took over pretty much said that there are no bad teams in the Sweet 16 because anyone can beat anyone, but Michigan State is No. 16 out of 16 even after an "impressive" win over Louisville. Oh, Jeremy Fears is playing well and Coen Carr is a great athlete, per Johnson.
This feels like he hasn't watched a single minute of Michigan State basketball all year.
Michigan State disrespect is always so obvious
I'm not sure what the reason for Johnson's ranking of Michigan State as the worst team left in the field, but I'm going to just assume it's because he hasn't watched the Spartans all year and he was tuned into other games in the first two rounds.
It's the only reason I can think of why he'd have an Iowa team that Michigan State has already beaten, a Nebraska team that Michigan State has been playing better than of late, an Illinois team that the Spartans beat, a 6-seed, his former school, a First Four team, a Purdue team that Tom Izzo beat, and an Arkansas team that he also beat ahead of the Hall of Famer's team.
Just more disrespect that we can all laugh at somewhere down the line. Even if Michigan State loses to UConn or in the Elite Eight, this ranking is egregious.