Never before in Michigan State basketball history have the Spartans begun a season 20-2. That mark could be hit on Friday if the Spartans are able to take care of Rutgers on Tuesday and then protect home court against the No. 3 Michigan Wolverines this weekend.
If Michigan State wins its next two games, it will officially be off to its best start in program history, and a win over Rutgers would tie this team for its best start ever at 19-2.
Carlton Valentine, the father of Denzel and Drew who played for Jud Heathcote in the 1980s, went as far as saying that this is one of the best basketball teams that he’s ever seen. Not only are the Spartans really good this year and probably better than last year’s team, but they’re historically good, in the context of the Michigan State basketball program.
Unfortunately, this is one of the worst years to be historically good.
The rest of college basketball’s top 10 is making history, too
While Michigan State is busy making program history, the rest of the top 10 is off to a historic start to the season, too.
In fact, the top 10 teams in the country 13 weeks into the season have a combined 13 losses. That might sound crazy because, well, it is. The next-lowest number of losses by top-10 teams this far into the season is 21, and that happened in 2018-19, so it’s been a while.
13 total losses from the AP Top 10 heading into Week 13 is absolutely unprecedented
— Nick Bateman (CBB guru) (@nickbateman33) January 27, 2026
Just 2 years ago the Top 10 in late January had 34 total losses
The next lowest total over the past decade was 2018-19 with 21 total losses
The top brass of CBB is HISTORICALLY dominant rn pic.twitter.com/Op1Fe2BU3l
Not only is Michigan State excelling, but teams like Arizona and Nebraska are off to historic starts. UConn, Michigan, Duke, and Gonzaga all only have one loss each as well. There are six teams in the top 10 that have 0-1 losses. That’s just insane.
This might just be a bad year to be elite because so many other teams are elite, too.
Many of us believe that Tom Izzo will find a way to make a deep run in the NCAA Tournament this season, but it’s not going to be easy to beat the Arizonas, Nebraskas, Michigans, Dukes, or UConns of college basketball who are all off to incredible starts and who could all win national titles.
I don’t remember the last time there were 10-plus legitimate national titles contenders this late in the year, but college basketball is absolutely loaded at the top this season.